Papa Gio's Pizzeria of Irmo — Restaurant in South Carolina

Since I have moved to the Irmo area I've had nothing but good things to say about this establishment...that is up until the past few months. The guest relations and customer service has gone down hill so fast that no matter how great the food may be, eating at the restaurant is an aweful experience.

After the holidays I was so excited to bring my parents here to eat. First off the beer was skunked and flat, this wasn't a huge issue because we switched to wine, but on multiple occasions this has seemed to be the case. We continued to order multiple appetizers, 2 large pizzas, as well as other dishes to share due to how delicious the food had always been. The appetizers came out first and tasted great, it did take a little longer than we had liked, but was understandable. After this is where the problems actually started; both of our pizzas were made incorrectly with the toppings being jumbled around different than we had originally ordered, my gnocchi were almost inedible because of how hard they were, and this is with us being the only people in the restaurant. I traded my gnocchi for the chicken alfredo, and we just decided to work with the pizza mistake, but at no time did any type of management come to the table to clarify or apologize for the service.

Given that I have been eating at Papa Gio's for around 3 years at this point, and loved the food I had decided to go back for pickup orders, but even this has been more of a hassle than it's worth half the time. The location claims free delivery all over the menu, sign out front, and employee shirts, but it is $1.99. It has been this way since I first went there, but given it has been multiple years, you'd think they could change it and do more than just cross it out with a marker.

Today was my final straw with the restaurant. I went in for a quick lunch while on break from my job (I am in the service industry). There was a miscommunication about my girlfriend's order and she received the wrong dish, when trying to explain the situation to the cashier she was met with conflict. There were no smiles and was told that she ordered the wrong thing and she was to blame, not being offered to replace the dish due to the miscommunication. My meal which I have ordered multiple times to-go, and usually takes about 20-25 minutes tops, took close to 40 minutes putting me behind schedule to make it back to work. When the meal was finally delivered it had a hair in it. As mentioned before I work in the service industry and a hair getting in to food is not uncommon, but at this point I am so late for getting back to work I don't have time to wait around another hour to eat.

It pains me to leave such a negative review and score for this location due to the fact it was my favorite dinner spots, but until the front of house service issues are resolved I can not recommend anyone go here for more than a pizza...

The only reason why I order from this restaurant is because I like to pay cash and not use a card and this is the only place nearby that offers different types of food other than just pizza and wings, but the service is horrible and I say this because the posted amount of time that it tells you on the website is not the time that it gives you once you have already placed your order which I find very frustrating. If you tell me my food will be there in 45 mins then after I order you give me an hour fifteen to an hour and a half and then it still comes late, then I have some issues with that. Also every time I order something that has fries, the fries are always hard, old and cold. Oh and don't get me started on if you want to cancel your order. The last time I tried to cancel because they changed my time twice the customer service representative pretty much wouldn't let me, so I got to the point where I almost didn't even want to answer the door to accept the food or pay for it. And when I asked her reason for not wanting to cancel it she said it's because the food was already ready and was about to be delivered from that point it still took another hour before I got my food (by the way the restaurant is only 5-6 mins from where I live). Whenever I order from here I always tip because its the right thing to do but I'm getting to the point where I just don't want to deal with this...

If I could give them a ZERO, no a negative -1, I would definitely apply this score to Papa Gio’s of IRMO! I’m a firm supporter of small businesses but I refuse to support businesses that refuse to keep its customers safe! I’m totally shook like my hands are shaking in utter disbelief and my appetite was decimated by the cavalier behavior displayed in this restaurant! In the past, I’ve used GrubHub for delivery but tonight, I opted to make the short trip to pick up my food and I’m so glad I did because their blatant disregard for public safety was frightening. I went to Papa Gios of Irmo to pick up an order and left feeling totally betrayed by this business who is casually dismissing health guidance in the midst of a pandemic!!! Only one staff person was wearing a mask, there were approximately 5-6 other staff members present. I inquired about the lack of masks and was informed that only the front-end (cashier) wears one so this means the cooks/chefs/delivery personnel etc. DO NOT WEAR MASKS. I did not even see them wearing gloves in the food prep area. The lack of gloves when handling food is truly disturbing but my brain is wrecked just thinking about how many other food health and safety violations are happening on a daily basis. I promptly requested a refund, I’ve lost my appetite, and WILL NEVER PATRONIZE THIS...