Applebee's Grill + Bar — Restaurant in Renton

It's hard to find good help these days, isn't it? Service and food was uncharacteristically slow for this Applebee's. My husband's half rack of ribs was barely warm, the fries were cold (but tasted good). I had the Parmesan Shrimp and 8 oz steak, presumably they allowed his food to sit while they cooked mine. Doubtful it was 8 oz. to begin with. I was worried about it being too much food but it was meager portions. We asked for waters at the beginning of the order which were never brought. Someone else besides our server (who never gave us her name) brought the food. We were long done and put the dirty plates at the edge of the table. A whole bunch of employees (including our server and the hostess) walked by without taking the plates. We were still hungry, so we ordered dessert off of the device on the table, because our server still had never come back to check on us. It would be nice if we could order drink refills from this device, as is the case in other restaurants.

We asked the (still another) employee that brought the dessert to give us drink refills, since we had no waters and ours were completely empty. Finally, our server walked by to ask how we were doing. I told her that another person was already bringing us drink refills. The person who brought our dessert brought our drinks out. A few minutes later, still another person brought two more drinks out (presumably our server had half-listened to me and told someone else to get some) to us. So we had gone from having no drinks for 5+ minutes to to double drinks (we declined the third round as we wanted to leave)...and still the dirty dishes were on the outer edge of the table.

We have had several excellent experiences with male servers in the past at this location, fast food and attentive service. They were busy that Thursday evening, but they also had a plethora of staff. There was no reason for our dinner to be protracted and unsatisfying like that.

Additionally, with the desserts, the Pecan Blondie thing is shown on the menu with ice cream, but if you try to order it, the ice cream is $2.99 additional. That's misleading advertising.

We also had to deal with a nearby table of two couples that had asked to split the bill, then the server apparently only took one card and turned around and walked away and went ahead and charged both tickets to the one card. Understandably, the couples wanted to be made whole, and assured that the money would be credited (as I'm sure they had to make another "purchase" of the actual half bill, in addition to crediting the original charge). Their server came out about four times after they had finished their food. Apparently there was an assistant manager on duty who could not be troubled to come out and give the couples the answers they wanted directly (which would have negated the multiple trips the server had to make).

Next time we will go to Jimmy Mac's, where the portions are much larger, food is served hot, service more attentive, and prices...

Our server was new. (Said at the time was 1 week in) she did her job okay. (Assuming new to that kind of work so in time she'll get better) I ordered the endless wings and had the manager immediately come over to tell me they aren't too be shared. I then asked why? She said "just isn't allowed" I followed up with where does it say that? She said "They didn't think they'd have to put it on writing" with a condescending tone. I said okay. Then say said "I'll be watching the refills" and proceeded to roll her eyes and walk away. A little later the manager went to my server and started to talk badly about me calling me stupid and other inappropriate things then started to degrade the waiter saying she's not doing her job right. All of this was within eat shoot of me so I heard all of it. Through the meal the manager was giving vial looks at me and the others at my table. It took 45 minutes for the wings to come out. 30 for 2 of the 3 dishes to come out then my dish came out 10 minutes after that. The wings were hard and drenched in the honey BBQ sauce. Definitely not worth the $12.99. The broccoli always comes out cold. We asked for more wings and got more sauce then had to ask again for the wings not the sauce. (It was not loud. Maybe half full at 6-8 pm) the steak was cooked to mid-rare as asked. The hamburgers (2) one was drenched in soy sauce and BBQ sauce (mine). The second was seasoned well. Both burgers were very greasy though. I'm 50 50 on if I'd recommend the burgers. Both cooked to mid-rare as requested. So the cook they had that night knows what they are doing. After my meal I talked with another manager and found out that by the body language none of the servers or male manager like the female manager due to the fact she talks bad about the customers in front of them and belittles and degrades the servers. Over all the experience was okay. The food was cooked great just not seasoned to my liking. The servers are good at their job and even under the pressure of bad managers they...

Went to the Renton Applebee’s on 6/28, which happened to be the hottest day of the year, over 100 deg outside. Since we do not have air conditioning in our home, we wanted to go our to dinner to get out of the heat and enjoy something to eat. First of all, the restaurant was at less than 50% capacity. There were several open tables that could’ve been filled. We were told the wait was an hour and we were actually seated in about 11 minutes. I later realized they were trying to discourage people from coming in and eating in the store. Then while we were enjoying our dinner, two employees were talking with each other right next to our booth complaining that the store was open when it shouldn’t be. That it was a “health hazard” for them to be open in such extreme heat. She then went on to complain about the number of people waiting to be seated. She said “let them wait, I’m not going to help them”. Just alittle bit later, while this same employee was working the front, she actually turned people away making them wait outside in the 100+ deg heat, when there was NO ONE inside in the waiting area. That is completely unacceptable. Her customer service is terrible. I am going to contact the store manage since I have the name of the employee and I will be contacting Applebee’s corporate. This person should not be in customer service. She did not appreciate that fact that people that were suffering at home in the heat wanted to get out to get cooled off somewhat. She was complaining that she actually had to do her job. And she should be fired to making people wait out in the heat when there was absolutely NO reason to. I do not recommend this store at all and will not...