I went to Legacy of China after 4 years for dinner last night with extremely high hopes. I grew up visiting my aunt and grandmother in 7 bungalows and have eaten at Legacy of China multiple times, never leaving disappointed. Last night, however, not only was I disappointed but vowed never to walk into the restaurant again.
I believe the management has changed in the last year, having said that, a restaurant that itself is a legacy, much as its name suggests, is expected to maintain its standards of service and food quality whether or not the management changes.
Whenever we visit the restaurant, we always get a small plate of complimentary prawn crackers along with our drinks. Last night my aunt ordered her drink and requested for prawn crackers - at this point the waiter nodded his head without hesitation. Our drink arrived, but the prawn crackers did not. It was after waiting for a considerably long period of time that we asked them what happened to the crackers that we ordered. It was at this point that the waiter informed us "Maam it’s going to be chargeable". My aunt politely requested- "I’ve been such a regular customer here, I’ve come after a long time, it’ll be nice if you could get us a small complimentary plate of crackers".
Don’t get me wrong, we were not being cheap- of course we would have paid for the crackers but we were trying to recreate an experience we once used to have at the establishment and saw no harm in making such a request. The waiter arrogantly responded, "no ma’am". "Please sir?", my aunt lightly and casually persisted. He returned to the kitchen and said, "let me see". There was no sign of him for another ten minutes after this. At this point, embarrassed enough, we asked, "sir, prawn crackers?". "Sorry ma’am, the Chef has REFUSED to make them unless you pay for it".
Never have I ever been received with a more insulting response than that while eating out. Upon a simple request to enjoy my drink with a small plate of prawn crackers, I was faced with such condescension and arrogance.
Firstly, the waiter kept blatantly ignoring our request for the crackers and didn’t even have the decency to come up to us on his own and tell us that they do not serve complimentary crackers anymore. Moreover, we had to follow up twice after being told "Maam we’ll just get back to you."
I told them I don’t want to eat at a restaurant that doesn’t respect its customers, and to this the waiter very nonchalantly said, "okay".
The restaurant was EMPTY and we seemed to be the only business that they were getting that night, despite that when I was disappointed, instead of trying to persuade me to stay and making up for their rude and inept service, they sat there with a chip on their shoulders.
I am truly disgusted. I complained to the manager upon my exit, who said "I’ll talk to them inside." But instead of immediately running inside and trying to redeem themselves, he stood there casually even after I had ranted to him. It was pretty clear he had no intention of going inside and talking to his management, and so I left. I will never walk into the restaurant again and I will make sure this review is all over the Internet.