Sommelier Service Question:
For my past birthday, my wife and I went to Las Vegas and
she took me to dinner at a very nice hotel restaurant.
We brought along a bottle of Sea Smoke Ten to enjoy with our
meal. But before we went to the restaurant, as I always do, I called ahead and
asked about corkage fees etc. I was told that the wine could not be on their
wine list and that it had to be approved ahead of time. In addition the corkage
fee was $50.
I asked for it to be approved and they connected me with
their Sommelier. I informed him of the wine and he said it is not on their list
and it would be fine to bring to dinner.
We arrived at dinner; the Sommelier came over to our table,
opened our wine and poured a glass for each of us. That was the last time we
saw him. There were times during the dinner that our glasses were empty and
wanted a refill, and we waited- no one came by. So I ended up refilling our
glasses the entire dinner.
As a Certified Sommelier myself, I found this appalling. A $50 fee for opening our wine, the least that he could have done would be to
refill our wine glasses. Mind you, we had an early seating (5:30) and the restaurant
was not even ½ full.
Do you think I am over reacting? What do you expect from a
Sommelier at a 5 star restaurant?
