foolhandy.com

After last Friday’s events and my letter of complaint on Sunday the wait for a response ended this morning. Here goes…

Dear Mr Handy

Thank you for contacting us regarding your visit to one of our restaurants. I am very sorry to learn of your disappointment on this occasion.

In order for us to carry out a full investigation, I would be very grateful if you could clarify what item was given to you instead of a Toasted Spicy Veggie Deli and whether it was packaged in a Toasted Spicy Veggie Deli wrapper.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Regards etc.

So it’s the wrapper that’s important then, not the customer service? I replied thus:

Hello,

I am not sure exactly what type of Deli it was, but it was a chicken one. The wrapper was not, I observed afterwards, a Veggie Deli wrapper but did not say ‘chicken’, just 6 letters which unfortunately I can not remember at this time. I acknowledge that had I not been sat in a dark car I probably would have seen that it didn’t say ‘veggie’ on the wrapper and checked carefully before eating, but I tend to trust that I’ll be given what I ask for.

The main point of my complaint however is that when I was given the wrong item no one seemed to be bothered about this and no apology was offered. What would have happened if I had been allergic to an item in the chicken deli? Do your staff randomly hand out pork products to Muslims? I doubt it – so why do they hand out meat products to vegetarians? I have been vegetarian for over 20 years and to have found myself with a mouthful of chicken was extremely distressing – and the staff I dealt with on Friday night just did not care.

Regards, etc.

An hour later this arrives in my inbox:

Dear Mr Handy

Thank you for contacting us about the Swavesey restaurant. I was sorry to learn of your disappointment.

The Swavesey restaurant is franchised to Mark Richards.   As the owner, he is responsible for any customer feedback relating to his business.   I will therefore forward your contact details to Mark Richards who will ensure your comments are responded to.

Again, thank you for taking the time and trouble to contact us.

Regards, etc.

And so it would appear that if the issue was chicken put in a veggie wrapper it’s a matter for McDonalds, but if it’s just the wrong item handed out and rubbish customer service it’s nothing to do with them. It’ll be interesting to hear what Mark Richards has to say on the matter but I fear (perhaps wrongly) that now it’s no longer a McDonald’s central office issue that it’ll end with silence. If I’m wrong, and I hope I shall be, I’ll let you know…