Cheung Hing — Restaurant in San Mateo

UPDATED one week later: I just checked my credit card statement, and this restaurant tacked on a 15% tip even though I absolutely DID NOT give any tips. What ludicrousy is this?!?! I am contesting this with my bank. Such practice is illegal, and this restaurant needs to go out of business.

ORIGINAL review: My god, I have never received such HORRIBLE service at a restaurant in my life. My friend and I arrived for dinner, and the place was packed, but we were not even acknowledged by the waitstaff until waiting for over 20 minutes. When we were seated, we already knew what we wanted to order since we’d looked at the menu while waiting for a table, but we had to flag them down after they didn't come take our order for over 10 minutes. Our appetizer and two main dishes came relatively quickly, but they neglected our white rice and milk tea, and we had to flag them down twice to receive these items. Finally, at the end of the meal, they placed our check on the empty neighboring table, which was so odd, and they didn't even say to us, here is your check. And they didn't even return to collect the bill—I had to go up to the front counter myself with my card to pay.

Needless to say, we gave zero dollars in tips. In fact, I wish it were possible to give negative tips for the service we received tonight. We were so stunned to the point that we were laughing our heads off after leaving, exclaiming, “WHAT service?!” The crazy thing was that none of the other tables seemed to be experiencing the same frustrations that we were. Coincidentally, most of the other customers there that evening were older Asian folks. My friend and I are Asian, but we are in our 20s and don’t speak Cantonese. We had a theory that there was some strange generational bias or racist thing going on that prompted them to completely ignore us the entire evening, which would appear to be supported by a review from just 3 days ago also criticizing the restaurant for poor service to non-Asian, non-Cantonese-speaking customers.

We absolutely will not be returning. It’s a shame because the food is quite good, but there are countless other Chinese restaurants in the area that make excellent food AND provide quality service, so we will be taking our...

I would give zero stars if I could. First of all, I absolutely love Cheung Hing for their food, but the San Mateo location is so disappointing, to the point where I won’t be going back to this specific location EVER.

I went here for dinner with my mom on New Years Eve and our food took so long to get there. There were multiple times when we had to get up out of our tables and ask our waitress for our food. After the 2nd time asking for our food, a portion of what we ordered got there. However, in order to fully enjoy the food, we had to wait for the fried rice. After what seemed like half an hour, my mom decided to get up, yet again, to ask for our food. Another waitress scolded my mom and told her that “There is only one kitchen!” Instead of being apologetic and courteous.

Once the fried rice got there, the rest of our food was already cold, so we had eat it very quickly.

To add to this horrendous dining experience, when we asked for a to go box, the same waitress who scolded my mom told our waitress to attend to another customer, resulting in our waitress practically throwing the to go box at our table so that she can multitask.

The cherry on top of this night was when we got up and waited YET AGAIN to pay the bill. We basically had to raise our voices to catch the attention of someone to get to the cash register to pay, to which the waitress who scolded my mom took her time going to cash register to ring us up. We usually give a big tip to restaurants, especially smaller businesses, but with the way we were treated that night, we left no tip.

Please don’t get us wrong, we aren’t acting like entitled brats who want to have a lavish dining experience, but when it’s extremely obvious that the workers at Cheung Hing restaurant in San Mateo are prioritizing folks who speak their language and to-go orders, such as DoorDash, the people who decide to dine in are left with extremely...

Worst service I have ever encountered, period. Made online order for one Peking Duck. Arrived 3 min early to pick up and was told by hostess to wait a little bit. OK, I was early. 10 min later, she told me the order would be ready soon. Good. Then she started to ignore me and hid in the back of the restaurant. Another 10 min passed and I had to catch another waitress to check on my order. She went to the back and came back and said it was still being worked on. I asked for a realistic time estimate so that I could decide on whether to continue waiting or go and come back later. She bluntly just ignored me. After 40 min of waiting, I had enough and asked to cancel the order and get a refund. Their answer: You have to get refund online, we don't do it here; you should ask the kitchen how much more time is needed, we don't cook the food. Seriously? Do you really work here? I then asked to speak to the manager. The answer: Manager is not here. Then a guy showed up and appeared to be in charge. I told him my experience and all he said was to wait outside. My total wait time was 45 min, for one duck, and horrible customer service. I understand delays can happen, but be transparent and respect...