Taco Del Mar

So the other nite my wife and I went to the local Taco Del Mar for a some of their extremely generous mondo burritos.

In and out, quick and easy as always. The food is great and the portions huge. Well sad to say that will be our last trip to Taco Del Mar.

Last nite my wife was balancing the check book and seeing what charges had cleared and what was still pending. Taco Del Mar cleared for $2 more than what our receipt had on it. Hmm.

Well the Paisley put in a call to their store and asked to speak to someone in charge. The voice on the other end stated he was in charge and when confronted with this information, all of a sudden he was no longer the person to speak with. As a matter of fact he suddenly didn't have a name either when repeatedly asked what his was.

She finally asked who the manager was and how to get ahold of that person. The employee gave her a first name only and a phone number for the owner of the franchise.

When she spoke to him he accused her of lying. Seriously. It's $2. Why would anyone lie about such a small amount. So I called the owner and spoke to him. Of course he had a different story and said he would check it out. I also let him know that he really needed to apologise to my Paisley for being rude and accusatory to her. She has yet to get her apology call.

Meanwhile I have contacted their corporate office with an overview of the happenings in their franchise store. The franchise relationship manager emailed me pretty quickly, but seemed to dismiss my claim as an "unfortunate incident" and as an apology offered up gift certificates to keep us as customers and too pass along our comments to the franchise owner. I"m not satisfied with this and let her know that. It's not about the $2, it's about being stolen from by a business that we frequent and to be called liars and brushed aside when we call them on it.

So after consulting our attorney, we did as they advised. Stop dealing with the store. Called out bank to dispute the charge for the $2. They of course credited out account themselves and will conduct their own investigation. Our attorney and the credit union both advised that we call the police.

The police advised that we try to work it out with the store. So Paisley and I went to the TDM to get the $2 and to get a photo copy of the store receipt. After much hassle we left with both. Just as we suspected: the added amount for tip on the receipt was not my wifes handwriting. The employees on hand last nite had no comment. The corporate office has had no comment to this at this time.

I personally would urge people to skip over Taco Del Mar. Not based soley on the theft, but also the mishandling of the situation by the owner and the corporate office.