PizzaExpress — Restaurant in England

Poor management and service. We arrived for booking at Christchurch branch 02/01/22 at 16:00 only to be left waiting at the door for some time with young kids, meanwhile the restaurant was empty and the young staff looked at us like it was someone else's responsibility to greet us. When we were finally shown to our table we were left waiting again for considerable time before having to leave table and find staff to order our drinks. It took 20 minuets to be seated and to order soft drinks for our kids in an almost empty restaurant! We had to locate staff again to order food and ask again for the bill when we wanted to leave. The service was non-existent and I don't blame the young staff either as clearly there is a problem with higher level management which also seemed non-existent in this establishment. Tables left dirty and used dirty plates left stacked on customer tables and kitchen floor. Saw other families turning around leaving at the door as fed up waiting to be seated. Over staffed and under managed. Would we go back? No way... not even if they offered us a free meal. Shame as the Pizza was OK but the management and service was...

Turned up to try out the restaurant after it's new refurb.

Was a bit puzzled why it took so long to be seated, and thankfully the gentleman who came to greet and seat us was open and honest about them being overrun.

He explained that they'd been overrun with Online/Delviery/Just Eat orders due to an online discount that service times would be double what they normally were (Starters would be 30 instead of 15 and about an hour for mains).

While it's "only Pizza Express" it was a huge disappointment. Nothing more disappointing and discouraging than being a physical patron in a restauratnt who's there in person spending no only my money but my Time ..... and end up seeing Just Eat guys walking in and our with boxes and boxes of pizzas while I'm sitting hungry.

Until a restaurant prioritises the In-Restaurant diners over the takeaway orders you're not a real restaurant. You're just a takeaway shop with tables.

The 2 stars go to the gentleman who had the decency to let us know before we ordered any drinks and made any financial commitments how bad the place was being run. Could tell he was at the coal-face of a bad...

I showed up with my kids to Pizza Express without a reservation and was sure I was going to be turned down as they looked fully booked. To my surprise, the person at the door went straight away to look for a table for us. As soon as we were seated we were explained the new rules and asked if we preferred a paper menu as now the menus is available on line by scanning a QR code. It was really great to do it that way. It made it a lot faster and the staff is able to get on with things until you are totally ready. No waste of time. Our waiters was lovely. And when I talked to the manager to let him know how amazing our expletive was, I found another lovely person! I’ve been to many Pizza Express around the country and I can honestly say they not only make great food but also are fantastic at choosing staff! Thanks for a lovely evening, Pizza Express...