El Patrón Downtown Riverside — Restaurant in Riverside

Do not plan anything with this business! It is poorly run and the owner Santiago is extremely rude, prideful, and unprofessional! We scheduled a dinner party of 35 people. I was communicating with their event planner Evelyn via email. Everything seemed to go smooth until I sent a $300 deposit to hold the date and space. I emailed a copy of the receipt and asked for confirmation. I sent three emails and started calling. I finally was able to get Jo on the phone who was the only person that even tried to get me answers. (Thank you, Jo!) She tried to get Santiago to help me but he just got on the phone and said the event planner will call me back. I waited two days and still no call back or response via email. Jo then said she got with the manager and found the date was double booked and they couldn’t host our event after all. Although this was upsetting I just said okay and asked them to return my $300. She said Santiago would call me back but I never received a call from him. I emailed a fourth time asking them to return my money and no response. I went in today to ask them to return the $300. Santiago didn’t try to even understand the situation. He said, “if you guys didn’t show up then you don’t get the money back.” I explained the event hadn’t even happened and explained AGAIN it was the event planner (Evelyn) that made the mistake. He then said, “oh well people make mistakes.” I understand that but it doesn’t explain why you haven’t sent the money back. He started to get angry and said, are you really making a big deal out of $300?” The audacity! He then started to walk back to the kitchen and said don’t worry you’ll get your money back. I asked when and he started to yell, “do you know how busy I am and I am trying to run a business and your making a big deal out of $300!” Wow! I asked him “what if I came in and ordered $300 worth of food then walked out, would you be okay with that?” He replied, “Yes!” Soooooo everyone the take away here is, Santiago the owner of El Patron welcomes you to dine and dash! Free food for all! $300 is nothing to him especially when it’s not his money. He takes zero accountability for the mistakes of HIS team. Please save yourself the headache and don’t do business...

Went here with my husband because of all the good reviews. Found out the hard way that Saturday afternoon must not be the day to go. Upon arrival we were seated in the back left side of the restaurant which was completely empty. However, everyone that arrived at the same time as us were seated to the right of the restaurant. Shortly, after being seated a few more patrons arrived to set up for a birthday party they booked for the patio area. At that same time at least 4 possible more waitresses arrived for work. From that point on we basically didn't get service. I can understand slow or nonexistent service when restaurants are short staffed but to have 4+ waitresses standing around talking around us but also ignoring us felt like we wasted our money and time by eating here. The food wasn't good enough to come back due to the molcajeta being mostly burnt. To make things worse as we were trying to flag someone down to get our check we were asked to move so they could plug an extension cord up behind our table for the birthday party they were setting up for. My husband had to stop mid bite as some guy moved our table. Keep in mind the whole room was empty with the exception of the staff talking to each other so it could have been plugged up anywhere or they could have waited for a few minutes as we were trying to get a waitress to pay our bill. My husband doesn't get a ton of time off and it sucks they we wasted any of that time at this...

This is the worst service we’ve seen in a restaurant in years! Upon entry, the music was so loud it was difficult to communicate with staff or our group! The drinks were not the best and 2 of the tropical margaritas were sent back after the waiter was asked what the ingredients were and he did not disclose the main item that was not wanted in the drink. The waiters response was that he would get in trouble for returning drinks. ??? Why? That’s on the bartender and the waiter, not the customer. Upon receiving the bill, we see there is a $10 charge for using a credit card. This was not disclosed anywhere except on the bill. According to California Law senate Bill 478, also known as the “Honest Pricing Law”it is illegal for most businesses to charge additional fees at checkout that were not disclosed in the advertised price, this includes credit card surcharges. Businesses can’t add a disclosure statement to a menu or POS System. Non-compliance can result in fines up to $1,000 per violation. The Manager was very rude and argumentative and tried to sell us a load of BS that all California restaurants and grocery stores charge for using credit cards. I will not patronize this place again and neither will the 9 other friends at my table. I will be following up on...