Boston Pizza — Restaurant in Kitchener

We had prebooked reservations for BP Dinner and then Kingpin Bowling. The reception area/front desk was absolute mayhem... it took us close to 15 minutes to flag someone down to let them know that we had a 7pm BP reservation, even though we were standing by the sign that said, "Stand here for BP". In fact, my husband kept trying to directly flag employees while I returned to the general line up to see who would get served first. Clock ticking, we were seated well after 7pm. Then, it took another 20 minutes for our server to even show up so I directed the table to place their food orders at the same time as our drinks because I was starting to think this would be the trend for the night. A good 40 minutes later, we asked about our food because the clock was ticking towards our bowling reservation (note: we thought 1.5h would be plenty of time between reservations, there were only 4 of us to eat). That prompted immediate food delivery to which we were pleased but soon realized that our food had been sitting in the kitchen, arriving luke warm at best. We made the best of it, correcting for missed side items on plates. Again, the server was missing in action, clock ticking down to bowling, and when we saw her running across the dining room in the distance I yelled to her that we wanted our bill. I have to say, we were never made to feel welcome during that whole experience and in fact, felt that we were bothersome. I don't know how you get an easier table to serve than 4 people, no alcohol, 2 pop, 2 water, a bowl of soup with bread, a spaghetti and a shared pizza. Common now. Being Canadian I was very polite in leaving a 20% tip, everyone has an off night but it appeared that the staff at BP were struggling in management from reception to customer service to food prep to overall functioning. Next we went to check in to bowling. As it turns out, never agree to bowl in lane #17 - it doesn't return the balls properly. The balls kept piling up at the end of the lane and then every now and again they would all return in one big launch. The problem was, we had to keep going to lanes on either side and borrowing balls to keep our game going. This impacted our time in the lane because of that constant search for balls. Overall, I'd say 15 minutes of the game was lost at the very end because the balls were piled so high at the end of the lane that the game stopped. During the hour, another 15 minutes would have been lost to tracking down bowling balls. There was 1 server working in the area who never checked in with us, not once were we asked if we wanted drinks or snacks. He was run off his feet taking care of 2 large groups further down the facility. Being new to bowling, we didn't know that we should have gone back up to the front desk (no small feat given the distances involved and the clock ticking on our lane). When we stopped by the front desk on our way out, we were reprimanded for not acting sooner on requesting service and when we asked for a raincheck on 1 bowling game, we were scolded for even asking. Long story short, it was a Saturday night, everyone was indoors because it was raining, and our impression is that the front desk is not able to manage large groups. Once a large group comes through that front door, any smaller groups like us are swept aside and ignored. Overall management of that area could use a review and new plan of approach. We would also recommend to improve efficiency that servers have tables in a 'section' and not be required to run all over the dining room space. Lastly, there should be a dedicated/scheduled employee responsible for trouble shooting the bowling lanes and keeping the area clean - the tables at our lane stayed dirty the whole time we were there. Not only did we miss out on a fun game of bowling, Kingpin missed out on a drink/food order from our group. This experience, combined with a negative experience in the escape rooms, we've decided we will not be returning to this facility...

Love this place. Our yearly trip to the lights was fantastic as always. But the Boston Pizza left a bit to be desired. Usually this place is spot on with service and food but this time was the first time we weren't 100% happy. It started with our assigned lane still having folks sitting eating at it. No problem, they moved right away and were very nice. They left all their dishes and we had to ask to have it cleaned up. We helped and no problem it was done. But then the staff disappeared and we had to go ask if we ordered from the bar, or if they were coming over. They came over and took our order. In no time they were back with our drinks. Great. We started bowling and the food took a while to come. We had ordered the cactus cut fries and the banderas bread to start knowing it was busy and we would likely be waiting a while. Whether the order was put in incorrectly or they were too busy, the apps showed up with our meal. The bread was great but the fries were a bit crispy/burnt and we didn't eat about half of them. Picture included. Also the mains came and we had ordered spaghetti and meatballs and spaghetti with a meat sauce. They sent fettuccine noodles. This was not a problem with the spaghetti and meatball eater but the other one is a kid, very fussy about noodles and was very unhappy. We asked the server and he checked with the kitchen and they subbed them out as they were out of spaghetti noodles. He was very apologetic as this was not his mistake. We wished they had told him to ask us, as our kiddo might have wanted a different noodle or a different meal at that point. But we didn't get the option. So she ate what she could with a scowl on her face, lol. Overall, the service was slower and we waited a while for him to come over to get drink refills. He was standing at the bar, tapping on the slushy machine. We were going to go over to get our refills and saw he was not busy but we did not go over as our food was on the table and we were eating and bowling. He did come over eventually and that's when we discussed the food errors. He was very nice and after that did a good job taking care of us, getting us to go boxes etc.. He was very nice, and accommodated us in everything we asked for. We did not send the food back or get a new order of fries as we were already done at that point. He did offer but we said no its OK. We paid our full bill and left. Sadly this is the first time we have not been happy here and overall, this place is awesome. Great lights, great new outdoor area with more lights was very cool, bowling is always fun, arcade is great and the food is usually wonderful. So chalk it up to an off night. We will be back. It's a great place for family fun and I would reccomend it to...

We ordered online, from Boston Pizza, assuming a solid experience; we've had a number of satisfactory encounters with this franchise before. Our five-person birthday order was done online. There was trouble with the website in paying online so I chose the "Pay at the store" option. Our order placed, the website told me that our order would be done in twenty minutes.

I arrived at the Kingpin Bowl and Boston Pizza location, in Waterloo, Ont., ready to pay and depart. The individual at the front desk, the same place you choose bowling shoes, said he'd go and get my order. I'd prefer to have a counter devoted to food and a counter devoted to bowling; clarity is useful; it also says something about the seriousness of how each side of the business is taken.

I waited at the counter for almost half an hour; clearly unacceptable. Twice Staff asked if I'd been served but didn't volunteer to go and see what the delay was. Finally one Staff did go and investigate.

Eventually my Server arrived with our order. He was not overly apologetic, neither was he rude, and said something about our order being "all over the place." I wondered to myself about the state of the kitchen and its Staff. This wasn't overly encouraging. I chose not to protest as I was well past the time we were hoping to eat, so I didn't want to delay any further.

Getting the food home we discovered quickly that one entrée wasn't included (but we did get a random Apple Juice box, that we hadn't ordered). Instead of a nice salad I got a small container with chicken in it, presumably to go on the missing salad. I ate that and the "Thai Shrimp bites"; these were good. One of our party was very disappointed with their Beef Dip sandwich. It appeared to have been thrown together by someone unaccustomed to food preparation. The pasta dishes that two other members of our birthday party had ordered were well received. The last member of our celebration had a positive experience with his pizza.

As a consumer I simply expect better from an established restaurant chain like Boston Pizza. Additional Staff, at the front desk would have been very useful. Clearly something wasn't at peak form in the kitchen; the subpar sandwich and the clear disorganization in assembling orders need prompt attention to. A desk for the restaurant and a desk for the bowling lanes, staffed by sufficient employees, would be a good start in improving the overall customer experience.

I'll likely give Boston Pizza another chance. Should I receive the same disappointing service that I experienced this time, however, I'd be forced to reconsider...