Wild Gulf Shrimp
Howard's Seafood

Howard's Seafood

13500 Baltic Ave, 8008, Surf City, United States

Wine • Seafood • American • Ice Cream


"Decent food, but portions have shrunk and it is extremely noisy. But my biggest disappointment is in the way they 've trained their waitstaff. I experienced a once in a lifetime occurrence as I was leaving this evening. When the waiter brought the bill for our party of 8 and handed it to my wife, she heard him say gratuity is included, and she relayed this message to me as he was standing at our table, and as she handed me the bill to sign. Logically, I did not add a tip. In reality, he must have told her gratuity is not included. But, instead of politely correcting her misunderstanding, he returned to our table 30 seconds later (while we were still finishing our meal) and picked up the signed check. To be clear I have been dining out for 40 years and I have never witnessed a waiter pick up a signed bill before I leave the table, unless the restaurant is closing. Five minutes later, he followed us to the parking lot to find out if there was a problem with the service. The only problem with the service was in the way in which he disingenuously handled a misunderstanding of which he was clearly aware i.e., he clearly realized that my wife misheard him; otherwise, he would have done as he has been trained and not picked up the bill while we were still finishing our meal. In other words, he could have corrected her mishearing at the time he heard it or even after he picked up the bill while we were still at our table instead of following us to the parking lot. For the record outside of this odd situation, our waiter was very polite and ended up with a tip that was more than 20%."