The Royal Oak New Malden — Restaurant in London

A place deserving of 0-stars! Really, really slow service, and the staff were incompetent & unhelpful. I'd not recommend this pub if you have kids who want to eat. There were so many issues during our attempt to eat here. The lady tried to overcharge me since she didn't know how to put some items on the computer, and then shrugged like its my issue she didn't know how to do it, and I had to change my order. We then waited over an hour for food, and upon enquiring, was told off the cuff, "we''re out of the item you ordered for the kids, you'll have to order something else"! I'm not sure they can consider themselves a kid friendly restaurant when they make kids wait over an hour for food, and still have not even started making it at that point. When I asked to speak to the manager about a refund, I was told, "He's too busy at the moment, can I come back tomorrow to complain"!?!? Ordering took so long, and plus waiting for food - we ended our almost 2 hour "experience", by getting a refund, and left having not eaten - our little guy in tears because he was upset he'd waited for so long and not getting his food. I've not encountered service this bad in a long, long time, avoid this place. And it seems I'm not the only person to...

I recently discovered The royal Oak Pub. We visited for a comedy Evening upstairs

We took a few minutes to get around the idea it's all app based service to the table but once it was set up it was straight forward. The food was good and the service while upstairs was faultless. My one issue was once our event finished and we were asked to move downstairs it was unclear if we could just take a table or if we had to be seated or have a reservation. The staff werent so friendly when my friend attempted to down the last of his pint and leave and was told off about his mask not covering his lips. Unfortunately it left a sour note in our mouths and we left to find a venue with less rude staff. This having been our first visit to a pub since February made us less prepared for the new style of service and new aggressive stance staff have taken on. We tried to apologise for the misunderstanding on being sat or covering face.

I wont let this put me off visiting however I shall be more vigilant about my service I recieve

The staff I encountered in the event were much more polite and welcoming and agreed the staff shouldn't have been so rude to a group of...

Info provided re response from the pub (which is appreciated)

The fish and chips were v dry and the mushy peas even more so (and were also cold) and didn't seem fresh - chips tasted like oven chips. When pub has a v small menu you expect the meals to be top quality. We were not given any cutlery with our meals or offered sauces - as the bar was now busy it took a while for one of us to go up and request these meanwhile couldn't eat our food! There is also a 10% service charge included which I don't like restaurants doing and unless I am v happy with the service / would have left this amount anyway I always ask for it to be removed as I prefer to leave the amount of my choosing (and usually cash) but for a pub to do this is unusual; I requested this to be removed especially as we had to go up to the bar to pay the bill ourselves anyway and was met with a slightly curt "was there a problem with your service then?" to which I responded about the cutlery etc. The pub is a lovely old building and the majority of the staff were friendly and hosting the comedy events in a decent function room is great so I'm hoping this was...