Arturo's Mexican Restaurant — Restaurant in New Bern

MAKE SURE TO CHECK YOUR BILL!! We came here last night for the first time, we were hoping to find the perfect, little hole in the wall Mexican restaurant, but trust me this ain’t it! We were greeted with an annoyed “how many”, the waitress pursued two tables together, threw menus on the table and walked away. Five seconds later, while we were still trying to get the kids situated she wanted to take our order, we haven’t even had the chance to look at the money. We kindly asked her to return as this is our first time there. Took her a sweet 25 minutes to even come back and grab our drink order. We ordered everything at the same time. Once food and drinks arrived considerably fast after that, that was pretty much the last time we saw our waitress. No refills, no second round offerings, but especially no making sure if we liked the food. The shrimp tostadas were awful, the shrimp tasted microwaved, frozen shrimp that had been in the freezer for a decade. The kids Mac n cheese, were so dry and overcooked that you couldn’t even grab it with a fork. The real struggle started, when we saw our bill though, they added items, we never ordered, added price increases to at least 5 of the items. We tried to bring it to our waitress attention, we she simply didn’t care and pointed us to the front. We spent about 30 minutes up front, the cashier was awesome. He deserves a raise! But wait until you meet ARTURO, the Arturo!! Owner of the establishment.after bringing to his attention, that we were overcharged on almost half our bill, he annoyingly responded, it’s just a little bit extra, how about you charge, what’s advertised on the menu and not what you please? He charges you a credit card surcharge, which I’m a big fan and supporter of, but he also charges you that on DEBIT CARD payment, which is highly illegal in the state of North Carolina. He wanted to blame it on the system and I even wanted to show him, it has nothing to do with the system, one click and you turn it off, knowing really well, because WE HAVE WORKED WITH THE SYSTEM. Adding random prices to items and charging a non cash adjustment on debit card payments is stealing people’s money and putting it in your on pocket. It’s illegal to do so and I kindly asked him to take it off, he refused and a complaint is filed with North Carolina Attorney General’s Office. We really believe in giving small businesses a chance, supporting local. But it’s the honest, hard work that makes you successful. Not stealing peoples money, with shady things like that. Always check your bill, when you go there or try to avoid giving Arturo your business all together, this man is rude and does not care about customer service at all. We disputed the charge with our bank, theft is...

I understand lots of people enjoy this place. I’ve had the place recommended to me multiple times, but each visit in the past year has only ever been okay. Service is always poor (not rude, just inattentive) and the food is mediocre. I guess going there on Friday the 13th was asking for trouble, but I had to work later and few restaurants have late hours aside from those downtown. So we decided a margarita sounded nice and to give the place another shot.

Tonight, we frequently wondered if we could get an app called Find My Waiter, because ours was nowhere in our vicinity. It turned out he was just hanging out with the others at the bar. With Mumfest in full swing, it wasn’t very busy here, although we were giving him the benefit of the doubt until we went to the restroom and discovered where he’d hidden away.

The food was about as expected. Nowhere as good as you’d hope it to be but okay enough that, for the price, it’s all right. Except for the steak milanesa, which was, frankly, a choking hazard. We all tried a bite and agreed. Normally, when you let the waiter know you don’t like something, they simply apologize, offer to remake it, and accept when you don’t want a substitute. Here, the manager/supervisor came over to let us know we should have ordered the chicken milanesa, everyone likes that. We said that we’d ordered the steak version elsewhere without problem and no we didn’t want the chicken. Then he said we should have ordered it medium-rare instead of well-done? It's a thinly pounded piece of beef that’s breaded and fried. Seems like there's just done and overcooked. I don’t know what to take away from that, but we let him know the waiter never asked how we wanted it cooked.

If this man hadn’t come out and tried to tell us what we did wrong by ordering food off their menu, I wouldn’t have felt motivated to leave this review. But how can you stand by what you sell if you try to tell us that we made a mistake by ordering beef and not chicken when you offer it on your menu?

Also, they charge you for fountain waters. We ordered alcohol. Of course you want water when ordering a beer and a pitcher of margaritas. Only fifty cents a glass, but our waiter was never around to give a refill, so it just feels a bit like adding insult to injury by the end of the meal. If your bottom line is bad enough that you gotta charge for tap water, just raise the menu prices. They’re more than fair as is.

Anyway, I hope maybe you’ll choose to improve your business. Maybe don’t make the customer feel like they did something wrong when your kitchen overcooked an order. You won’t lose much from us. We weren’t regulars, but we aren’t ever...

This was a very disappointing decision. I ordered the Fajita Texan after asking questions about what comes with the dish. I was told that it'd be ready in 15 minutes. I arrived at the drive thru window about 20 minutes later. I was greeted at the window by a young man who asked for my order number. I told him, then he said, just a sec. Next a young lady came to the window, gave me my total, took my card and asked me to give her a minute. I waited 4 minutes at the window. Finally an older gentleman came to the window and asked if I'd been helped. I told him that I was waiting on my food. Again he asked, but have you been helped. The repeat was weird, but I said yes. After several more minutes the young lady returned with my card and my receipt. She handed me the bag. I handed her the signed receipt and left. When I got home (less than 2 minutes later) and opened my bag, my food was barely warm. Which begged the question what had I been waiting for. What took so long. There were no soft tortillas in the bag at all. The dish itself boasted steak, chicken and shrimp. Must be a shrimp shortage. 3 popcorn shrimp. When I called, I never mentioned the 3 shrimp, but I did ask why I didn't get any tortillas. I was told that previously tortillas came with that meal, but ppl were throwing them away. How the heck would they know what someone is tossing on to go orders? Even if that was their baseless perception, why wouldn't they ask the customer whether or not they wanted tortillas. I was told that if I wanted to return, one would be free since previously it was a part of the dish. I would need to pay for any additional ones. To shorten this, the food left everything to be desired and the service was below subpar. Never again. 10 out of 10 would...