Arby's — Restaurant in Lakeland

For the first time ever patronizing your restaurant I had a horrible experience due to the lack of basic, respectful customer service from a counterperson there who said he was the manager. This occurred on Friday night, March 28th, 2025 at 8:50 pm. When I walked in, the person behind the counter, a somewhat older, skinny Black man with dreads, instead of greeting me, stared me down in a hostile manner. I walked around to the counter and, still, not saying a word, he just kept that same stare. No "hello, how can I help you", NOTHING. It felt somewhat hostile.

Moving forward, I broke the ice and said "good evening" and stated that I wanted to order the chicken tenders and fries meal deal that I had a coupon for. He tells me "we only have curly fries". Okay. I really wanted crinkle fries, so I pulled another coupon for your mozzarella sticks deal and ordered that. He then tries to charge me more than the coupon, which is for 4 mozzarella sticks for 2.29. He rings up 2.99. I tell him, "no, it's supposed to be the price printed on the coupon", which I hold up to show him. It then becomes clear that he doesn't know how to process the coupon sale, but at some point he figures it out. After that, I tell him I'd like marinara sauce and he says "we don't have any marinara sauce". I'm pretty sure there's got to be some somewhere in one of your storage areas, no? He made no attempt to even try to accommodate that or anything I was ordering fully, even from the first attempt to order chicken tenders and fries. On that count, couldn't he have at least offered to make the other type of fries and/or told me "crinkle fries will be a 10 minute wait", etc? I've never come in there and had anything ordered just flat out refused like this man did, making no effort to even try to provide those things. Just "we don't have that" Period. Right then, I just canceled the order and left.

My main issue, though, was his attitude. Very unprofessional, somewhat hostile and just plain rude. All the other times I've come into your Arby's the counter people have been exceptionally pleasant, professional and a pleasure to deal with. This experience I had here the other night was a first. In my opinion, if he truly is a manager, he needs to be retrained. From A to Z, what I experienced with this manager person, an older black man with dreads that appeared to be in his 40's, was just inexcusable. He gave no f's about how he was treating me as a customer, and this interaction with me was inexplicable, I could not understand why there was this hostile attitude. By the way, all of your counter people greet and say hello when we walk in the door. This man doesn't seem to understand that this is part of business and customer service? Just very basic? I ended up going across the street to Wendy's. I hesitate to come back to your store after this, honestly. There was no call for what I experienced there a...

This is a review of an Arby's restaurant located at 3524 Lakeland Highlands Rd, Lakeland, FL 33803, regarding an order placed at 7:03 PM Friday, January 3, 2025. The restaurant was not busy, and there were about three customers dining inside.

We ordered two of Arby's "Limited Time" Crispy Fish Sandwiches, one Classic Roast Beef sandwich, one Classic French Dip & Swiss sandwich (which comes with a cup of Au Jus), a large order of Mozzarella Sticks, a large order of Crinkle Fries, and an assortment of condiments to go with everything.

Except for the Au Jus, the whole order was crammed into one bag that had to be taped shut with stickers.

All condiments (10 packets of ketchup, 8 packets of Arby's sauce, 3 tubs of marinara sauce) were thrown on top of/into the open containers of cheese sticks and fries.

First, that is gross and not sanitary. Second, cold and cool condiments should not be thrown on top of or into the containers of hot foods (or what was supposed to be hot foods).

The fries and cheese sticks were warm at best. I know this because I tried them on the way home.

The two fish sandwiches were in the bottom of the sack, and by the time we got home, they were smashed completely.

The French dip sandwich was shoved sideways down into the bag.

The classic roast beef sandwich was the only food that was left decent enough to eat out of the whole bag.

The total price before the coupon was $31.04. Even though I used a "reward" to get 25% off, which brought the total to $24.91, this is still quite a bit to pay for food that was mostly not fit to eat.

I thought Arby's was supposed to be a higher-class fast food restaurant, but this particular store proved me to be wrong. It doesn't begin to compare to a Culver's or Chick-fil-A store. Just simply splitting this order and using an additional bag for packing would have been beneficial in keeping the food fit to eat. Given the food's price, I believe the cost of using another bag in which to package the order would have been justified.

When I went into the store to pick up the order, there were a handful of employees standing huddled around a cell phone in the background. None of them looked up to greet me as I came in. I tried to get their attention so I could ask if the smaller bag was mine, too. However, I had to open it to see for sure. Luckily, it was mine. Otherwise, I would have been opening another customer's food bag.

Service and food at this location were a huge disappointment.

This trip was a waste of hard-earned money and...

Daytime crew: 5/5 Nighttime crew: 1/5

Ate there once during lunch, it was busy but good.

Just got nighttime dinner and here are the issues:

Service started off poor. Could see employees "horseing around" play-fighting through the windows. I am all for camaraderie at work but when you're visible to the public there are certain expectations even when it is slow.

Then at drive through it was obvious the person taking orders was either distracted or didn't care much, because after giving an order for an item the response was, "yeah". When ordering a meal normally you are asked for which fries, what drink, and if you want anything else. None of that happened. When I ordered the meal I got a single "yeah" and then nothing, so I stated curly fries - "yeah" - and after another pause I said my drink.

At the drive through I was handed food before giving payment, so as I reached out with my card they had both hands full of food and drink, so I had to fumble to try and take the food and exchange the card.

Now the food: fry oil was off. Maybe old or dirty or burnt, but fries tastes like burnt oil. Fries also weren't even filled up in the cup. The drink was the wrong one. And the double cheddar was just a double, no cheddar.

Nobody was mean or rude per se, but service was way off the mark and food items were incorrect.

C'mon Arby's, you're new here. Get...