A Cambridgeshire restaurant owner has said he uses CCTV to debunk “nonsense” reviews from guests.
Jackie Wan, the owner and head chef of the Forum Chinese restaurant in Great Shelford, has been running the eatery for 11 years.
Mr Wan said he uses footage to “clarify” problems raised from unhappy diners who leave one or two-star reviews online.
In one case, the head chef conducted a week-long inquiry and looked at footage of the diners after a customer reported that their stir fry only had four prawns.
He responded to the reviewer after getting in touch with the CCTV company and receiving the high-definition copy of the video.
The review on TripAdvisor read: “We arrived quite early for a Saturday night to avoid the crowds and our food was rushed out with very little taste and substance.
“The sizzling prawns with onions was literally a large plate of four prawns and a big pile of onions! £15 please!”
“Overall we were sorely disappointed in the quality and presentation of the food,” the reviewer added. “In the end we finished what we could eat and left to pay the bill.”
The Forum Chinese owner replied: “We managed to pull out some footage to clarify the issues u mentioned. It’s such a shame that you felt like this, as every other person at The Forum that night; really enjoyed their food along with the evening.
“We never rush out our food, as everything come out from the kitchen are prepared with love and passion, to perfection.”
Mr Wan added: “[The] sizzling king prawn and rice was served at 18:53:25. Below is the exact time for you both actually put the prawns in your mouth: 18:54:34 yourself, 18:54:39 yourself, 18:54:39 your partner, 18:55:49 your partner, 18:57:11 your partner, 19:01:33 yourself, 19:02:27 yourself.
“From my limited calculating skills, I got seven pieces, which is the standard number of prawns for our main courses. Have you forgotten the three pieces your partner had?”
Responding to the reviewer saying he finished what he could, Mr Wan replied: “The bowl, the plates were shining clean, I could almost see my reflecting image. Still not enjoying huh?”
The Hong Kong-born head chef said that he only uses camera evidence when the complaint doesn’t align with his or his staff’s memory of the incident.
He told The Times: “If there are issues on our side or whatever happens is our mistake then of course we try and make up for it … I’m more than happy to offer free bills. But there are some customers that it doesn’t matter what you do, you cannot please them. Those are the things I really can’t stand because we’ve done nothing wrong. I will not kneel down for anyone. I will stand up and fight when the fault is not on our side.”
The restaurant has a 4.5-star rating on TripAdvisor from 305 reviews and 4.6-star rating on Google from 319 people.
