Nando's - Richmond Hill

I didn't dine inI went Nando's for take out and ordered a "peri peri chicken" sandwich with a side nandos potato wedges for my boyfriend.

Despite being open for awhile now, it seems like they're still figuring things out and getting into the rhythm of things.

Their system overall is so inefficientYou have to line up for both dine-in and take out, so you're basically competing with others for spots as well.

Excellent food at reasonable prices polite and caring staff. Looking after your needs in a professional manner. Strongly recommend.

As a big fan of Nando's food in general (visiting the new-ish Queen St location frequently and getting takeout from other spots), I decided to go for my birthday dinner with my fiancée and her family. First off, I'll get this out of the way. the food was really good as always. I take no issue with that.The service however was abhorrent. My father-in-law, as someone who has been in the food and service industry for 30 years, running several high level and successful chains, has certain expectations with regard to service staff and the way you treat. but by no means are they outlandish. When we first arrived this past Saturday night, it appeared the restaurant was in chaos. For what it's worth, the manager and one young kid in particular seemed to be doing their best to keep it together but as for the rest of front of house, it was brutal.When we arrived, we were told it would be a 15 minute wait for a table. No problem, it was a busy place. Shortly thereafter we realized that they had forgotten about the people standing in line right in front of us and the fact that they too were still waiting on a table, so they told us it would now be more than 20 minutes. We decided to stay because it would have taken just as long to drive somewhere else and get seated. Not but 5 minutes later the girl comes back and says they have a table and that we can go sit down. At this point the young, hard working kid mentioned above comes to tell her he still needs to clean the table, she proceeds to argue with him, saying we can sit, and in the end we decide to wait for the visibly stressed kid to do his job. Finally, the table is clean and instead of seating us, we're simply told by the girl that our table is in the back corner of the restaurant and we can go sit down. No pleasantries, nothing.After finally sitting down and figuring out our food order, my father-in-law goes up to the counter and places the order. Much to our non surprise at this point, they didn't have two out of the four appetizers and one of the drinks we wanted. So we settled for other things and added that we wanted to tack on a takeout order to be made/picked up when we're done our dinner.Food finally arrives. haphazardly placed around the table. At the same time, the takeout order (a chicken Caesar wrap comes out brown bagged). My father-in-law understandably says that he asked for it to be made when we're done our meal. The girl who brought it out half heartedly argues for a moment until she understands the point that a lettuce filled wrap that's been sitting with warm chicken for over an hour likely wouldn't be all that appetizing so she disappears back toward the front of the restaurant. Within a moment or two we realize that we're missing two sides. We wait a bit before finally asking the hard working kid if he can look into it (he wasn't really our server, he just seemed like the only competent person on the floor). Moments later, the oh so pleasant girl from before comes over and asks about the sides we're missing. Then once again, the kid comes back and asks the same question (don't blame him, he was likely just trying to do his job).Finally, the rude girl we'd been dealing with all night (not sure if she's a floor manager or service person or what) comes back with the sides, puts them down, then asks to see the receipt to confirm that we're basically not trying to pull one over on them. Now, I'm not the "customer is always right" type. However, this is just bad practice. My father-in-law, understandably annoyed informs her that it's terrible customer service, especially after everything that's happened so far, to do that. Especially when he had already brought the receipt to their attention earlier, showing what we're missing (beyond that, I'm quite certain that they could just look it up in their computer).This is where things go off the rails. Rather than apologizing, she looks at him and says "are you joking".? Of course that was it, my father-in-law asked if it looked like he was joking and said that he was appalled by how she was acting. She continue to argue, finally basically slamming our receipt down and walking away. We never saw her the remainder of our time there.Thinking this was it, we get up to leave and pick up the takeout order from the front of the restaurant. First they tell us that we already received it (which we obviously hadn't) and my father-in-law proceeded to explain once again what had happened. The girl then sees the bag (with the now hour plus old chicken wrap) on the counter and tries to hand it to him. That didn't go well and he asked that it be remade (not unreasonable since it was their error). The final icing on the cake, the girl gave it to the kitchen to remake and they started pulling it apart like they were just going to warm the old chicken and put it back together. At this point, we basically demanded that a FRESH one be made. Thankfully the manager ordered the kitchen to make it fresh (it should be said that it did seem he was trying really hard. but with staff that obscenely incompetent, I can't blame him for having a tough time).Incredibly long story short. good food, manager and young kid worked hard, girl running front of house was simply awful, as was one of the less than hygienic girls at the cash register.It was just about the worst birthday dinner experience I've had in my 35 years and we will certainly never return to this location.