Beachside Grill — Restaurant in North Devon

It is very rare that I feel the compulsion to write a review due to poor customer service, but unfortunately this is the time. I had planned to visit Saunton for the day with the family and dog, as we know the area well (we stayed at Staunton Sands Hotel as a group of around 30 for a decade, before my grandparents passed) I thought the ideal would be to centre the day around lunch at the beachside grill. Due to covid-19 I consulted the website for their policy - if you want to book it has to be inside, if you bring a dog you have to sit on the terrace, if you want to sit on the terrace you CAN’T book. Okay, fair enough, get down early to ensure we get a lunch table - easy. We arrive around 12:15 and there are free tables on the terrace - perfect! Or not!!! We were told by the boy assigning tables and further by the manager that the outside tables, on the terrace, were in fact reserved for those who had booked inside tables. Going completely against their own website (otherwise I would’ve booked), you were in fact allowed to book a table - inside only remember- but request that you sit outside instead. Thereby in fact booking an OUTSIDE table on the terrace.

At no point did the manager apologise, instead he treated us as 3rd class citizens for following the instruction on the restaurant’s website. I have never experienced such poor customer service, and to you covid-19 as an excuse was inexcusable - covid-19 was not responsible for them giving priority to indoor tables to sit on the terrace when their website specifically highlights that you can’t book to eat on the terrace.

In summary, The beachside grill lost out on a circa £400 bill, we gained in some sandy beach ciders and a packet of twiglets. If you go to this restaurant expect to experience extremely poor customer service from the management, (the young boys serving were very nice and simply following instruction) that would result in the loss of jobs at any similar city establishment. Oh, and completely ignore their website instruction - you can book to sit on the terrace - just book an indoor table and request to sit outside (eye rolling doesn’t do it justice!!).

As a suggestion for the beachside grill I would suggest amending the website with their actually policy, as well as to ensure the staff know what tables are available indoors (if you are moving indoor tables to the terrace, surely these tables become free for those without a dog - the couple behind us we’re not given this option), and finally to have a text system in place - add your name to a list, when it comes free send a text show up in 10 mins or loose it ( standard practice across most of...

I was quite amazed at the ambience the Cafe had and the view to the beach was superb. That I'm afriad is where it all ended for positive connotations. The Service was slow from the waiting staff and the their knowledge of the dishes was poor at best. I may have been unfortunate enough to have dealt with the staff who were on the first shift ever but this was not apparent in their welcome to seat us. I ordered the Caesar salad with grilled chicken. The description on the menu was of the classic Caesar recipe but what came to the table was something completely different. My first mouthful of the salad I was dumbfounded by something that was very bitter. I investigated the bitter taste and to my dismay I found a caper in the salad. Caesar salad and capers? I understand that there are variations to the Caesar but nothing as strange as this. I quickly grabbed the nearest menu and had to make sure that the description did not mention capers and I was right. It did not. I then called over the waitress and asked her why there were capers in the salad and why if it was in the recipe why it was not on the menu. She offered to change the dish. I requested whether it would be possible to remove the capers and to start over again. She quickly came back from the kitchen only to tell me that the capers were in the sauce mix! Very disappointing. That only tells you one of two things, They bought the wrong dressing or they are unable to make a dressing from scratch. Having been told they were unable to take the capers out of the dressing I decided to order the Avocado and bacon salad. Again, I was very disappointed. The bacon that was described came as a small mound of bacon shavings. All in all, great venue but an extremely poor experience. If you are going to go, just buy a drink and...

Stupidly I did not think to book a table ahead of us arriving at Saunton Sands so that is on me. However takeaways are only available to order on the day so I thought great, my family and I will decide what we want the night before and at 1 minute past midnight I will book a slot and order the takeaway.

I go to do this and am only able to order drinks, fair enough, maybe they don’t release the slots until they know which staff they’ve got in that day in case they are short staffed. So I go to sleep and check again at 8, still only drinks, check again at 9am, the same. Then 10am, then 11am, then midday, then 1pm, then 2pm. All the while I am checking the social media looking out for these supposed ‘updates’ on availability. Nothing there. I walk down at 4:30pm to see if I can order from the door and explain the situation, I’m told I was too slow and must have missed all the online bookings as they’ve done a couple that day, which to be honest I doubt. I said I was happy to wait the 30/40mins outside and was told that wasn’t possible as they had too many tickets, again unlikely the restaurant didn’t look that busy. No queue out the door that it’s had the rest of the week.

If you’re going to have a booking system either just say takeaway is unavailable that day, actually update the social media or actually release slots?

It’s a shame because the food...