Update: Mariko

Some weeks ago (9 weeks, to be precise), I visited Mariko Sushi at Yonge and Elm. In my write-up, I mentioned a mix-up with the bill. If you'll indulge me, I'd like to expand on that story a bit now.

Here's what happened: we were given one single bill for our party, but two of us needed to pay with our respective credit cards, while a third was paying cash. Now I realize this is a minor pain in the butt for the staff, and we should have asked for separate bills ahead of time. But we clearly explained to the server: put $x on this card, put $y on that card, and we'll pay the balance in cash. She took our cards and our cash and went off. When she came back, I found that my card had been run for the amount of my meal plus the person who paid in cash. They had screwed up and double-charged us for one of the meals.

But whatever, screw-ups happen, and we had kind of made things complicated for them. I went up to the counter and pointed out the error, and after much confused discussion amongst the staff, they determined the correct course of action to be to re-run my card for the right amount.

It's important to note here that my card hadn't been charged for the incorrect amount, just pre-authed, so they couldn't (and didn't need to) issue a refund. In a restaurant, the funds aren't actually "captured" until you fill in the tip / total, sign the receipt, and give it back to them. I did not sign the receipt, of course, since the amount was wrong. They put a line through the un-signed receipt and set it aside. I kept my copy of the incorrect receipt on file, just in case. A few weeks later, I got my credit card statement, and only the correct bill had been charged. They hadn't captured the erroneous pre-auth. Good! I pitched out the receipt and promptly forgot about the whole thing.

Flash forward to today. I'm reconciling my October credit card statement -- the one after the one with the charge to Mariko -- and what do I see? Another damn charge to Mariko, that's what. It's that incorrect and un-signed pre-auth, posted ten days after I was actually in the restaurant, late enough to push it to the following statement. So the stupid jerkwads charged me for three meals, when I only ate one, and it wasn't very good.

So now I feel like a chump for kinda pulling my punches in my original write-up. So let me set the record straight: Mariko on Yonge Street SUCKS. Some of the food was on the OK side of mediocre, but some of it was decidedly sub-par, and none of it stood out above anywhere else I've been to. And the place was disgustingly filthy. The table was all sticky and gunky; we spread napkins over it so we wouldn't have to touch it, and at the end of the meal they were all brown and gross on the bottom. We considered moving to another table, but it was just as bad. We may have considered asking the waitress to clean it for us, if we ever saw her. Which brings me to the service. Oh, the service. The best thing I can say about them is they weren't actively rude. But they sure were slow and incompetent. It took them forever to take our order, and forever to bring our food, and when they did bring it they brought the wrong thing or forgot something more than once. One member of our party waited 40 minutes for a damn can of pop. Another one finally got sick of being ignored and got up and marched over to the clutch of chatting waitresses to submit our order. Oh, and they triple-charged my credit card!

Heed my words, oh hundreds dozens couple of loyal readers: if you're looking for sushi on Yonge St., DO NOT GO TO MARIKO! I can recommend (so far) 25 better sushi places within easy walking distance. Oh, cruel Sushi Business Gods, why could you not have made Mariko on Yonge go belly-up instead of Mochizuki? I shake my fist at you in impotent rage, Mariko on Yonge! I will curse your opprobrious name with my dying breath!

So, I guess I have to call my credit card company tomorrow. Sigh.

(Disclaimer: there are other Mariko locations in town; they might not suck. But the one on Yonge St. sure does.)

[Photo by waferbaby, used under a Creative Commons license]