Caruggi — Restaurant in Victoria

My partner and I dined at Caruggi Friday 26th June and I made the booking on line and stated it was a birthday celebration. We arrived on time at 6:15pm and were ushered to our seats. No sooner had we sat down we were informed that we must vacate our table at 8pm due to another booking. As we sat down another person came for our order (we hadn’t been given time to view the menu properly or get comfortable)! After a few minutes we gave our order for our entrée and main. The entree was brought out and my partner and I started to eat and chat as normal, when half way through it  the main course was presented! We hadn’t even finished our entrée! This meant that the table was very cluttered and the server and us had to juggle plates and wine glasses around to make room. We continued to finish our entrée whilst our main course sat there going cold! Then we decided to leave the entrée for later and eat our main meal. The server then came over and tried to remove our entrée without asking if we’d finished. We asked her to let it stay. Then around 7:15pm we ordered our desert and again was reminded the table was booked for 8:00pm. Around 7:50 we had finished our desert when the server without asking brought the bill to our table!! We weren’t even asked if we would like coffee!! There was no mention or acknowledgment either of the birthday we were celebrating so why put it in your booking site as an option? This experience has disappointed us as we’ve ate at Caruggi at least 6 times and not felt rushed. If you are going to run a class restaurant like a fast food establishment we won’t be returning or recommending to our friends and family as we have...

You need to improve your reservation system. I left a phone message twice at off peak times. I did not receive the common courtesy of a reply. I tried your on line system, which is ridiculous and must lose you trade. I don't need to, and I won't, wade through Ts and Cs and waste time keying in all my details and then pay $20 just to reserve a table!! (Suggest you book a table at The Sawyers Arms for example, "your name and phone number please"......all done in 15 seconds. You need to lift your game and get away from your Fawlty Towers approach where running the business is more important to you than looking after the customer) I reserved by walking in as I walked past. To add insult to injury,

1. the $20 booking fee was not taken off my bill 2)I was hit with $8 surcharge to save you the hassle of dealing with depositing cash.
2. I was allowed two hours to eat and get out.
3. I was excessively hassled by reminders.

Your system RUINS what would otherwise be a delightful experience. Please take my feedback on board and adopt a more customer...

BAD CUSTOMER SERVICE. Had a meal here and me and my partner had steak which was ok. Very overpriced but ok. My mother in law was over from the Uk so we took her out because she loves Italian food. She ordered a seafood pasta dish but wasn’t happy and said to me it was tasteless. She didn’t want to complain but instead suggested to me to order some Parmesan cheese for her to make it taste better. I asked for this but the waiter said they didn’t have any. We thought this was funny an Italian restaurant without Parmesan cheese. We got offered pecorino which we accepted. After coming to the table with maybe a heaped tablespoon amount we ordered some more.The bill was $202 for three main courses and a maybe 3 or 4 drinks. Can you believe they charged me $2 for the cheese to add to their tasteless dish. I didn’t want to pay the $2 dollars but they wouldn’t let me leave until I did. What a bad rip off experience pls don’t go through the same pain and carry on walking to the many better choices...