Sometime last year, a diner was very upset with the service she received at our restaurant. So upset that she and her husband left without even dining with us, even though they had enjoyed our food the first round.
After reading her review, I fully understood her sentiments if I was in her shoes. I was thankful for her taking time to write even though she was not a regular reviewer on the website when she first wrote about us. Her truthful account enable us to share about Special People in our mist.
Our blog is a place where we share our Ups and Downs and so, here's my reply, Copy & Paste here to share our story. It's a happy story as we get to share a little more about us.... about our conviction. So here goes..............
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Hi Summerribbon
Thanks for appreciating our good food and deciding to visit us again.
I was equally baffled when I read your review and I do agree with you that such a statement by a Waiter is certainly not acceptable.
At Villa di Parma, besides having a passion in serving hearty good food which you’ve enjoyed; as a family, we believe that the business should be a blessing to others too. Since then, we choose to recruit staff with special needs. Thus, among our Staff, we’ve various personnel with their individual cognitive and cycle-motor skills challenges. For example, we’ve an autistic young man who has been working with us for the last 3 years.
Last Sunday was a busy night, with our small restaurant operating at a full capacity. Besides the usual Sunday walk-in crowd; yes, as you’ve noted, there were 2 big groups. One was a table of 14 diners. In situation like this, we make special provision for our Staff with Special Needs so that they would not mess up orders and get unduly stressed and confused.
Thanks for appreciating our good food and deciding to visit us again.
I was equally baffled when I read your review and I do agree with you that such a statement by a Waiter is certainly not acceptable.
At Villa di Parma, besides having a passion in serving hearty good food which you’ve enjoyed; as a family, we believe that the business should be a blessing to others too. Since then, we choose to recruit staff with special needs. Thus, among our Staff, we’ve various personnel with their individual cognitive and cycle-motor skills challenges. For example, we’ve an autistic young man who has been working with us for the last 3 years.
Last Sunday was a busy night, with our small restaurant operating at a full capacity. Besides the usual Sunday walk-in crowd; yes, as you’ve noted, there were 2 big groups. One was a table of 14 diners. In situation like this, we make special provision for our Staff with Special Needs so that they would not mess up orders and get unduly stressed and confused.
The young Trainee that served you and your hubby last Sunday evening was one of our special needs staff. Though he may look normal, he does have his own set of cognitive challenges. Since it was a busy night, he was instructed not to take orders to minimize miscommunication and confusion. We are sorry that with his cognitive challenges, he had unfortunately repeated his personal instructions ‘wholesale’ to you without understanding the implications.
While it was true that he cannot take your order, he unfortunately does not have the ability to understand that your order, nevertheless, could be taken. Our Senior Staff had tried to explain, but we now realized that our young Trainee with special needs had already caused you so much distressed.
We sincerely apologized and we will work harder to help our Special Needs Staff. Thank you for your feedback and this opportunity to share our social cause.
Drop by soon ; )
Cheers!
Ping.
26 September 2011
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