The Amberley Hotel — Restaurant in Canterbury

My wife and I have just experienced a wonderful 10 days travelling around the top half of the South Island before returning to West Australia yesterday. We stopped by for lunch at the much improved Amberly Hotel earlier this week and were advised by staff that there would be a delay in the service due to staff shortages. It seems that all to many businesses are jumping onto the same bandwagon and using it as an excuse for not being able to provide an acceptable level of service. Several times during our wait, four and sometimes five staff members could be seen having a chat amongst themselves behind the counter at the back of the café. Obviously nothing was happening at these times to assist in getting meals out to customers or assisting in the kitchen. After ordering two seafood chowders we were given 2 glasses to use with drinking water. The bottle of water however, I was directed to get from the refrigerator myself soon after the glasses turned up because they were too busy! When the two chowder dishes (they were fantastic I must add!!) arrived we had to wait even longer and summons another staff member to fetch spoons in order to eat the meal. A couple of things spring to mind here - If you are short staffed and cannot provide a satisfactory service for your customers, do what many other businesses are doing - put a sign on the door stating 'Closed due to staff shortages', keep the door locked and stay at home until you are able to provide the correct level of service. If staff are incapable of correctly attending to simple tasks, employers must entice older, more experienced employees to work in your business, but make sure they are properly paid. Perhaps employers should be placing more emphasis on training for their employees, both in the workplace and in dedicated training environments where qualifications...

An exceptional surprise. Travelling to work in Amberley for 5 days I needed to find accommodation. I will admit my expectations were not high at all. ||I rang and made the booking. It was an efficient and well handled experience. I was emailed instructions on what I should do to get my room key when I arrived. The instructions were both clear and accurate on where I should park my car. ||I was shown my room which was a good sized room beautiful decorated. The sea grass blue room was soothing and relaxing and the accents of teal and grey finished the room beautifully. A good sized ensuite was clean and well sized with bright white fluffy towels and face clothes. ||The bed was a great size, crisp clean sheets and it was super comfy. A heat pump let me regulate the temperature of my room so I was comfortable during the evening and overnight. ||While the accommodation was a lovely surprise the restaurant downstairs was next level amazing.||I ate there for the 5 nights I stayed. Every meal was top quality, packed full of flavour and cooked to perfection. The slow cooked pork belly was sublime and the slow roasted lamb shoulder was superb. Tasty, nourishing and warming and exactly what I needed on a winter evening. The restaurant staff were lovely. Smiling and friendly ensuring my dining experience on my own was just right. ||I can’t recommend The Amberley Hotel highly enough for both somewhere to stay and somewhere to dine. ||It was such an amazingly unexpected pleasure and I’m only sorry I won’t have a regular need to visit Amberley and stay again...

An exceptional surprise. Travelling to work in Amberley for 5 days I needed to find accommodation. I will admit my expectations were not high at all. ||I rang and made the booking. It was an efficient and well handled experience. I was emailed instructions on what I should do to get my room key when I arrived. The instructions were both clear and accurate on where I should park my car. ||I was shown my room which was a good sized room beautiful decorated. The sea grass blue room was soothing and relaxing and the accents of teal and grey finished the room beautifully. A good sized ensuite was clean and well sized with bright white fluffy towels and face clothes. ||The bed was a great size, crisp clean sheets and it was super comfy. A heat pump let me regulate the temperature of my room so I was comfortable during the evening and overnight. ||While the accommodation was a lovely surprise the restaurant downstairs was next level amazing.||I ate there for the 5 nights I stayed. Every meal was top quality, packed full of flavour and cooked to perfection. The slow cooked pork belly was sublime and the slow roasted lamb shoulder was superb. Tasty, nourishing and warming and exactly what I needed on a winter evening. The restaurant staff were lovely. Smiling and friendly ensuring my dining experience on my own was just right. ||I can’t recommend The Amberley Hotel highly enough for both somewhere to stay and somewhere to dine. ||It was such an amazingly unexpected pleasure and I’m only sorry I won’t have a regular need to visit Amberley and stay again...