The Pump Room Restaurant — Restaurant in Bath

This is the worst afternoon tea I have ever been to! A waste of my 42£. I've been to tea at the Ritz, Aldwych and Café Royal in London; the Balmoral and the Signet Library in Edinburgh; Gleneagle's in Scotland; even at some small cafes in Glasgow. However, none have been this bad. I was expecting something amazing because of the other reviews, but clearly these other reviewers have no decent comparison points. Probably mostly American tourists (I am also American) visiting England for the first time.

Let's start with atmosphere...such a plain and boring room! And the "musician" made me feel more like I was at a funeral than a high tea. Then, the service. The waitress did not seem to understand much of what I said. She asked me if I wanted a tea refill when I was totally done eating and ready to go...I had already been out of tea for a while. Then, I found a HAIR in my clotted cream! When I told her, she just brought me another one. Usually this sort of thing warrants a visit from the manager or something to fix the situation.

And now for the food...I've never been to an afternoon tea where the scones were served cold and everything is already plated up and just simply brought over to the table. If you specialize in afternoon tea, I expect my scones to be warm and fresh. Most places even have fresh jam or lemon curd, not a store-bought jar of jam. Then the rest of the food was just subpar. I enjoyed the food I got in several cafes around Bath far more than anything served in this overpriced tea. I sent more than half of the food back to the kitchen and left hungry.

Such a disappointment! If you've ever been to a proper afternoon tea, avoid this one because it does not compare at all. I wish I had requested a refund, but I...

Bit of a let down but still a nice treat.

Considering the money we spent coming here for my birthday I was quite disappointed.

My mum specifically booked a table but when we arrived there was a big queue with no mention as to what to do if you have a booking. A sign or something would have been nice. After waiting 10 minutes with everyone else my mum went to find one of the waiters who again asked us to wait in the queue and we would be called forward. Our booking was for 3 o'clock and even though we arrived early we weren't seated till 3:20.

The service to take our orders were quick, no complaints here and the food came fairly quickly also. I didn't feel the waiting staff were particularly suited to the tea rooms but maybe that was just my perception. I expected more "silver service" rather than people obviously still in school and working in the tea rooms as a part time job. The food was tasty and very filling, they provided us a box to take home the food we had left where our eyes were bigger than our belly. I would definitely advise going in hungry.

Lastly, just one other small thing was the fact the email confirmation said we weren't allowed to wear jeans yet a great number of people were wearing them. I would say either say they are allowed and change the email confirmation to reflect that or say they aren't and be consistent in not letting people in if they are wearing jeans.

Overall not the best considering the reputation this place has however still had a nice time and the...

Relatively disappointing experience. The restaurant is attached to the Roman Baths and has a few windows that overlook the spring, but is not visible from any of the tables. The room itself is grand and beautiful, with an oversized chandelier in the center and live music during service.

We went for afternoon tea and the food was OK. The scones were nice and perfectly buttery and the strawberry jam was really tasty. The tea sandwiches were standard, if not a little sub par. The coronation chicken sandwiches had hardly any chicken salad on them - it was comical how stingy they were. The salmon mousse was really tasty, though. The pastries were nice but nothing to write home about.

They lost us on the service. We were seated quickly in spite of being told there was a 30-40 minute wait and our waitress came and took our order right away. Food came out very fast, but that was the last we ever saw her. We had one pot of tea between the two of us which had about 2.5 cups and waited 15 minutes for our water to be refilled and a second pot of hot water. To add to all this, the second pot of water she brought was half the size, so after waiting close to 20 minutes for more water for our 'unlimited' tea, we each got an additional 3/4 of a cup. As far as teas goes it's reasonably priced, but we likely wouldn't return and have had much better experiences...