The Owls at Standish — Restaurant in Wigan

We have been going to the Owls for years but won't be returning.

We had booked a table for Mothers day, unfortunately on arrival in the reception area our infant son vomited all over the floor (we think he must have been feeling unwell and the car journey there finished him off - unfortunately he's too young to tell us). Before we took him outside to clean him up, I reported it to the two members of staff behind the reception desk. Both of whom were totally unresponsive and unfriendly.

After cleaning him (and ourselves!) up we decided that is was best to take him home as we weren't sure how sick he was and also we felt that it wasn't appropriate to stay given that he could have been sick again in front of other diners. I reported this to the two miserable staff behind reception and yet again was met with little reaction aside from having my receipt (for the deposit I had paid the previous week) snatched from my hands.

Later we decided to contact the restaurant to share our disappointment with the service received and asked if it was possible to get a refund on the deposit (as we had actually turned up) or get a partial refund or even knock a certain amount off our bill when we next visited the restaurant (we live locally and have been many times over the years). Both myself and my wife had shared several messages across the day with the Owls and they refused any sort of request for reimbursement and, whilst attempting to dress it differently, they essentially blamed us for having had to clean up after our sick child which we thought was out of order. Despite escalating it to management level, we were still treated with contempt.

For the sake of the deposit, which was £15, the restaurant would rather lose customers and have negative reviews than offer some form of compromise which seems to defy common sense.

As for the food on offer, it's cheap and cheerful. Reasonable value for money and quality that matches the prices on the menu. It's just a shame that the place has disappeared up it's...

Visited yesterday and will not be returning.

You can ignore the Guinness pump on the bar for it is a mere prop. I ordered a pint, turned around and saw them pouring it out of a can. They then refused to allow me to change my drink and offered me unwanted advice about it being okay out of a can.

One of the party ordered the steak pie. The waitress came to the table and advised they had run out. A different selection was made and she returned to the bar to calculate the difference in cost. She then came back to the table to collect the princely sum of 25 pence. Yes, she made the journey to the table to demand 25 pence. She wasn't even slightly perturbed by us frantically searching for 25 pence in change. She stood there, waiting patiently, for the 25 pence to be paid. Not for one second do I think that she would have refused a card payment either, should we not have been able to find it in loose change.

An 83 year old lady was then served chips, despite her ordering new potatoes. Still visably proud from being able to offer worldly advice on drinking from a can, the waiter, on this occasion said in a very condescending way, "oh, so would you like me to change them for potatoes, well I'll have to ask him". No apology whatsoever...

What a frightful service. The waitress had a 'I don't want to be here and I don't really care for your custom' look about her and the waiter's advice on drinking from a can and frightfully patronising attitude to an elderly lady was just unwanted.

Sadly, not wanting to make a fuss or cause further embarrassment to my party means that I'm now confined to retrospectively complaining via an online review.

A small footnote - why that pond has not been fenced off or filled in is beyond me. It's a accident waiting to...

Was invited to a meal there. Only a very, very limited Sunday menu only was available with two courses for £14.00 (or it was around that figure). Incredibly limited choice of 6 starters and 8 mains. (Three of which were Sunday lunches.) We didn't fancy any of the starters on offer, so we got garlic bread, which was awful. The dough base wasn't cooked properly, and it tasted like raw garlic had been rubbed on it as opposed to a warm garlic butter. I like garlic, but this was just overpowering, and the taste stayed in my mouth throughout the meal (and next day) despite rinsing my mouth several times and cleaning my teeth multiple times. It was also caked in dry small pieces of parsley (the type that comes in bottles from the supermarket), which I inadvertently inhaled causing a coughingfit! . I had a "bacon chop" chips, and veg. The "chop" was a small piece of gammon. I suspect the chips were frozen chips cooked in the oven. Mainly small pieces of potato that didn't taste of anything My meal came out 5 mins after everyone else's after they tried to serve me a turkey roast and were disbelieving when I said I didn't order that! On a plus note, we had puddings, which were nice! The building and surrounding area are nice, but it's not somewhere I'll be going back too. It is truly a story of "you get what you pay for." Maybe focus on food quality, and I'm sure people would be happy to pay a bit more for a decent meal. As always with these reviews, this was my own experience. Others may have had a...