Long John Silver's | KFC — Restaurant in Orlando

I made a big mistake and gave them another chance (they have failed often in the past). Did not go well. Arrived at 8:45 pm (they close at 10:00 pm). Stood at the front counter for nearly two minutes before a worker finally noticed me standing there and came over to take my order. I asked for the fish and shrimp platter. The worker's response was just four words ... "no long john silvers". Nothing else. If they are not offering ANY Long John Silver's items an hour and a quarter prior to closing, why don't they lock the door and close for the evening? This had happened to me once before, but much, much earlier in the day.

Could be the result of persistent supply chain issues, or franchise owner not paying their bills so they cannot buy food supplies, or who knows. One thing for sure, it is just another example of how the majority of usa businesses have fully embraced taking their customer base for granted over the past 15 to 20 years. Covid amplified their poor attitude exponentially, but we all cut them some slack at the time since they were the "heroes" who decided to continue making money by keeping their doors open and considering themselves to be "an essential business." Well, it has been nearly five years since covid hit the usa, with nearly all precautions and restrictions having ended nearly three years ago. Despite this, many businesses continue to use it as a convenient excuse for their declining levels of customer service, care, and product quality. Just raise prices far in excess of the rate of inflation, and provide smaller portions to maximize profit. The largest companies in this country, despite their constant complaining about "tough times", are making more money each year than ever before. Besides the company making more, they have also managed to greatly increase the paychecks and bonuses of executives ... who are, may I remind you, NOT the owners of the company, but rather are employees. Increased paychecks for the bulk of employees at most companies? Not so much.

Unfortunately, my willingness to overlook major flaws with this KFC/LJS location has ended. I waited far too long ... should have written them off a long time ago. Just another business that has adopted the modern customer service policy of "they are only customers ... they'll just have to take what are willing to offer and be grateful for it."

Please sir, can I...

Okay, for real, this joint was a clown-house even before the pandemic, but now, they just seem plagued with low staffing and low supplies. Dunno if the Long John's menu is even active. I dip in once every six weeks, and while the existing staff is cheerful and doing all they can, the orders are always messed up. That is, when they are open and when they have things to order. Tonight, I just ordered some chicken fingers, and ended up waiting about half an hour in the parking lot. Even though two staff members came out to ask me what I wanted for my side item (they had no fries), I said mac-n-cheese would be fine, but ended up with half a portion of mashed potatoes. And the chicken fingers tasted like they'd been sitting out for awhile. Pretty dry. Would have helped if they'd actually put some sauce in with the order. A couple months ago, I showed up around 7:30PM, and while the lights were on, no one was working. One time before that, I showed up at noon, and the guy smoking near the dumpsters said they weren't open yet. The highlights of the visit this time was getting serenaded by a drunk cougar fighting with her old man in the parking lot, and the nearly naked young man that burst from the bathroom and may have stolen a bike with no seat parked right outside the door. Of course, I can't fault the store for its clientele, but I added the anecdote for its ambiance of waiting a fairly long time for what I thought might be the easiest pick...

Very disappointing. We pull up and a man with no shirt on waves us to the drive-thru. We reluctantly go to the drive-thru and they can't recognize the current promotions. We finally settle on an order. They hand us 1/2 of the order and say the rest will be right up. 10 minutes later, they park us. 5 minutes later they finally come out with the rest of the order. I had to point out that the first half of the order was now cold. The person walked away without even acknowledging the problem. I went inside and found that they had, at least, begun working on getting replacement fries. A very frustrating experience. The food is good. The service is lackluster and uncaring. I hope they figure out how to have the service match the quality of their food.

Update --- no real improvement. It took over 20 minutes to simply place our order. They did not have most drink options available. Food was ok, but it really doesn't make up for the lack of service. It was an off time and the lobby was dirty. By the soda machine it was soaked on the floor. Not sure if someone spilled, or there was a leak. I do know no one made any attempts to clean it while...