Somtum Thai — Restaurant in North Island

I've dined here before and enjoyed the food, however I had an unfortunate experience with the staff which has soured the place for me. Essentially myself, and my partner were waiting at the counter to be seated. There was one table left, and we were the only customers waiting to be seated. We didn't want to be pushy, so we didn't bug the one staff member who was frantically running orders out. Then some other couple walks in, and the guy desperately grabs the staff members attention, interrupting their work, and is then seated at the one remaining table. As me and my partner had been walking around for about half an hour looking for a place to dine, we were hungry and there were few options open at the time to our taste, so I raised this with the staff member who came to tell us that there were now no tables available. I have worked in customer service in the past, so I'm very polite, but I say that we had actually been waiting for longer than the customer that just arrived, and a staff member had addressed us first saying that they would be with us as soon as they could. The staff refused to acknowledge this being unfair. Yes, the pushy customer was partly to blame, but I don't think It's unreasonable to have a staff member apologize and say that actually someone else was waiting for the table first. They were totally unwilling to do this, even though we'd been patiently waiting there for 5 minutes. The other couple had only been seated for half a minute at the time that we were told that there were no tables, so It's not as if they had ordered anything, or settled in. It was unfortunate. I know that working in customer service can make you hesitant to confront people, but it was truly disrespectful, and...

Overall this is just about in the cheap and cheerful category, and I mean that in a good way. Decor pretty basic, staff casual, cheaper than elsewhere, rice included (not typically the case at Thai places), and good food.

However our experience was soured by the failed redemption of our Grabone coupon. And in the confusion that was causing, not noticing we'd been charged two drinks that were not ours, in addition to our ones.

Having contacted Grabone to ask for info about when the coupon was supposedly previously redeemed, the answer was the same day I tried to use it. There is no other logical explanation that the person behind the counter managed to scan it but then scanned it a second time getting the message that it had been redeemed.

The effect of paying for the coupon, then full price on the night, and two drinks that weren't ours, more than doubled what should have been the cost.

All Grabone have done is un-redeem the coupon for another use, but I'm not taking the risk of the same problems again, and spending good money after bad.

It's terrible to be standing there saying there has no way the coupon has been used previous to my visit, having multiple attempts at redeeming, digging through email on my phone, and having to front up the full cost. Going home having cancelled other plans as we had to pay more than expected. To notice at home we'd been charged other peoples drinks too.

It's put me off Grabone as well. Their system should tell the vendor if it's been redeemed such a short time beforehand - likely only a matter of several seconds in this case.

Overall everyone has lost in...

Food is good, although stop bring the Phad Thai with a big covering of egg, it looks stupid and ruins the presentation, mix it in with the noodles. The only problems were the staff vacuuming and mopping the floor while people were walking in. Pro tip, do that before and after service. Real rocket science stuff, I'm sure. The floors need a SERIOUS refurbishment as the nylon was covered in grim along the edges and the carpets were just disgusting. Decor is a little weird, with a mish mash of wooden and plastic chairs and kiddy booths where you have to either lean way forward or sit on the edge of the seat in order to reach to table Then we saw a young staff with a brown baseball cap wiping his nose on his hand as he was handling the cutlery. Huge marks off for this blatant disregard for hygiene. Moreover you need tell your staff they need stop texting on their phones, especially when the bell rings to take someone's meal out. Overall, not a place I'd recommend dining in, but OK for takeaway provided they can get their staff to act more professional and keep a clean working...