There’s more to a good restaurant than just the food. Dining out can be a fantastic experience, but even the best meals are nothing without great table service. So how do you make sure you get it?
Imagine it’s a special occasion, and you’ve decided to celebrate with a meal in your favourite restaurant, followed by a fancy night out at the theatre. This means you want lovely food, but with the show starting in an hour, you need super efficient service too.
But it’s a Saturday night, and the restaurant’s packed, so your waiter is really busy. How do you make sure you get noticed when you want to order, and when you want to pay the bill? Here are four ways that are far from perfect:
1. The eyebrow dancer
Often the preferred choice these days for diners who don’t want to be a nuisance. They’ll try to make eye-contact with their waiter from the other side of the room, and with a little raise of the brow, show they’re ready to order. This does assume that the staff has zoom lenses where their eyes should be. It may be polite, but unless your waiter is a peregrine falcon with vision 30 times better than the average human, you could be waiting a long time (Effectiveness rating: 3/10).
2. The flirter
Not quite as offensive as the ‘finger-clicker’ (see below), but you’re on shaky ground with this one. You may think smiling sweetly at your waiter is going to get results, but you’re far more likely to seem like a creepy customer who thinks they can flatter their way to preferential treatment. And if you’re having a romantic meal with your partner, you’re just asking for trouble (Effectiveness rating: 4/10 (including possible relationship crisis).
3. The finger-clicker
This one is an absolute no-no. In fact, do this, and you’ll probably guarantee you’ll be kept waiting for as long as possible. It’s really offensive to treat staff like servants at a medieval banquet, and it makes the clicker look like bigoted idiot with no respect. In other words, use the finger-click, and you may get another finger gesture back in return (Effectiveness rating: 0/10).
4. The drowner
Perhaps the most obvious technique, but far from perfect. Yes, waving your arms about is going to get you noticed, and it’s certainly better than the other options. But there’s a major flaw: you can’t use a knife and fork while you’re doing it. Which means that in a busy restaurant, you could end up spending more time waving your arms than actually eating (Effectiveness rating 7/10 (but gets surprisingly tiring).
5. The effective way of Calling the Waiter
So if all those don’t work, what’s the best option? Well you could try getWaiter!, our new smartphone and tablet app, which takes all this hassle away. It means you can call your waiter over, order another round of drinks, or ask for the bill, all by simply pressing a button on your device. It instantly notifies the member of staff, so you can guarantee they’ve noticed you – Effectiveness rating: 10/10!
