Sonic Drive-In — Restaurant in Overland Park

I came here today, May 3rd of 2025, just before the lunch rush (around 10:20 CST) to grab a couple of drinks: 1 medium Cherry Dr. Pepper, and 1 medium Cherry Limeade.

Timeline of issues:

1: It took a while to be greeted at the drive thru board. No big deal, it happens.

2: The guy taking my order got my total wrong, and he changed it from $5 to $6ish. Again, no big deal -- it happens.

The guy brings my drinks to me, hands me a drink, and it's dripping wet and gets water all over my shorts. I immediately hand it back to him, pointing out they're both dripping wet, and asked for napkins so I could clean myself up.

He says "okay" and reaches his hand out to me -- it took me a moment to realize he's asking for payment for the drinks. Seriously? I told him I need napkins to clean myself up, to PLEASE bring me some napkins first. So he goes back inside.

He returns with the drinks, which have been cleaned off by him -- but no napkins. I asked him to please get me napkins and he responds with "but I cleaned them off inside!" .....AGAIN, seriously? I once AGAIN told him it get my pants wet and I need some napkins to clean myself off. He goes back inside.

He finally comes back with napkins. I thank him kindly, cleaned myself off, and told him he needs to take care of his customers FIRST next time before asking them for cash. However, I thanked him again, gave him my card, paid for the drinks, and left. He was shaking when he handed my card back to me, and he didn't say a word. Not "here you go," not "sorry for the inconvenience," not "thank you for coming," not "sorry I got your lap wet" -- nothing.

Got home, put the straw in my drink, and it SPILLED ON ME because the lid wasn't even attached correctly! (This is why the Food category is 1/5 stars)

Does Sonic provide zero training of any kind to their employees? The next time a worker gets water (yes, the drinks seemed to be covered in water, not soda or anything like that) on a customer's lap, a simple apology would be nice, instead of ignoring it altogether and just asking for my money first. And this isn't the first bad experience at this location -- my family and I have had MULTIPLE instances of bad service and incorrect orders over the last few months. I'm not sure why I bother returning.

Please provide basic customer service training to your workers. I know times are tough, but he acted like he was...

Updated 2/15/24: Go ahead and call me a liar because I've been back because I love Sonic and I'm lazy and don't want to drive all the way down to the one by Costco when I'm near home. So it's on me. But I have a sick kid at home. I had to go pick up groceries and thought I'd stop by Sonic and get her a cherry limeade and then thought a grilled cheese might get her to eat a little something while I was there. It wasn't even grilled! It's like they stuck it in a microwave and gave it to me. I'm paying full price for food and I'm fine waiting to have hot and fresh food! How hard it is and why is it every single time I get cold and partially cooked food?! So thank you for ruining my sick kid's lunch and making me waste my hard earned money!

This is the last time I come here. This is the closest Sonic to me and it's always mediocre. Good to go to for drinks but not food. I ordered a hamburger wacky pack for my daughter and paid $1 for cheese to be added. There was no cheese and she didn't even get her toy. My mozzarella sticks were old. I have never once gotten the marinara sauce that's supposed to come with them. I got the chicken slider, and it looks just cooked. Like I'm afraid to eat it because the chicken isn't completely white, but it's not really pink. It just has that texture like it is just barely safe enough to eat. I got two other meals. So $37 for one adult, a preteen, and two kids and to have food missing and the food we did get not even be hot and fresh because I thought they cook to order? Not worth the money. I'd be happy to wait an extra 10 minutes for quality food that I'm paying for. I didn't pay for this quality. It's a shame because Sonic in general is really good, but not this location. If it's a staffing issue, I get it. But like I said, I'm willing to wait for better quality food and to make sure I get everything I ordered the way I ordered it and preferably more fresh. $37 for lunch is just insane. $4 of that is the added nerds in the kid's...

The most recent time I've been to this Sonic location (probably back in May) and possibly the last time ever, was when I ordered online through the app and 3 out of 4 items were not fulfilled due "shortage" (If I remember it was like two corn dogs and a Sonic Blast that we did not get). Just to note, I would also partially blame the app for allowing partial orders to go through (I understand that it is probably difficult to maintain up-to-the-minute inventory) but Sonic needs to empower their stores to place blocks on items that are out of stock.

So the carhop comes to my car with one item (a Route 44 Slush) and he said unfortunately the rest of your order isn't available, go and call the support line on the app to get a refund. I asked if he could just cancel the order completely. He said no, they can't do that (I sort of find that hard to believe - again limiting the scope of power for the individual location) and walked off. When I called Sonic support, the CS representative try to give me a $5 gift card instead (which was less than what than part of the order I did not receive) as compensation. I told her that's a terrible policy and that your company is essentially ripping off your customers at the point. She eventually refunded the whole order, but only as courtesy as that is outside their policy. facepalm moment for their CS policies.

All-in-all, it's just a bad overall look for this particular location, their app (and their inefficiencies) and lastly their live in-person...