Chili's Grill & Bar — Restaurant in Crystal River

My Wife and I took 2 of our kids to Wiki Wachee to see the mermaid show. We had a good time but were hungry when we left.

We drove back home and stopped at this Chilli's on the way. We were seated pretty fast, in under a minute. My son and I went to the boys room to wash up while the girls settled in. Typically my wife orders the drinks. Not today. I came back and asked if she did but they had not came to get the drink orders. They did not come to get our drink orders for almost 10 minutes. We had been out in the sun and were hungry as it was already 2:45 and at breakfast by 9 am.

The girl finally comes and apologizes explaining she had broke a plate and got distracted and for got to tell the server we were here. The server had already be by the table quite a few times and ignored us.

We order our drinks and our meals at this time. My wife and I both got the potato soup with our meals. Waitress asked if we wanted it our first as an appetizer, we said yes. After at least 15 minutes she tells us they were our and are making it fresh. Great. Or you could have offered an alternative. When the soup comes 5 minutes later it is cold. So we sent it back. Luckily the food was there with in 60 seconds after the appetizer.

We sent the soup back. After that the manager came out apologizing profusely. She told us that is not the kind of service they normally have. That they normally get great reviews. She offered to let us have free desserts, we declined as we are on some what of a diet and did not want it. I simply asked her to remove the soups from out ticket. No problem.

We finally finished and got our ticket. We were charged full price and did not get the soups removed. We simply paid the $26.47 with cash and left the waitress the $0.53 tip. Not be cause she deserved it but we did not want to wait for her any more. We just wanted to leave.

The food was not bad. Typical chain food, save for the cold soup. The servers were all "teenie boppers" that by our observation were more concerned with chatting with each other talking about how they only took the job since they were told they could make good money and had never worked at a restaurant before, than they were about actually EARNING nice tips.

Had we not been neglected on our drinks we would have gotten chips and queso or some other appetizer, but by waiting so long we just wanted to order and get out.

We always tip 20% so even at our small ticket the girl would have gotten $5 rather than $0.53. If they would have taken our drink order faster she would have gotten even more on the tip as the bill would have been larger and her 20% would have been more.

It is obvious to me as this place is in need of a new GM that can lead and set a level of expected service. We were very...

Normally, I love Chili's and would have given them a better review. However, on this trip I placed an order with someone who treated me like I was an annoyance rather than a welcomed guest. When I arrived I wasn't acknowledged by anyone. I could see into the kitchen from the "To Go" area they could see me as well...yet they didn't open the door to say anything to acknowledge me and my son. In fact, they were in the kitchen laughing and talking amongst themselves. When a waitress came out; I thought, " Okay, finally someone will acknowledge us!" However, she walked right past us and kept on going. She didn't acknowledge us even with a smile. 😞 A few more minutes went by with us just watching them in the kitchen laughing and talking amongst themselves. I thought about opening the door and asking if we were ever going to be acknowledged! Then finally the To Go person came out (Now mind you he looked at us several times from the kitchen)and asked if we wanted to place a To Go order. I asked him if he was the manager. He said "No, " I said I wanted to speak to a manager. I made him aware of what I had seen. I also made him aware of the fact that I had already placed an order and was there to pick it up. I paid for the order...I did add a very small tip only 10%. Because I have worked in the service industry myself and I understand that servers need their tips to make rent, etc. I normally tip much better... However, your establishment and your staff have a ZERO sense of urgency. Maybe your staff including your manager have forgotten the real reason they have a job....CUSTOMERS!! We make your paycheck!!! I watched your To Go person explain to your manager why I wanted to speak to him. Even he treated us like we didn't matter. He heard and then walked somewhere in the kitchen. I couldn't see where and then he came back into view he looked at me and noticed I wasn't leaving until he came out and spoke with me. He finally succumbed to the fact that I wasn't leaving until we had a conversation. And, had the conversation gone in a more positive direction I would not be writing this review right now. Maybe it's time to make some changes? Looks like complacency has taken hold of your establishment. I hope your able to turn...

Arrived at 12pm for lunch. To Start the menus were greasy and so was the table menu inserts. NASTY! We ordered sodas while we waited and they came back tasting watered down and nothing like soda should. That was only the start. We waited for another party to arrive who walked in the door at 12:08. We placed the order for lunch specials and waited... and waited... At 12:11 our order was placed. However the kiosk did not start registering for another 10 minutes so apparently the server didn't put it in immediately as any good location would have done. After complaining to another staff member at 12:38 we were still waiting for our soup with lunch, the soup FINALLY comes out COLD at 12:41pm! I advised her at that point it was too late and she stated (with attitude in her voice) I will tell the manger to come speak with you) and walked away. We were on lunch break and could not wait. The manager was the only one who seemed sorry at that point but clearly the employees do NOT care about customer service because immediately after they were bad mouthing us not realizing we were still there getting someone else to go order for them. We told the manager we wanted to pay for our sodas and then we left. At that time we went to the carry out to pick up food for another staff member and clearly overheard them badmouthing us as the "impatient party" who couldnt wait 13 minutes" Clearly we were there for 41 minutes! Not 13. It is not the customers fault a server didnt input the order in a timely fashion! . It should not take 30 minutes to bring out COLD soup when the place was half empty and so was the parking lot. Completely unacceptable and the audacity of the employees badmouthing a customer is far worse. I can promise them corporate will hear about that. We have the audio recording to prove it! This reflects on the poorly trained staff and on the...