Carmelo's — Restaurant in Maryland

The food is always delicious. The service is always terrible.

The manager, Julie, is awful and does not know how to speak to people. She and her staff messed up my order, had me drive all the way back, only to try to force me to pay the difference on an error that they made after I was told on the phone that they would contact the manager to have the difference waived. When they said they would not waive the charge, I asked for a refund of my entire charge so I could take my business elsewhere. They then claimed they never made such a claim.

The young woman who took my order claimed she would be fired. I told them I would just pay the $8 difference and go home and never come back again. The manager, Julie, was out right aggressive, told me I was lying about what has transpired, and that I was “too angry to deal with”. I informed her that I have had problems with wrong orders in the past and she pulled or a binder of complaints claiming that if that was true my name would be in this binder. She then said that I wasn’t in there. She continued to argue with me, and to drag along the argument. I told her several times to either give me my dishes, or my refund and to let me leave. I believe her intention was to make me so angry that I left with neither.

It was a complete mess. It could have been easily recitified if cooler heads on the part of management and staff has prevailed. The best part is, that after I demanded a refund, I was given back almost $20 less than what I actually paid ( which had included a $10 tip that I gave them initially) ... and then accused of “not paying for meals I forced them to remake”.

This is only the most recent of terrible service (I have had two terrible experiences in the past. One in which myself and a friend sat at a table for 30 minutes and were never served and got up and left, and the other in which we were brought the wrong food for a delivery and then were told we had to pay for both the wrong meal and the correct one- this one was fixed and should have been in the stupid binder) and I have had at this restaurant. This time, however, they literally short changed me money, fought with me, insulted me, called me a liar and I still left with nothing but tears and frustration and $20 less than I came in with.

I do not recommend ever, ever eating here. We try every 3 months to see if it has gotten better... and it...

If I could give this place negative 5 stars I would. The absolute WORST customer Service experience in my life. To make an insanely long story short, the “manager/owner” is probably to worst human being in baltimore. For religious reasons, I don’t eat pork. I was unaware there was pork in a specific dish and simply asked to just swap for something different. I didn’t even need them to refund the extra money I paid to make an even exchange. I was content with getting an entirely different dish. She proceeds to be condescending towards me and basically wants me to pay for a different dish for half off and keep the one that I can not eat. Why would I pay for something else if I’ve already paid for something I cannot eat. Either way words were exchanged and as I’m leaving she wants to continue to be rude and say “maybe if you ate pork your attitude would be better”. Like as a “manager” how can you say that to a paying customer (because she said, without me asking, that she wouldn’t give me a refund even though that’s not what I wanted in the first place). TRASH experience. Never...

Never again. If you have children 2 or 3 years old go somewhere else. We went at noon and there were 2 people eating. First we were told no wait staff, so come up to the counter. Yes. the children were starting to get restless, but would have settled down after the food came out. We were told by the guy at the front if they didn't be quiet, we would have to leave. I would have canceled the order, but my niece said to pack it up for carryout. Then she took the kids out to the car. And we got them 2 Mac and cheese kids meals. Came right from the Kraft Mac and cheese box. You think an Italian restaurant could have something a little better. Use to be a nice restaurant. No more. There are too many other nice Italian restaurants around. And before anyone says the kids should behave, I have been in restaurants where kids 5 and 6 have been loud and running around. They are learning. 2 and 3. And we were going to leave before Jack of all trades (hostess, waiter,cook and cleanup person)...