Itoh Kyuemon - JR Uji Station / Sabo — Restaurant in Uji

If I could give 0 stars, I would (TOO).

The customer service here is absolutely terrible. The staff wouldn’t listen or respond properly to what I was saying. A week ago, I visited and got a ticket from the machine, which showed an estimated wait time of about an hour. Since the system stated that I would receive an email notification when my table was ready, I went out to explore Uji while waiting.

I never received any email notification, though I should have. Perhaps it was my problem, but I never got notified in the same way I usually do with other emails. Regardless, I returned to the restaurant within the expected time, only to find that my number had already passed—by just 5 minutes. I explained the situation to the staff and asked if I could be put back on the waiting list. Instead of offering any understanding, they robotically insisted that because I had exceeded the 10-minute grace period, I had to queue all over again.

This is absolutely ridiculous. After waiting an hour in the cold, instead of showing any basic human consideration, they rigidly enforced their policy without an ounce of flexibility. What’s even worse is that I had already spent money in their souvenir shop, which I now completely regret.

Despite all this, I requeued and finally tried the food—completely overrated and not worth the hassle. UNLESS they DRASTICALLY IMPROVE their CUSTOMER SERVICE, I WOULDN'T RECOMMEND wasting your time here. I followed the rules, paid, and experienced it firsthand, so I have every right to say this place is simply...

Would give zero stars if I could.

I would highly, highly discourage anyone from visiting this place.

The store is a huge tourist trap. In the shop, they sell matcha products and packaged goods like matcha nama chocolate, matcha carbonara, matcha espresso etc. Packaging is decent for gifting, but rather pricey and over commercialized, in my opinion.

At the back of the shop, there is a small restaurant/cafe. We had to queue to get a table, and were only told after entering that EACH PERSON HAD TO ORDER ONE DISH. There was no sign outside the store indicating this, which I thought was rather bad business ethics, as it forces customers to purchase and spend more unknowingly.

As we were unsure of this rule at first, the waitress came to our table, rudely banged her hand on the table, pointed at the menu, then pointed at each of us, demanding for us to each order. This ruined the entire experience for us, and we did not enjoy the rest of our meal. The food looks good, but was expensive, and not good enough quality to warrant the price. Also, take note that you can only order the meal by scanning a QR code on your phone and the store has no wifi, so if you do not have mobile data, you will not be able to order.

Overall, I regretted going to this store, and had a HORRIBLE experience. Please do not go here, there are many more cafes and eateries around...

We had high expectations for this place, but the experience was terribly disappointing. We were among the last customers of the day (seated at 5:25 PM), and perhaps because the staff were nearing the end of their shift, their attitude was very rude and dismissive.

The desserts arrived fairly quickly, but only four spoons were provided for our group (6 pax). We requested for additional spoons THRICE, but this older female staff member repeatedly ignored us and pretended not to understand. There's already a policy of one dessert per person, and now we’re not even allowed one set of cutlery per person? Taste wise, nothing special.

When we wanted to pay, the same staff member was at the counter. Instead of explaining where to pay, she just pointed down the corridor. Assuming that we had to pay at the main cashier where other customers were queuing, we went there, only for that staff to stomp out and yell at us for not using the machine at the side which we hadn’t notice. You could've just let me know verbally and not by pointing! Was the shouting even necessary?

TL;DR – After 10 days of travelling around the Kansai region, this was the worst customer service we encountered. Staffs were rude and shouted at us over a simple misunderstanding. Genuinely surprised that this kind of service is tolerated in a country known for its...