Woman complains about poor service in Swensen’s only to profusely apologise after learning the truth

A mother went to a restaurant with her young child to dine, but the restaurant’s service was not satisfactory. When the mother brought up the unsatisfactory service to the restaurant manager, she came to know that most of the restaurant’s employees were autistic.

Facebook user Sindhu RK Johnson posted yesterday (9th Aug) to share her experience of dining with her 3-year-old son at the Swensen’s restaurant in Clementi Plaza.

Sindhu wrote that the waitress at the front desk just gestured at them and then pointed to a table in the corner when a seat became available.

“So when a table was ready, a waitress called us both in.. not ushered in but hand gestured like u know how u call a cat n pointed us to the table at the corner.”

Then, she found the table top wet, so she gestured asking the waitress to wipe it. Unexpectedly, the waitress asked her “Is it dirty?”, and bent down to check the table carefully. The waiter then brought a damp towel to wipe the table top, the more the table was wiped, the more wet it became. Sindhu had to wipe the table dry with her own tissue.

Sindhu also said that although there were several waiters standing by and doing nothing, when she waved to order food, no one paid attention.

When the food was served, she asked the waiter about redeeming the free drink, but the waiter was unresponsive and just walked back to the kitchen.

“So, I had a free drink coupon on Swensen’s app which i wanted to redeem. So, I told myself nevermind, I’ll wait for the food to be served. The guy came with food, I told him about the drink coupon.. he completely blanked me off, put the food down and walked away (Zero interaction).. than i thought, maybe he is getting a server since i saw him walking out from the kitchen with my food earlier.. No, he straight went back in to the kitchen.”

According to the Facebook user, she was not event served cutleries.

Store manager: 90% of employees are from APSN school

Unbearable, Sindhu finally asked the restaurant manager to come over and calmly reported to the manager all the experiences that made her dissatisfied. After listening to her patiently, the manager explained to her that 90 per cent of the employees of the branch are from a special school of the Association For Persons with Special Needs, and they are all autistic young people, and have limited social interaction abilities.

Sindhu immediately apologized to the manager after hearing the truth and suggested that signs could be placed outside the restaurant to let customers know about the situation.

She then went online to check the comments of netizens about this restaurant, and as expected, all of them were negative, so she decided to post a post to clarify about the restaurant.

Sindhu believes that restaurants willing to give jobs for autistic youths is a sign of inclusiveness. She hopes that everyone will not react too quickly like herself, but give more patience and support to this group of waiters, and don’t boycott the restaurant because of poor service reviews.

The post attracted more than 3,800 likes and 4,100 retweets as of date. Some netizens left a message saying that other branches of Swensen’s have also employed special-needs staff, and they have done so for many years. Others said that after reading the post, they would be more patient with the waiters when they dine at this restaurant in the future.