It is a complaint against Mast Kalandar's awful catering service/
It was a party for my daughter's 3rd birthday and we had invited some very formal guests. We needed a good caterer and food for approx. 35 people and based on my great personal experience with Mast Kalander 3 years back (we had hired your chain as caterers when we did a function when our child was born), I without any 2nd thoughts, finalized on Mast Kalandar as my caterer this too, but only to have horrendous experience later.
To place the order, I went to their Varthur branch on 25th of March (near Forum Value Mall) and spoke with Abhishek Kumar and placed the order for Mega pack and asked them to keep the starters and drinks ready by 6:45 PM on Sunday so that when guests start arriving, we can welcome them with drinks and starters and then after the cake-cutting ceremony, start the dinner at around 8 PM. Abhishek came to inspect the site at 3 PM and confirmed that his team would be there ready with the starters and drinks by 6:30 PM and it was all looking very professional till then. But, when it came to the actual party time, there were no signs of Abhishek and his team until 6:45 PM. Finally, they arrived a few min before 7 and despite I asking them to quickly setup the starters and drinks, they were very slow and kept on setting the vessels etc for the main course for which we had more than an hour. The guests started arriving and we had nothing to serve them. After repeated reminders, they setup 15-20 glasses of drinks in total and a few plates of snacks which were insufficient for the people in the room. Later on I realized that, they actually did not have enough drinks and starters. I had ordered the Mega Pack, so I should have got at least 35 glasses of two drinks and enough starters (Shammi Kabab and Paneer Tikka) for 35 people, but actually they has stock only for 15-20 glasses of each drink and thus they were serving half-filled glasses. Same with the starters, they had brough only about 30 pieces of Paneer Tikka which meant we could not even serve 1 piece per person. As this time, I was furious as we had almost everyone arrived and we had nothing to serve them. Abhishek had no answer about my questions about the missing quantity and the other person Pratap Kumar said that there is enough stock in the tempo and they would be getting in within a min which again was a lie because when I went downstairs to check the tempo, the tempo itself was missing, it is when I realized that they actually had not brought enough food. When I shouted (very unfortunate, but I was getting no response from Abhishek and Pratap), Abhishek told me that their tempo had gone to Sarjapura branch to get more starters and drinks and during this period they had brought 4 bottles of Coca-Cola and asked if they could serve that!
During all this period (for about an hour), we did not have enough to serve to our guests and we went on this cake-cutting. We had to feel such a sorry figure in front of our esteemed guests and our heads were down with shame. Finally, they arrived with more paneer tikka and drinks but it was too late as it was already time for dinner and that's not all. There were many other hiccups as following:
• Shammi Kabab served was of poorest quality. It was served like a powder because it could not keep its shape. Not many people ate it.
• Soup (Veg Corn) was horrendous, they served it cold. In fact, guests complained to us and then we asked them to heat it, but still not many people had it.
• They forgot to bring the spoons, and then they asked whether plastic spoons were OK. Did I have a choice?
• They did not open the ice cream counter on time, many people wanted to have combination of Gulab Jamoon and Ice Cream, but could not enjoy the combination as until I realized, they had not opened the counter. It seems they did not want to serve it.
So, what should have been a very enjoyable party for us (it was our only daughter’s 3rd birthday!), turned out to be a nightmare. I actually was missing completely from the fun including the cake-cutting ceremony because I was busy following up with Abhishek and your Vice President – Operations (Ashwini, if I recall correctly). And the worst part of it was that they (Abhishek, Pratap and Ashwini) were not even apologetic about it, because they kept giving false hopes and explanations like “jo ho gaya..ab bataiye kya karen…should we serve coke? ”. Is that how you deal with your customers?
This is my final interaction with Mast Kalandar (catering or walk-in) and I am sure many people in the party also got the message. I am now repenting my decision to stick with Mast Kalandar despite some people cautioned me about their degrading service and food quality.
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