Pret A Manger - Basingstoke and Deane

After a disappointing thali at a nearby Indian restaurant, I decided to end my lunch with dessert and coffee at Pret A Manger in Basingstoke's Festival Place. The restaurant is a spacious and comfortable square with red chairs. I opted for a refreshing Greek style yogurt with berries for dessert. The espressos at Pret are consistently well-blended and mild, unlike the overpowering coffee served at other cafes like Caravan.

I adore the food at Pret, particularly their soup. The staff is consistently friendly and helpful. However, on weekends, when the restaurant is bustling with customers, there is often a long wait due to a shortage of staff. It's common to receive a disposable cup instead of a proper mug, which I assume is due to a lack of clean dishes. In contrast, coffee chains like Costa and Starbucks manage to provide proper cups even during busy times. The cleanliness of the toilets is also lacking, but this may be attributed to the customers themselves. I urge Pret to increase their staff-to-customer ratio and provide the quality service we expect and pay for.

Quick service as they were not very busy even though in was lunch time just after 1 pm. Staff noticed that a new customer tried to push infant of me for service and served me first even though the other customer was a bit pushy. We just had coffee plain black coffee so not much could go wrong with that order. My friend walks with a crutch and I have a supported wrist but there was no offer of help to take our tray to the table, still I managed ok. I notice the disclaimer on the counter in relation to food allergies guess this is following their recent bad press over the tragic loss of a young life. Now to the important issue the taste of the coffee not quite to my taste a little bitter but adding a half pack of sweetener didn't help so I tipped in the rest of the packet; better. Neither of us could drink the of the coffee as it had become over sweet and it went cold quickly. On a positive note the table and chairs were clean and someone was working at cleaning them and sweeping the floor too. Would we go back again maybe if the other coffee shops are busy but not asa first choice.

I have been getting a soya caramel iced latte every day, but on multiple occasions it has been lumpy. It wasn't until recently that I noticed they leave the milk out on the counter for hours, even in hot weather. The lumps are probably due to spoiled milk, and it's frustrating that they don't just put it in the fridge. It seems like a simple solution to me.

My gripe is same with all Prets especially Winchester but trip advisor could not register it. 1. No tables due to many single persons sitting at a table for 4 with a laptop with usually only a empty cup for 1 hour plus ahhh. 2. Why oh why do the men’s toilet seats not stay up. Resulting in having use one knee to stop the seat from falling down.Please just get them fitted correctly it’s not much to ask. 3. Why is coffee only warm. You make tea with boiling water so why are coffee drinkers penalised. The staff and service is usually very good but little niggles let Pret down