Jones Barbeque — Restaurant in Seattle

Worse service experience in my life. Do not eat here. Intimidating, ruse, and threatening staff.

I recently purchased a Groupon for "football special" barbeque bar for my husband's birthday

I followed the instructions on the Groupon and ordered at least 72 hours in advance. The ordering process was seamless and pleasant.

On Saturday morning I received a voicemail from the same woman I placed the order with who let me know my total (taxes plus I added on a cake) and advised me to pay with cash or check and confirmed my order would be ready at 5 (the party started at 7).

I showed up a little after 5 and waited about 10 minutes as a new employee helped the two customers ahead of me. This gave me time to write out my check. My order was ready - I could see it waiting on the counter. The new employee seemed a little confused as to how to ring up my order and asked a more experienced female employee.

As the woman rang me up, I reminded her I had a groupon and handed her the groupon and check. She told me they do not accept checks. I told her about the voicemail I had received and said maybe it was because a catering order. I also said I would be happy to pay with a card. She went in to the back to check with someone and came back and told me that the owner that was there (Chase) said the groupon was not valid.

I was confused and explained there had not been any issues when I said I had a groupon when I placed the order (the woman on the phone even walked me through what was and was not included) and the expiration date had not passed.

This is when things got really weird.

Chase came out from the back and agitatedly told me that the groupon was fake and that he had never put it out. I pointed to the phone number on the groupon and said that was the number I called, explained that I had received a confirmation voicemail and pointed out that they had my order ready AND that a note on it said the amount I still owed, which was the same as the amount on my check. He then said I was a liar and repeated that the groupon was fake. He also said, "We don’t have a football special and it isn’t even football season." When I asked him to talk to catering or call the number he told me to get out of the store. When I continued to talk and try to explain the situation, he kept yelling at me to get out and then threatened to call the police.

I left the store and called the number on the groupon. Luckily, the woman answered. I explained the situation and she was also confused and said that they had catering customers pick up at the store before. I asked her to stay on the phone and explain the situation to him. When I walked back in and tried to hand the phone to Chase, he again called me a liar, refused to speak to the woman, said he didn't know who she was, again told me to get out, told another employee to call the police, and got in my face and continued to yet all me (Note - I am a 40-something woman and he is a muscular man).

At this point I was near tears. I went to my car and, thank goodness, the woman from catering reached out to her brother, one of the owners, and got the situation handled. One of the female cashiers brought my food to my car. She apologized and said she wished she could say this was the first time something like this happened, but that Chase has a temper and won’t listen to them. By the time I got home I was still shaking. I was charged the full amount for the food (they eventually took my check) and, as goodwill, the catering woman offered to comp me the same deal in the future.

The food was good, but I do not think I can ever do business with a company that would treat customers with intimidation, rudeness, and threats when they were trying to pick up and pay for the food that they ordered through a promotion the...

Right off the top, I've been eating at this place since they opened on MLK at S. Hudson, and I will keep eating here. It's good, consistently quality BBQ. But Jones, c'mon folks, tighten it up! First off, let's properly train the counter help. Don't ignore the telephone completely. Conversely, when it IS ringing and you have a customer in front of you, and they are gracious enough to let you answer the phone, don't then proceed to ignore the customer in front of you to take the phone order. Try this instead: "thanks for calling Jones. I'm with a customer right now, can you hold?" And for goodness sake, do not then CONTINUE to ignore that customer right in front of you who allowed you to take the phone call, turn around and package up two orders, selling a drink to one of them in the process, and then finally turn to ask for my order. Which I had called in and was ready, had been sitting on the counter behind her, for more than the full ten minutes I was in there before she got around to helping me.

Needing to come back from the parking lot to pick up the bread slices I hadn't even been offered was just a little added irritation. Now, as for the food. The rib tips are just what I was looking for. Thanks, they are delicious, and the outside rib meat isn't tough and chewy as can sometimes happen with rib tips. The baked beans are fully up to Jones' standard. Not the most incredible beans I've ever had, but almost always damned good (I've had some end-of-the-shift, gluey beans before, but VERY rarely, and only at the end of a shift. They've been open for around 20 years now. Everyone is liable to slip up occasionally).

Which brings us to the coleslaw, which once WAS pretty darned good, in the semi-creamy coleslaw category. Tonight's coleslaw tasted more like somebody chopped some cabbage and dumped some pineapple juice on it to steep for a few hours. That was the only flavor I picked up. And I'm a former professional chef. When I taste something like that, I can tell if anything else had been added. The only flavor I detected was canned pineapple juice. I added some S & P, a pinch of cayenne, red wine vinegar, yellow mustard, couple pinches of celery seed, and a small scoop of plain yogurt, and now it's worth eating. Thanks for providing the base, I guess? Oh yeah, running out of sides BEFORE a normal dinner rush would start (I was there @5PM), as other customers were told while I was in there, and as is normal for this Jones kitchen, is seriously bush league for such a well-established business

Love you folks, Jones, and I am a customer for life, but holy smokes,...

Took my money, didn't deliver the order, and didn't really seem to care. I've been patronizing this restaurant for many years and liked their food. But the people I spoke to there today were unprofessional to say the least and have no customer service abilities. Tried to call back for a refund but then the line went dead and when I tried to call back the call would not go through. I just wanted dinner. And now I'll have the huge hassle of having to file a chargeback with my credit card issuer. When did dealing with Jones BBQ turn into such a massive hassle?

Backstory: I placed an online order with Jones BBQ late this afternoon. There was an option to order directly through the website - and not through a service – so I did that. I got a conformation and then, a bit later, a notification that the delivery driver was approaching with my order. Then there was another message a few minutes later saying the order was cancelled and to call Jones BBQ for more info. So I did. And I got a woman who told me very little except "We have your order here." Another woman, who was a bit more articulate, got on the line and told me that the delivery was being handled through DoorDash. I told her I didn't know that, as I had placed the order directly through their website. The charge on my credit card was from Jones BBQ. I had no idea who was delivering it. She had no explanation as to why the delivery was cancelled. Despite the fact that I had placed, and paid for, an order for delivery, all they seemed willing to say is "We have your order here." and to call DoorDash if I have questions. Unbelievable. They just don't care about customers. I'll never waste my time dealing with these disorganized, unprofessional people again. During my last call with them I asked for a refund and the woman said she took care of it. But why was I not surprised when the pending charge went through and the refund never came. The chargeback is now in progress and they've permanently lost my business.

Update: REALLY disheartening that this business has made ZERO effort to correct my experience and it seems they would rather post shrill reviews and to pay Google for my review not to appear. Wow. This business has deep levels of not caring about customers. Beware giving them your business (or your credit card...