Oriel’s Cafe
I went out to catch up with some friends in Subiaco last night, so we decided to go to Oriels as it is open till much later. That was possibly one of the worst decisions we ever made. Like I said previously, the renovations made to the place, although made it look newer, it did it no favors. I think it made the place look too artificial now, and not in the “WOW” way either. When we got there it was surprisingly busy, but we managed to gt a table for four. The head waiter who I only ever hear grunting out out orders at people was back. I didn’t see him the last time I was there, so you can imagine my disappointment when I saw him grunting for us to wait to be seated. I was wondering why they gave us such a big table, when we could have waited a few more minutes and gotten a smaller one. All the same we sat down and waited for our friends. We watched as people finished their meals and left, and another group of people came in. We were trying to decide whether we should order something before the others came first or to just wait for them when we were approached by an old guy who was not wearing uniform, asking us if we were waiting for anyone else or wanted to order. I told him to give us a few minutes more as our friends had still not arrived. By then we had only been there about 5 minutes. We watched as he went around to make sure the staff were working, and he rushed in the new customers and rushed out those who were finishing up.
I was thinking that maybe we should offer to move to a smaller table when I saw a group of women sitting at a smaller table, but before I could mention it, the old guy was back, and was telling us we had to order something and move to a smaller table as we had now apparently being there for 45 minutes. I looked at my watch and it was exactly 10pm. which meant at the most we would have been there 25 minutes not the 45 as he claimed. I know this because we had arranged to meet at 9.30pm, and when I got to Subi, it was exactly 9.25, and I waited in my car for awhile talking to a friend on the phone and waiting for my other friend to arrive. I know at 9.32pm, she called me to tell me she had arrived, and I got out of my car and went to look for her car. I know it would have taken us at the very least 5 minutes to find each other and walk to the cafe, which would have meant we went and sat down at the earliest at 9.37pm. I know all this because it is on my phone log. So he had lied about that. Then he told us that they had a reservation for our table for a group who were at the theater. I believed he lied to us about that as the next words out of his mouth was that he was switching our table with the group of women who I saw at the smaller table. If he wanted the table for a reservation, he would have left it empty so that it would be made available for the reservation group. I get that it was busy. I also understand that we had a large table considering we only had four people, and that we had been there awhile. However there is a nicer way of asking us to switch tables as well as a nicer way of getting you point across. Making up rubbish is not one of them, especially not to customers.
Previous times when I had been to Oriels, I had put up with the rude grunts of that waiter. I don’t think I’ll be going back there anymore. I walked out of there last night really annoyed. We didn’t bother staying after that BS he made up. If he is the owner, he needs to let his staff deal with the customers while he deals with the actual business side of things. If he is a waiter there, he needs to reevaluate his people skills. We went to Funtastico for our coffee instead. It was some much better. The staff were much friendlier and actually smiles and says hi to you when you enter and best bit is… they don’t grunt at customers!!! 
Oriel’s has always been an incredible waste of money. Their food isn’t even good, and their menu is always overpriced. Although I guess it’s overpriced because of the location and that they have a 24-hour opening license – not because of the quality of service, and food and beverage items.
I still remember when they tried to charge us for tap water… and that my tea was late by an hour or more when it wasn’t even busy (only a few tables were occupied). How hard does it take to organise a cup, saucer, milk, milk jug, strainer, tea leaves, and a small pot of hot water?
And to top it off, the only reason Oriel’s closed was because they tried to evade tax (according to a friend’s friend who works/worked at Oriel’s).
Oriels was pricey because it was opened 24hours. It wasn’t exactly a casual hang out either, so all in all it was expected to be a little more pricey.
Food took a long time because it was always PACKED. It was always packed because it was good. MMMmmm shoe string fries…
They charged for tap water to deter people from taking up valuable seat space because it was so packed. It was also to stop all the drunken subi people coming over to sober up on free tap water, and generally ruin the atmosphere.
I remember many a uni day hanging out there till the wee hours of this place. Oriel was what made Subiaco Subiaco. As soon as they changed hands and stopped being 24hr Subiaco went down with it.
Whatever the reason a ‘friends friend’ told you, losing Oriel 24hours was the worse thing to happen, for Subiaco, for Perth. It just made Perth become more ‘Perth’. A town that is so boring with so few social evening options(other then get sh*tfaced).
Given our population size Perth desperately needs more 24hr Oriels and places similar like Moon, Exo Mod(minus the cocroaches), Suites etc