Edinburgh’s eteaket Tea Rooms has defended itself from an American’s harsh Tripadvisor review during Festival Fringe in August.
The middle-aged American mum from New Jersey visited eteaket Tea Rooms for a classically British afternoon tea experience about a month ago during the end of Edinburgh’s Festival Fringe. However, the experience failed to meet her expectations.
She even advised others on Tripadvisor to “pick somewhere else.”
“We each ordered our tea, which was served in weird iron pots, rather than the traditional ones I expected. We were given little hourglasses to let us know when our tea was steeped enough. They brought the tea with milk and sugar packets, but neglected to bring spoons,” she said.
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The American woman ordered a tea tray for her and her daughter, and while they were waiting a “clearly still being trained” waitress took a “lovely tea tray” to a table of young women at another table.
“One of them spoke up and said they had not ordered that. The new waitress (clearly still being trained) told them that they did. The young ladies took lots of pictures of it, but never did touch it,” the review narrated.
“Fifteen minutes or so later, the other waitress (the grumpy one) approached us to tell us our tea tray mistakenly went to the wrong table, and a new one was being prepared for us, but it would take some time. We had no other plans, so we said that was fine.
“The grumpy waitress then walked up to the other table, told them that the tea tray had been given to them by mistake, so if they had eaten anything from it, they would need to pay for it. The young ladies insisted they had not touched it, and the waitress took it away. The grumpy waitress no sooner returned to the kitchen than she reappeared carrying our tea tray. We found it to be very fishy timing.”
The owner at eteaket Tea Rooms hit back at the woman’s review on Tripadvisor, stating that they were faced with “many challenges” during the festival.
“Despite immense preparation and planning we faced some unforeseen obstacles that I am afraid had a knock on effect on our service. Our team takes great pride in the level of service but our team is also human working under difficult conditions brought on by service disruptions and staff shortages,” the owner replied.
“We would also never re-serve incorrect food and can assure you you received a fresh order.”
The American tourist listed a litany of other complaints, mostly focused on customer service procedures. She said she was “outraged on the behalf” of the young women having tea because “if a restaurant delivers the wrong food to a table, that is their mistake. Under no circumstances should that table be charged for it.”
Secondly, she explained that the same table had allegedly ordered four drinks and only received two. When they asked for their other drinks, the “grumpy waitress” supposedly “marched up to their table to tell them they only ordered two drinks and they weren't allowed to share them.”
The reviewer also complained that they had not been allowed to sit at a window table for three because there were only two guests in their party. However, she said “not once” had anyone else come in for a reservation at that table.
“I've rarely seen such poor customer service,” the woman concluded.
The eteaket owner stood by the decision to turn the party away from the window seat table for three, but said other errors were “miscommunication.”
“We have worked with our team to ensure better quality of service. Despite this summer being a challenging one we have learnt a lot and we're very excited to work hard to ensure a better Edinburgh Fringe Season next year every month until then.”
Eteaket Tea Rooms has an average four star rating based on more than 650 reviews on Tripadvisor. Eteaket sells loose leaf tea, teaware and gifts alongside its tea rooms on Frederick Street in Edinburgh.
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