"We visited Lationo Joes last Friday evening for my hen do which was kindly arranged as a surprise for me by my work friends. We had a table early as we wanted to go on for drinks elsewhere afterwards and by the time everyone arrived, there was 16 of us, we were all seated by 7:30. There were a couple of other tables occupied at this time so it was far from busy. The waitress came and asked us if we 'd like to order drinks whilst looking at the menu which we did and most of us had cocktails which took a little time to arrive but that was expected as they are all freshly made. We were given sombreros to wear which was fun and then they came to take our order. Our starters actually arrived fairly quickly but after that things started to go down hill. We didn 't get the same waitress every time so there was no continuity with service. Our plates were cleared and we were asked if we would like more drinks which we ordered. and then we waited.......and we waited.......and we waited. We were seated by the kitchen so we could see main courses coming out to tables that had come in after us and by this time it was getting busy but the waitresses didn 't come to apologize for the wait or to give us an explanation as to why there was a delay although they did keep asking us if we wanted more drinks, probably in an attempt to a) get us to spend more money and b) to distract us to that fact we were still waiting for our main courses. We hadn 't ordered anything difficult a couple of us had fajitas, some had enchiladas and 4 of us ordered the chicken paella and someone had a steak. I did actually comment that maybe it was the paella that was taking so long if it was being cooked from fresh......wrong! During the time we waited, which was more than an hour and a half, no one apologized, a young waiter hovered by our table and then reached in and took a full jug of water which we 'd asked for off our table stating they were sort on jugs so he was taking this one!! We had two other jugs (there were 16 of us) and one of them was empty, I watched him then place it on someone else 's table so they didn 't even receive a fresh jug. I also noticed the chef come out of the kitchen twice in this time. Finally one of the waitresses said it will be 5 mins, which was more like another 10 mins, and the main course would be with us. They arrived! First to come out was the paella. This was a smallish bowl that had nachos stuck in to the rice, which I thought was a bit odd, slices of lemon or crusty bread slices are more traditional. Anyway, I looked at my dish and my friends dishes that also had paella and it did in no way resemble paella, there were no peppers or peas and the colour wasn 't yellow as you 'd expect, in fact what we 'd received was 4 bowls of basmati rice (uncle bens no doubt) and chicken!! After tasting it, I called over the waitress and passed it back to her saying that this wasn 't what id ordered and was definitely not paella. She took the bowl back in to the kitchen only to return with the bowl, hand it back and said that they don 't have any paella rice!!!! No apology, no offer of something else, she just walked off. Two of my friends just picked at their meal but myself and my other friend ate ours, we were so hungry and everyone else had there meals by then so to re order and thought of having to wait again wasn 't a option. The friend that ordered her steak medium rare sent hers back as it was well done and she couldn 't eat it so the waitress said she would take it off the bill. When we 'd finished our meals some of the group had to leave as it was now getting quite late and left us the correct money for their drinks and meal. We 'd asked at the beginning for a separate drinks bill and food bill so we asked for these. We sorted out the drinks bill first and when it came to the food bill we asked to see the manager as we were unhappy paying for the paella and the steak hadn 't been removed from the bill. The waitress came back and said that the manager couldn 't come as she was busy! Anyway she eventually arrived apologizing saying she was having to serve behind the bar and asked us what the issue was. We explained what had happened, the length of time we were waiting, the non paella and the steak. She then said she would take the steak off the bill but two of us had eaten the 'paella ' she wouldn 't remove all of them. I told her that we had complained at the time and not offered anything else and we 'd waited so long for it to arrive ate it as we were hungry but we weren 't happy about paying £11.95 for a bowl of basmati rice!. She finally agreed to take off two of the paellas and gave us a shot each on the house. We paid the food bill, some in cash and some by card and all appeared ok. We then left and were standing outside on the pavement waiting for a couple of people that had gone to 'powder their nose ' when one of the waitresses appeared with a calculator exclaiming we 'd under paid, and that they done the calculation twice and we still owed them money. I asked if they were serious especially after such poor service and food and how much did we under paid to which she said £14.37!! Really!!! after a bit of discussion we did pay this but the whole experience put a dampner on my hen do. Disappointed that their customer service and making sure we had a good experience in their restaurant was not that important to them and although the manager apologized I didn 't feel it was sincere. Looking at the other reviews, myby its just par for the course for this restaurant. I don 't usually complain, but this was a special night for me and my friends and it was spoilt by our experience. I have emailed Latino Joes via their website and not surprisingly, I 've had no response. Speaks for itself."
