Tim Ho Wan Chatswood Sydney Review

I typed this right after the soft opening. Don't know why I didn't publish it back then...

Queue was long, 2 hours, as expected for a soft opening. So that's fine. We were seated around 11:45 AM. Floor staff were friendly, we had no complain about them. 1 recommended the desserts, saying he tried those the previous day and they were nice, while the other one didn't know chinese tea is for a pot or a cup, but she happily went and checked it out without me asking. So first impression was good.

The food came and they were great enough. I expected better though, since the HK one was awarded Michelin star. However, they are not bad, just not AWESOME either. Pork buns and both desserts were the highlight for me. Oh steamed cake was nice, soft and fluffy. I don't usually like steamed cake, but theirs was great.

At the beginning, the food came quickly. However, 45 minutes after we sat down, the food stopped coming eventhough we still had 6 pending. We waited 15 minutes, and decided to order 2 more since we were still hungry. That's when we realised that the fried prawn dumplings with wasabi sauce was not in the receipt eventhough we ordered them. We told one of the staff and ordered 2 more dishes. That was the first mistake.

10-15 minutes after, the food from our 2nd order came. They came fairly quickly, and within 15 minutes or so, all 3 dishes in our receipts were delivered to our table. Then, stop.

We waited and waited. We asked one of the staff who took the receipt, went to the kitchen etc, but nothing happened. By 1:30 we couldn't wait anymore and called one of the staff who had earphones on, thinking she might be manager or something. She came, checked with the kitchen, genuinely apologizing to us, and said they are making them. 10 minutes past, and a dish came to our table. It wasn't what we were waiting for. She came to our table again asking about it. We said we were only waiting for har gao, fish maw and 2 desserts. She then went back to the kitchen. She returned to us, said she was terribly sorry and she assure us the kitchen is making them now. They should come in 10 minutes.

10 minutes after, ALL the dishes we ordered started to come one by one. I mean ALL. Including the ones we already had. Except those bloody har gao, fish maw and desserts. We kept getting our hopes high and then crashed back to the ground as those were all wrong dishes. I could even see in the faces of the staff delivering the food to us, that they were sorry and frustrated for us too. At one point I was SO pissed off and asked the staff who brought the food to us, "Okay, what do you have there now?" And nope, those were not the har gao, nor the fish maw.

By 2:10 PM we couldn't wait any longer. So I called that girl who chased the kitchen for us and said, if they are gonna take longer, just cancel those dumplings and give us the desserts. She said yes and left. Right when she left, another staff came with the fish maw. F.I.N.A.L.L.Y. He was sorry for us too, saying they have made too many mistakes already.

Desserts came straight after. We finished around 2:30. We were seated around 11:45. 2 hours and 45 minutes.

To make that worse, when we went to the cashier, the woman asked us, how was it? We said they were nice, but 2 hours? She said "Sorry, but this is our first day so it is expected to be a little slower." I said, yeah but 2 hours? And she went on talking about how they still have a lot to learn as it is the first day blah blah blah, first restaurant blah blah blah... dishes not showing up is expected blah blah blah... long story short, she was defending herself. I doubt she even listened when I said we were there for 2 hours.

The only "Sorry" she said was that very first one and that's it. She was not apologetic and was not showing sympathy whatsoever either. Honestly, the service the floor staff gave us made me want to just forgive and forget, but this one made me not to ever want to let it go. Then she had 5 tries to enter the amount we need to pay into the eftpos machine and I was the one telling her how to do it. She really needs to be re-trained.

Today was your soft opening, fair enough, mistakes are expected, delay is expected. However, out of those many dishes we ordered, they ALL came again after we complainedexcept the ones we were waiting for? And a little bit slow is ok, but 2 hours and 45 minutes? And we didn't even get all the dishes. Is that a little bit slow? If you think it wasn't, what if I tell you, the table next to us already had change of customers 3 times!

I really had no complain about the floor staff. They were friendly, nice and helpful. I really need to commend the girl with earphone who chased our orders for us, she was really attentive and show genuine care to us, apologetic and showing sympathy. She really has good customer service and a sense of urgency. If she isn't the manager, I think she deserves to be one. The cashier needs to be retrained, and if she's the manager, she needs to be retrained in dealing with register, customer service and learn to put herself in customers' shoes. I don't know what happened with your kitchen, but someone needs to manage the dockets better.

If it's not because of the food and the floor staff, I'd have given it 1 star.