On the evening of the 4th of June I had a meal at your place with my friend at 9:00pm. The meal was lovely - we ordered a chicken pie,... read more prawn starter, two mocktails and a beer. But when it came to paying the bill, I provided a £20 note (after saying I would pay my share of £15.50 with my friend paying the rest by card) and realised I never received my change back.

Perhaps I wasn't vocal enough about wanting the change back. But I never mentioned anything about tipping - although we had been considering giving a tip contingent on me receiving change in the first place.

I also ask this because my friend has verification that he paid his share of £21 without underpaying. So that would leave £4.50 unaccounted for.

We don't recall a service charge being listed on the menu which we would have happily paid if it clearly existed and was transparent. Not to mention there was no clear indication of a service charge on the bill itself - with the service charge usually being included on final bills in establishments we've visited.

I will say we received excellent service from the tall girl with the white shoes - who took my call asking for space/availability 20-30 minutes prior to 9:00pm and also ensured our questions and needs were provided for throughout the evening, and I absolutely must emphasise she was not the person who sorted our final bill. She was a real star in charge of everything else to ensure we had a great experience yesterday evening and prevented this service rating from going to 1/5.

Outside of the generally excellent service and excellent food, I want to make it clear myself and my friend would have been very happy to have paid a tip to the tall girl for her excellent service provision. But the fact we don't get change back and are apparently not given a choice in the matter has unfortunately left a sour note on our experience at the Winchmore.

I am hoping no one gets punished because £4.50 seems like so little to kick up fuss over. But I reckoned that writing this review would just be good to ensure that better practices take place in the future. Because another customer in the future might take it extremely badly if this happened to them. I've worked in service many times when I was a student and it's absolutely unthinkable - the idea of not giving a customer their correct change back when nothing's been said and pocketing the lot/helping yourself to the change. Based off my personal experience, it just also never happens not even 'by accident' and is completely unacceptable.

Additionally when I sent an email to management at manager@winchmore.me listed on the website - it's been two days and I haven't received any response. I was hoping that at least there might be some kind of acknowledgement. I wanted to keep things private and potentially resolve things privately. Because mistakes and misunderstandings are natural and if an understanding is reached, it can be resolved. But I'm not seeing any willingness to admit to any mistake or try to resolve any misunderstanding. Apparently complaints like these aren't worth any acknowledgement from management so unfortunately I have to escalate and write this up onto a review forum - because presumably this is the only way to bring about any kind of change.

I hope that our concerns might be better taken into consideration going forwards and I also hope this review doesn't take away from the people who've done a genuinely excellent job as part of The Winchmore's waiting staff and cooks. They did an excellent job for the most part and don't deserve to be weighted down by 1-2 individuals ruining the whole thing.

  Never had a better experience in a pub before, service was efficient!! Rhian and Ceyda made the experience way better, friendly always smiling and done way more for our table... read more then was necessary! Recommend this pub to anyone. Garden is also amazing well heated and drinks are well priced!!

  The staff were very friendly and attentive. The food was excellent whether you are looking for a couple of bites with drinks or a full-on dinner. Will definitely be returning... read more soon and highly recommend it to anyone wanting to try.

  This isn’t the cheapest pub around
Me and my friends had dinner and a couple of drinks and a bottle of tap water
When we got the bill... read more they charged us for tap water which we paid
Thinking about this after I got home I find this disgusting as our bill wasn’t cheap
So people be careful
Check your bill