I AM SUBMITTING THIS COMPLAINT A SECOND TIME AS I HAVE NOT HEARD FROM YOU REF MY VISIT TO PERKIN WARBECK IN TAUNTON ON 2/9/16.

I was shocked and embarrassed by the behaviour of a member of your staff on my visit this evening. I approached a man at the bar and asked if he was still waiting and he said he was and as a joke he made a comment about the service – something along the lines of “I’ve been waiting 10 minutes – terrible service.” The man was not angry, he was not rude or aggressive in any way and I felt his comments were good natured. However, the barmaid whose name appeared on the receipt as Kerri clearly tok exception and refused to serve him because of his comments and even told her colleages not to serve him. She then put me in the embarrassing situation of serving me. I said to her “go on, serve that man” and she again refused at which point the man protested his innocence and Kerri argued with him and again refused to serve him at which he left in disgust. I was quite frankly appalled that a member of your staff could treat a customer in this way and “punish” him because she had taken umbridge at his comments. I am not normally moved to complain but on this occasion I feel I should bring the matter to your attention because you lost custom because a mamber of staff felt she had the right and power to refuse service to someone. I fully respect the right of staff to withold service to rude, aggressive, disruptive customers but in this instance the gentleman in question was none of these and I feel that you should seriously consider whether you want to develop a reutaion for staff who use their “power” in such an inappropriate manner.
I hasten to add that I do not know the man in question but feel moved to make a vicarious complaint because from what I witnessed Kerri behaved in a totaly unacceptable manner and frankly – rather than barring the man – should have apologised for him having had to wait 10 minutes. That way you would not have lost the gentleman’s immediate custom. The way things panned out I think you have lost not only his custon on this occasion but permanently and if Wetherspoons encourage this kind of autocratic behaviour from its staff you may be losing another customer. I would be very interested to ear your thoughts onthis incident.