Swiss Chalet — Restaurant in Toronto

My partner and I have been to this location 3-4 times in the last year. Out of all 4 times I would say we’ve had 1 good experience. The past two times have been absolutely horrendous. As someone who has worked in the service industry I am completely outraged by the lack of service, teamwork and overall care in this restaurant.

Our last visit was on Sunday, December 8. We arrived and was greeted by the hostess promptly (very kind teenager). We sat at our table for at least 15 minutes before being greeted. When our waitress came she was simply an “order taker”. We waited 10 minutes for our drinks, about 20 for our appetizer and even longer for our mains. When our mains arrived we received two white meet “holiday” specials although we ordered one dark meat quarter leg combo and one white meat quarter leg combo. I brought this to the servers attention as I wanted to ensure we didn’t have someone else’s meal, she showed me that she “wrote” down the right thing. Again, just because you “wrote” down the right thing, doesn’t mean you “punched in” the right thing. I also asked for another ketchup bottle as the one we were predeopped was empty.

We sat with empty drinks about our whole stay, until asking for another one mid meal. Our empty appetizer plates, empty cups and ketchup bottle sat on the table the whole dining experience as many staff walked by, our server dropped off refills, keeping the dirty plates and empty bottle on the table. We were really hoping to have dessert, but really what was the point, at this time in our dining experience we were so turned off. We sat next to a lovey older couple and watched them wait about 20 minutes just to be greeted. Mind you, this was the first time I have ever seen this location properly staffed. We waited about 15 -20 minutes for the bill as we sat in filth, I assume because she had to repunch everything in….. and behind us a group was being told “anything to make sure you have an amazing experience” as one of the staff changed the tv for them… hopefully their experience was better than ours.

To top it off my partner and I both got home...

We recently ordered from Swiss Chalet for pickup and it was a disaster. We submitted the order, it provided a 5:15pm pickup time, we received our order confirmation, and we walked over to the restaurant, arriving around 5:20pm. Once there, I received an email that I need to call customer service as there was a question about my order. Why didn't the restaurant directly contact me? Anyway - made the call, they let me know they were out of chicken strips. Person on the phone advised we'd have to cancel the order and start a brand new one - at this point, it's 5:30. Staff at the restaurant itself let us know the rest of the order was almost done so we wouldn't need to cancel. So, we waited until 5:45, order still isn't ready. We'd witnessed another party come in with the same issue, she was also noticeably upset as she'd waited significantly longer than the website advised, and there was no immediate offer of refund or substition despite the restaurant being out of the menu item. The pickup area was overwhelmed so we had to call customer service back, where they finally cancelled the order. It was now 6:00, 45 min after our order should've been ready. If they didn't have the menu item available, why did staff not just offer to 1) refund that item from our bill, 2) if option 1 isn't possible, provide a voucher for future use, or 3) offer a substitution? We would've gladly substituted accepted any of those 3 options, but instead our whole order was incredibly delayed so we just ended up cancelling. I'll be watching my credit card closely to ensure the cancellation and the order reversal comes through. We certainly won't be ordering...

I came in tonight to order from there takeout booth ordering 3 combos from their menu. I paid using my SCENE points ( a rewards program offered to Scotiabank customers) & by cash for a total of $56.00 even.

The menu above clearly STATES: COMBOS INCLUDE DRINKS (xml-xml, b/c I didn't have my phone to capture this detail). The girl told me that for drinks it would $1.79 EXTRA but the menu offers this as part of the combo.

I had a girl from the kitchen explain that drinks are additional charges & agreed with me that it was a bit ''confusing''. This states to me that this Swiss Chalet is offering false advertising b/c the restaurant is offering a product with the intent of charging extra for it. Rather than cancel my order, I still went ahead and got my meal b/c I also had a guest with me.

In the future, I will probably not go to Swiss Chalet & if any readers get a chance to read the sign, point that out and notice the drink cooler fridge full of drinks. I wonder why?

Because reputations are critical for a business success, ideally the employee should have given us 3 bottled drinks for the ''confusion'' and make a note to management that the description on the menu for lack of better words: More than meets than eye. Good customer service is taking action to resolve issues.

Also, I want to read if other customers were surprised and if you got any responses from this location's...