Federico's Mexican Food — Restaurant in Surprise

Beware if you order ahead at this store!

I like Frederico's in general and was glad a new location on Cotton Lane in Goodyear opened within 15 minutes of where I live. That location gets five stars from me.

Last week on Sunday at approximately 4 pm, I looked online for Frederico's on Cotton Lane to call in my order. The phone number for what I now now as the Surprise location on Greenway came up. The woman who answered spoke very quickly and I could not understand her telephone greeting. I asked if this was Frederico's on Cotton Lane and she said "yes." I submitted my order and was charged $33.47 on my credit card.

20 minutes later, when I drove up to the drive-in window at the Goodyear store, I learned that my order was mistakenly called into the Surprise store, which is more than 30 minutes from where I live. I re-ordered at Goodyear and immediately called the Surprise store to explain what happened. I further explained I would not pick up my order from the Surprise store. The employee at Goodyear suggested I call back the Surprise store to request a refund. I called back. The woman I spoke with stated she did not have the ability to process the refund and instructed me to call back the next day. I asked who I should speak with and she said what sounded like "Alicia."

I called back the next day. No one answered. I received a voicemail greeting. I left a detailed message for "Alicia" and requested a callback. No one called back. I called two more times later in the same week and had the same experience. Now, eight days later, I called again and someone did answer the phone. She explained the Surprise store is at the intersection of Greenway and COTTON LANE. This explains why the person who took my order answered "yes" when I asked if this is the Cotton Lane location. After encountering pushback on my refund request, I asked to speak with a manager. I was told to call back in another hour and speak with "Ylisa" (sp?). I will try again, though it has become a frustrating process.

Admittedly, I made the mistake of contacting the wrong store because of the phone number that came up in my online search. However, now that there are two stores on Cotton Lane, any Frederico's employee at this location who takes a phone order, when asked if this location is on Cotton Lane, should proactively explain that while it is, there is another Cotton Lane location. This would avoid any confusion.

While a refund is not necessary owed in this case, it would have been a nice good faith gesture under the circumstances. Also, there is no excuse for ignoring phone messages.

UPDATE - I did hear back eventually and was provided with a store credit. I did make the one hour round trip to redeem the credit. The food had to be microwaved when I returned home with it, and was very good. Thank you to store management for making it right! The only improvement the store has to work on is responding to messages...

I don't know if they changed owners, managers, or maybe even kitchen staff...? We have been enjoying take-out from them for several years, however, I'm sad to say I think we are going to look elsewhere from now on. The past 5 orders we got from them were not correct, and since we take them home to eat, didn't realize until it's am impracticality to do anything about. So... Up until the third incorrect order in a row, I was still thinking the quality issues must have been a anomalies, flukes, and therefore ii failed to mention anything to them... While placing the fourth order, I did tell them about the previous three, the last of which we were actually charged for food that we never received. I asked if they could make up for it and not charge for that ONE item in this current order. Their response? "Do you have your receipt?" (Who would?) And anyhow, what would that prove at this point? So no, they would not do that. I placed the order anyhow, took it home, and sure enough; this order was not all correct either. Four in a row, some people would give up then, but as I said, we had been enjoying their food, with no issues for years. So for my fifth order in this scenario, I actually WROTE OUT MY ENTIRE ORDER, ITEM FOR ITEM, very legibly, and briefly mentioned the past four when ordering. This time, in addition to other problems, they left ON an ingredient that my husband is allergic to, so he was unable to even eat his. So now we are done. I feel that five bad experiences in a row, two of which they were given opportunities to make right, is more than fair. I will miss the way they USED TO BE, NOT THE WAY...

We were looking for some dinner after we realized how late it was, and decided instead of driving to Filibertos (our usual late night Mexican food) we’d try Federico’s for the first time, after reading some of the reviews.

From our first experience:

The service was friendly & prompt. However, we asked for pico, not knowing this wasn’t included and weren’t told there was an up charge of $1.99 until we got to the window and were paying. We had just pulled out of the parking lot while checking our food, since one of the only/biggest complaints here is botching orders, and noticed they had forgotten the pico we paid extra for, and gave us 2 sauces instead of 4.

Other than those two mistakes, I’d say the food was pretty great! I ordered the carne fries, and they definitely beat out Fili B’s carne fries hands down. My husband prefers the crinkle cut fries, while I prefer regular fries, which is what they serve here. That’s really up to preference— but the flavor was great and the hot sauce had a nice kick to it! My husband got a chicken taco and a beef taco, and said the beef was better than Fili B’s, and while the chicken he felt wasn’t terrible it wasn’t his favorite, it was definitely more generous when it came to the portion.

Overall, not bad at all! If we need a last minute and/or late night dinner and are craving Mexican food, we’ll definitely hit up Federico’s...