The Bright Helm - JD Wetherspoon — Restaurant in England

Awful customer service. Young blue haired waitress brought food with only a knife. After 10 mins and multiple requests for cutlery, they brought a solitary fork over (with no napkin) by which point food was cold. Had to request for a napkin and wait another 5 mins for it to be brought. I told him the food was now cold. Barman only offered to heat it up so I requested a free drink for the poor sevice & hassle to which he said that wasn't their policy (despite other wetherspoons frequently doing it) and only the manager could authorise it who was on break for 25 minutes! 10 mins later, my reheated food arrives, not even hot. After 2 bites it's cold again and I can't eat it. Wait another 10 minutes for the manager (who never arrives) before asking at the bar for a refund. Barman radios manager. After explaining to the arrogant young manager, he refuses to refund my drink, taking the full price off the food, offering to refund only £2.25 of a meal that was over £8! I said no I want a full refund to which he says I drank the drink. I said of course I drank it Its been about 40 minutes, and I've been waiting for you for 30 minutes!!! He says, "There's no way I'm refunding the drink!" I said ok then I'll have a replacement pizza, and I'll take this fork just in case the waitress forgets again! He put it through, then gathered all the bar staff and started talking about me and all 3 went in to the kitchen (I dread to think what they did to my food). When the new pizza arrived after about 15 minutes I barely felt safe eating and only ate part of it. I really can't believe how poor the staff acted and how poor their customer service was. Won't be ordering food from there again and will stick to the North Wetherspoons.

6 months later and my first visit since the last ordeal has only reinforced my view of their poor service! Just ordered food and asked for a Poretti glass for my bottle of beer only to be refused by the young barmaid due to "I've been told we're not allowed to serve drinks in other brands glasses". I told her I've been to multiple spoons and never once heard this and she said "that's just what I've been told". When I saw the manager (short, blonde, about 28) I flagged her down to query the glass issue, and she started arrogantly making excuses for the staff (like how the last manager had) stating "some companies don't like their glasses being used for other other beers.....but I don't think Poretti are one of them and she must have been mistaken".

I said about I'd never heard that excuse before, and asked for a Poretti glass and she agreed but gave me a really filthy look. I've been into wetherspoons venues in 20 different towns and never once heard...

After an amazing day at the grand hotel, watching three boys fight, my group went to the Brighton helm. There was about 10-15 of us all around the age of 18-21. A few of the boys had been told off by this certain female member of staff (some sort of management) and the bouncer had then come up and said to us all very respectfully please no more vaping or I will have to kick you all out. We all then went downstairs to go outside. I’ve come back to my table and ordered a drink with a male behind the bar, he has confirmed my order , started pouring my drink and has charged me. All going well until the female manager comes over to be at the bar and says “you aren’t allowed your drink!” So I said “why I’ve literally just payed for it” and she did not care, apparently she had told our table half an hour ago that we were all cut off from ordering drinks. Which no one had been told about, and more to the fact she should have told her staff that before charging me for a drink. She then continued to refuse to give me a refund and was shouting in my face saying I’m not allowed my drink or my refund. Yet again the bouncer has come up (same guy) again very respectfully said go downstairs and we will sort something out but all of you arguing isn’t helping the situation so we did we all went downstairs. And the bouncer brought me my drink. This is now the second time I have been charged for drinks and then been refused them because she wants to kick us out. We went into this Wetherspoons back on jun 14th for a friends 18th and we’re all removed for no reason and the same female member of staff yet again didn’t tell her staff to not serve us, so I was charged for three drinks that I was then not allowed and was refused refund. And as for the male manager I have no sympathy for you, you need to start communicating with your staff and if a group is not allowed to order drinks then tell the whole group, and your staff not...

Does anyone read these reviews, especially when it's a "spoons" and we all just call cos we've heard of em and there supposed to be cheap Anyway I called here twice in a few days Same layout atmosphere etc as every other wetherspoons and a good location from walking from train to Brighton front or visa versa Yeah Both times I called staff are not very good I used the app which we are always encouraged to download and use etc 1st visit I ordered a drink via app and it took 15/20 minutes to arrive The place was fairly busy but not heaving yeah fair enough However called again 2 days later ,the place was a 3rd full at best with plenty of staff knocking about And this time after a 15 minute wait I actually went to the bar to enquire about my pint thru the app order And it was just sat there at end of the bar and was told Yeah take it! I was with friends I ordered 4 times thru app and 3 out of 4 times it took over 13 minutes to arrive And on the last order it took 17 minutes and by this time it was fairly empty Also on last order I didn't receive a glass for my canned drinks Just got told use the old ones left on the table from other people Wetherspoons is usually cheap and does what it says on the tin This is not a cheap spoons I appreciate that a lot of staff mainly work there part time as a stepping stone or going thru university etc But here it appears the staff don't care ,or certainly don't care the few nights I visited Can't say I recommend this...