Bank & Bourbon — Restaurant in Philadelphia

Food was good....not spectacular. Went for the Thanksgiving buffet. I first was a little irritated because I asked to seat in the half-booths by the window and the hostess said, and confirmed with another, that we could not sit there without specifying that in our resy reservation. She stated although empty, those tables were saved for those asking for a window seat in their booking. I thought, F' it, fine. Water service was quick, but I waited over 20 mins for my regular server to introduce herself and get our drink orders. I actually had to ask like 2 people to send her over. She had been in our area servicing other tables, but did not greet or welcome us in any way. Once she finally attended to us, I ordered the wine tasting offered with the buffet.

The food was good although some offerings were better than others. Overall I was satisfied. But between the table and the wait for service, the whole visit left me disenchanted. When a mother and daughter got seated in a window table across from is, I asked if she requested for or specified that before seating. The mother said "Not at all. I was surprised I got seated here. " At this point my anger was coming back and I asked to speak to the manager. He gave some nonsensical, b.s. excuse about bookings and overlooking and overlap, which completely did not address the situation. He did comp my wine tasting. Although I still had to send someone after my waitress after waiting 20 mins for a check. And she automatically assumed, without asking,my 12 year old child was an adult, so again it went back for correction. As we left, the original corner window half booth requested remained empty the entire time and was still not...

Service leaves a lot to be desired. Visited twice while I was in town for the National Black MBA Association conference. Both times, there was a very long wait to get the basics. We had to stop someone multiple times to ask for menus, water, etc. Our server was not concerned with our experience at all. When asked about the wait time on the food, she basically said it’ll get there when it gets there.

I have worked as a server in this type of environment. Things can get busy but I would never walk by a new table without even greeting them. Also, even if a table was in another server’s section, if that server needs help, anyone could walk over to give menus and water until the designated server can get there. But I guess that is not the culture of their staff.

The second time I visited, we still had to wait for the basics. & again, had to stop someone for help. This time it wasn’t busy at all so I’m not sure why it happened again. Maybe our TYPE of table isn’t high priority for them... I already knew where the rest of the night was headed if we stayed (downhill). So my colleagues and I decided to leave and walk elsewhere for dinner.

I gave 3 stars because I did like the ambiance, the offerings, presentation, & flavor of the food. I also had one interaction with a young woman who offered to check my bags for me. Not sure what her position was but she was warm, friendly, and accommodating. She was passing by and had no obligation to help (didn’t look like she was on the clock yet) but she stopped what she was doing to...

Came for restaurant week as I have been here before for restaurant week and really enjoyed it. This time though I can not say the same thing. One of the main issues was the wait, maybe it was understaffed or something but it definitely was not super crowded as I've seen Bank and Bourbon have extremely full dining rooms before and this was maybe 50%-65% full. Our reservation was for 7:30pm and we were signing the check and leaving at 10:00pm. We had ordered our food around 7:50pm so it took 2 hours for 2 apps, entree's, and dessert. There was about a 30 or so min wait between each course. There were tables that came in after us for restaurant week and left before us. Don't know why it took so long to get our food but it did not take nearly this long last time we came for restaurant week back in January.

The second issue was noise level. While there were a lot of other empty seats in the area we were in, we were sat next to a large party of at least 8. Just about everyone in the part was loud and seemed pretty intoxicated. My partner was less than 3 feet from me and we could barely hear each other speaking or the music that was playing in the restaurant.

The food wasn't a issue as bank and bourbon has good food, which is why we chose that restaurant in the first place. Main issues were how long it took to get food/service and the extremely loud party that we were sat next to. Love the food but definitely have to think very hard about if we want to...