Mekong Baby — Restaurant in Waitematā

UPDATE:

If you are talking about setting the record straight here you go. While we understand that flies are common in New Zealand during the summer, it’s certainly not acceptable to find one in our drink. What’s even more disappointing, is the lack of accountability from your staff and management once this was raised no follow-up—nothing more than a brief response from the waiter who took the drink away, your staff told us she is going to talk to her manager this is why we raised it again because we didn’t hear from your staff. When we raised the issue again at payment time, we were met with an unprofessional attitude from your staff. This is why our review was negative—because there was no genuine effort to address the problem and no indication that customer satisfaction is a priority. We later saw another customer posted a review who had a similar complaint about poor service that same night, which makes it clear that this issue isn’t an isolated case.

We do appreciate that your wife reached out to apologize via email and text, but she also asked us to take down our review. While we considered removing it, your rude response here has shown that your establishment is not open to growth or improvement. If anything, it feels like you’re more concerned with silencing negative feedback than actually learning from it. This situation could have been a great opportunity for your team to improve its customer service, but unfortunately, it seems like you're not interested in doing.

I am incredibly disappointed with the service we received during our visit. Our group was seated in one of your private rooms, and we discovered a fly in one of our drinks. While the waiter promptly took the drink away, there was no follow-up or acknowledgment of the issue. It was only when we brought it up again during the payment process that the manager, rather than offering an apology or demonstrating any concern, dismissed our complaint and instead asked what we wanted to do about it. This response was not only dismissive but completely unprofessional.

What is especially frustrating is the lack of accountability. There was no apology, no attempt to make things right, and no indication that the staff or management took our experience seriously. A simple acknowledgment of the mistake and a genuine apology would have gone a long way in salvaging the situation. Instead, we were left feeling ignored and disrespected.

This is not the level of service I expect from a restaurant, and it has completely soured our experience. It's clear that customer satisfaction is not a priority here, and frankly, that is inexcusable. I hope this feedback is taken seriously and results in some much-needed changes in how issues like these are handled...

Dear Owner,

I just want to share my thoughts here as the ending of this whole drama.

First of all, Google Review is a public place for people to share their real experiences and feedback, there is nothing wrong with my friends sharing their real experiences as they were all customers at your restaurant, they have the right to share. You can't say they are ruining your business just because they left their true thoughts about your place.

Second, you might be misled by your manager about what was going on. The root cause of why we are upset is not the private dining space or not allowing us to have our cake there. We respect your rules if they are reasonable. What upset us most is the way your manager handled this. When one of my friends arrived and asked her where the main door was, she was impatient and arrogant, made my friend feel he was not welcome.

When we asked if we could have an exception to have the cake inside your restaurant, she refused our request with an uncaring face. When we asked if we could speak to the owner, she said you were too busy to talk to us but you ring us immediately after we left. I felt so depressed because of those things and even cried (didn't want to mention that as it was quite embarrassing). But even she saw that, she didn't even pretend to be caring or helpful by contacting you for an exception.

Third, I appreciated your phone call after we left. But what you then replied to my friends' reviews was totally disappointing. My friends were fair about what happened, they mentioned your prompt reaction and your apology which they appreciated. There was also a waiter who was very nice and we could tell he really felt sorry about the cake issue, which we also appreciated. HOWEVER, you made it sounds like it's all our fault and nothing wrong with your manager, which was completely different from your phone call. Why it's so hard to admit there are some improvements you can work on with your staff and you will try to avoid this from happening again in the future?

From a customer perspective, a one-star review won't ruin any business, it’s important how the business reacts to undesirable reviews. But how you reacted here only shows you are trying to hide your faults from the public, which is not rational or caring. The STAR seems way more important than your customers' experience and feeling.

Mekong Baby was very special to me because I had one of my best memories there before. I was really looking forward to going to your place with my wonderful friends on a special day. With that mood, all those things happened and we had to leave and find another place for a Birthday Celebration at the busiest time of lunch on a weekend. Can you imagine how hard the decision was and how disappointed we...

I was very shocked the way the owner (Marcin) spoke to us. We were just asking if it was possible to change to a lower table, but he made it such a big deal and said no very rudely. Not happy with the customer service, no respect.

I thought I should add what happened in detail.

We walked into the restaurant asking if there’s a table available for 5 people, they kindly found us a high table and we sat there and ordered drinks and our food. One of us has a shrimp intolerance so it was a bit difficult to find a meal at first, but the lovely waitress helped us to finally find a meal to suit this intolerance. Your reply here to my review is very rude the way you said “Our waitress that was working with me then spend nearly 15 minutes exclusively working the your table sorting out your dietary requirements, as you were refusing to accept that shrimp paste allergy is very difficult to handle in our cuisine.”

It shouldn’t be an issue to help find food for people with intolerances, you guys should be more than happy to help, and we weren’t refusing to accept that shrimp paste allergy is very difficult to handle in your cuisine ???

We didn’t say that we weren’t happy with the high table, we just simply asked if we could move tables to a lower table, we didn’t ‘DEMAND’ as you’ve responded from my review. And when we asked to change tables, straight away the owner responded quite rudely saying “is it really necessary for you to move tables, is it such a big deal for you guys to move tables” He also mentioned “can’t you see how busy it is” Yes, the table we wanted to move to was vacated by people recently, but it was almost cleaned up, it just had a few plates and rubbish at the end of it.

We didn’t walk out because we were refused to move tables, the reason we walked out is because of the way the owner acted towards us, we were all shocked.

You mentioned that we refused to pay, however, We asked the waitress twice if we have to pay and offered to pay before we walked out and she checked with the owner and came back and said no.

You are making up unnecessary things in your response to our reviews such as “all because you think that people that work in restaurants are SERVANTS NOT SERVERS! That’s borderline psychotic to be perfectly honest.” We would never ever think that the people who work in restaurants are SERVANTS, that’s absolutely horrible, we never said that so you shouldn’t assume.

I am shocked by your responses as well, especially being the owner of Mekong baby. I feel you could have just said “I’m very sorry for acting this way” but you have taken your responses very far and made them misleading far...