El Vaquero Mexican Restaurant — Restaurant in Columbus

As a business, if you feel the need to pass along a 3% surcharge for the processing of credit cards, you should just close your business because that's something that should be "built into" the cost of the dishes you serve!!! As a former shift manager of a restaurant, I think this is very sheisty to allow customers to order food and eat, expecting them to tip their servers to then get the bill only to find out that there's an additional "3% surcharge" for using a credit card. It is grossly unacceptable to expect customers to outright pay your fees like this, and in a society where most people don't carry cash, it's disgusting that you'd even pull this b.s. on your customers. You're a sit-down restaurant and in my opinion, more of a classy place, and I understand that the prices of your food is a bit more expensive than bigger chains might be. But for you to expect your customers to pay the prices they pay, then blindside them with a "surcharge" is disgusting!! Do you realize that most of your servers are probably losing money, because like us, they see that "hidden fee," then take that amount off of their server's tip?!?! You're going to eventually hurt your own business and your employees by continuing this practice. Plus it's deceptive to not have it made clear when walking into your restaurants that there is a "credit card surcharge." This should be something that is posted and very visible to your customers when walking into your restaurants, and it is not. I'm surprised you haven't had a lawsuit against your company because of your deceptive practice. On an almost $40 check, your server lost $2 in tips because of it. Also, it's absolutely ridiculous that your restaurant, or at least the Dublin location doesn't have coffee creamer for customers who order coffee, at least half & half, at a minimum. Not everyone drinks their coffee black. And servers should never pour milk into a portion cup and bring it out in their hands...it should be brought out on a tray, same with drinks. Should be brought out on a tray. Not in their bare hands. I'm ServSafe certified and some of the things I saw are things that could easily cause cross-contamination, and I'm sure you don't want people to get sick and file lawsuits against your company. In addition, once we were seated, it took forever for us to get our drinks ordered, and it took forever to get our drinks. Our server only checked on us once after we got our food and when we got our check. I asked for a box for my food and the chips and got a paper bag for the chips and a box for my food. But wasn't given anything to put the remaining salsa in. The food was good and had a good flavor....but the service, the risky behavior (poor food/health safety handling), and the deceptive/hidden CC surcharge will keep me from ever stepping another foot into their restaurants again, unless I'm notified by them, that these things have been addressed... including the CC surcharge. Their servers, bartenders and cooks need to go through ServSafe or some sort of food safety courses. I sent a complaint to them via their website and am waiting for...

TL/DR: Bad service, bad food, and a bummer because we go there often.

I hate doing this. I’ve worked in bars and restaurants my entire professional life. I know there are off nights, I get that. But, yikes.

Honestly just a really terrible experience. We didn’t get our app until after our food came out, and we saw him ring it in after we mentioned it. My meal was the wrong entree, and when I said something as he was setting it down, he told me that I ordered the wrong thing. Which I definitely didn’t, I get the same thing every time, because it’s usually great. My husband’s meal was just bad, he got the mole and it was aggressively sweet, and wet? Like, very wet. Which is what it is, sometimes you don’t like something or it’s just not good, but not a write off offense in a terrible experience, and it was just sauce poured on the (wet) boiled chicken. Which is not how their chicken entrees usually come.

As he took away his full plate of food once we told him that no, we don’t want a box, he joked about us getting dessert and tequila, which was pretty rude considering he should have probably just asked why he ate nothing of what he was served. And, we asked to watch the World Series instead of the news, which I know is an extra request, and would be annoying if they were busy… But one of the three servers standing at the host stand talking to each other because there was one other table in the whole place said they would take care of it, and I said “no rush, take your time” and they definitely did. We were there for at least 45 minutes and nobody changed it.

We didn’t ask for a discount, we got everything we ordered, eventually, even if it was bad. But we didn’t even have an opportunity to tell anyone that our experience was terrible, because nobody asked.

The staff is usually rude, but the food is usually good, fast, and correct, so we don’t really care. Tonight was just awful, and unfortunately worthy of a bad review. It’s a bummer, because it’s nice to have a place to get good queso and margaritas that’s right around the corner from our house. Guess we will drive the extra bit to Cuco’s, Los Guachos, or La Casita...

Hello my name is Tom Johnson and I can say that el vaquero is one of my restaurants! It's hard for me to make it to a vaquero because of my job but when I do get a chance i always go to one! This location was by far my favorite one! When I get to catch my wife for lunch we will usually meet at this one! Lisa said this place felt like home, place where you could eat lunch and your server would always make you feel special! this week my daughter was in town and Lisa and I wanted to take our daughter here, but the restaurant wasn't the same anymore! We noticed that the usual manager wasn't there anymore! We were very sad to not see mike there anymore! I loved going in and sitting at the bar and having a nice convo with him, I'm sadden to not see him there anymore! He always took good care of customers there!!!! When we went this past week my daughter mentioned to me that one of the guys out on platform smelled like alcohol when he spoke to her! When we finally got a chance to talk to him his breathe did smell like alcohol, i don't know if their employees are allowed to drink on the job, but we found this to be very unprofessional! This has never happened Before? He has Gage's and tattoos on his arm and was thin, I wouldn't bring my grandkids again if he were there! I wish the old staff was here because this place isn't the same I was going to hold one of my biggest meetings at the restaurant with about 30-40 People! I was super excited to have the people that work for me come and try this place out!!! But I have chose to hold it at chilis this year because of the big change! I honestly hope that el vaquero gets things together because this is the second bad experience and it's starting to get to a point where we might not be loyal customers as we have been...