Reviews for Saito's

07/19/2021 - vana
Management should be fired immediatly! Living blocks away, we often will eat here on a Sunday evening, so let me preface this by saying, this is not the first time we have come in, found the wait to be a bit and asked to sit on the other side while ordering drinks and appetizers. Each time, it has been no problem. I find the service on the non hibachi side is always a little slower, but I always receive similar excuses (the servers have to take care of both side of the restaraunt and because that side is less busy, they often get held up on the other side.) tonight, we walk in (table of 6) and told 25 to 30 minute wait. Of course, i notice the help wanted / hiring sign, which is nothing new- no one can find anyone right now. Being a business owner struggling with the same thing, I comment to my husband that "they are having the same issue" because they have a few signs. We ask to sit on the non hibachi side for drinks and apps while we wait. The hostess was slightly hesistant but eventually, agreed. Mind you, there were two hostesses and absolutley no one on the non hibachi side. The sushi chef makes eye contact at least a dozen times as I am pateintly awaiting someone to visit our table. I approach the hostess after waiting for 30 minutes with no sign of a server and am told that we are still on the hibachi list and I asked about a server and she says "i dont know where she is". 5 or 10 minutes later someone walks in and opts for the non hibachi side. Within 3 minutes of being seated behind us, the server appears. I turn around to try and flag her down and the sushi chef yells out to me "she will not be able to serve you because you are waiting for hibachi" i explained that while I am waiting for hibachi, I have been waiting for quite some time to order apps and drinks. He tells me that she is not able to serve me and he will try and get us to be seated asap in hibachi. I am obviously upset at this point and go to get my husband, who went outside for a call. I tell the chef that it is unacceptable and I would like the manager to come talk to me, because he has confirmed that the server was made aware we were there and decided not to assist us because we were making her job harder and she would have to transfer our tab to the hibachi table and didnt really know how to do that. They come to tell us they will seat us, but I state again that I would like the manager. He finally comes out and since we passed on the table, he tells my husband that he needs to have patience and that they are short staffed. I explain that I am not sure why that means I am being told they wont serve us and he simply says that he can not stand around talking to me and walks away. I continue speaking to the sushi chef who agrees that it is not right, and he watched us sit there waiting patiently for almost an hour, while not getting helped. While I was livid that the manager walked away, i asked for his return to tell me his name and tell me where I could call to speak to his supervisor and was told "he said there is only one GM and you can call the company" - I was flabergasted. I have never been treated so poorly. I get it, short staffed stinks and all that, but come on, I am short staffed daily and I dont go kicking my customers around. I hope that the manager is let go because if he can not handle the stress and makes all the employees feel like it is okay to just not serve someone, he is failing miserably. I will continue to leave this review every where I can until someone addresses the issue. For what it is worth, we ate there. As usual, the food was sub par. It is our son's favorite resrataunt so we go there alot, but honestly, i would have rather burned $200.00 bucks (which is what my bill was) and we have already told our son we will no onger be visitng and instead head off to one of the other 10 hibachi places in the city. They just opened in July 2020, we have been visiting since before their beer and wine licensed was approved and I was excited to have something just by the house that the kids liked, but ya, im done. The server and chef at the table were excellent, as usual and I hope they are the only ones who received my 25% tip, because if any of that goes to the manager's pocket, it will be an absolute travesty. The guy is the worst.