Dear Texas Roadhouse:
We were looking forward to dining with you tonight because 1) it was Tuesday which means free kids meal, 2) we had a free appetizer coupon for my birthday, and 3) we lucked out in getting there before 6 to take advantage of your early dinner specials. Unfortunately, however, we couldn’t take advantage of all three of those at the same time, which I find very disappointing.
At first we were told we couldn’t use both the free app coupon and the free kids meal—I guess because it falls under the coupon policy of “not good with any other deal” but I think that’s crazy—your in-store all-the-time deal of kids eat free shouldn’t be counted as a deal or special. But, fine, whatever.
Then we got our bill and noticed that only one of our before-6-special-price meals rang up correctly. Come to find out, we were told NEITHER should have rung up with the special price…due to the free app coupon being used. Wait, what? Again, ridiculous in my opinion. We did talk to a manager who took the bill back and after 10 minutes finagled it with two separate $1 line item credits to make my dinner the correct price and she did give us a coupon for a free appetizer for the trouble… but honestly, I’m not sure I’ll even bother using it. We always eat with our son on Tuesdays and we usually take advantage of the early dinner meal deal, so heaven forbid I try to use a free app coupon again and face the same insanity.
We love your restaurant and go at least twice a month (partially because we love the food but partially because of the great deals you offer), and I find it hard to believe that you have such strict rules on using coupons with in-house offers. I can see not allowing two free app coupons on the same ticket (or even at the same table), but not allowing ANY other specials because you used a coupon? I’d like you to reconsider your process of handling this issue. I felt ridiculous complaining about a small amount of money, but it was more the principle of the thing.
Sincerely,
A Regular Customer for Many Years,
I wonder if I will hear anything back from them…