Complaints

The complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:08/21/2023

  Type:Order Issues
  Status:

  ResolvedMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  8/20 we had my youngest’s 2nd birthday party. We had booked Polka Dots Play Cafe after visiting 2-3 times prior and loved it.
  We paid 292.62 altogether including $25 tip.
  We had booked the party for 3pm and we’re told that we would have 30 minutes to set up beforehand, the party room for 1 hour, and the 10 children included in my package could play the entire time they’re open. I talked to 2 employees including a manager when I booked. The first employee told me that date was available but she wasn’t the booking person so she would have them call. The manager got back with me and helped me get the party booked online on 7/14.
  I go to check on some guests who weren’t in the playroom and an employee approached me and tells me they’re closing at 4 I check my phone and it’s 4:01.
  Why would no one tell me the time I booked was an hour before closing? I wouldn’t have booked a space for kids to play with that little time for a birthday party. It takes 30-45 minutes just to do food and cake we didn’t even get to open gifts and the child guests got to play minimally.
  So I tell the staff I need to speak to someone because I didn’t pay nearly $300 for my guests to be there an hour and not get to really use the facility. Also the place was incredibly hot, given it was 96 degrees today outside, but everyone was sweating.
  The staff tells me they called the owner and “the owners husband” would be on his way to talk to me. He gets there and never once acknowledges that there was a miscommunication. he tells me that I should have paid more attention at booking to the hours and there’s nothing he could do about it.
  I check online and it literally says closed all day on Sundays so I’m unsure how I was just supposed to know that they were closing.
  We loved this place before but they’ll never get a dime nor recommendation from me again.
  
  Also noting over half the ppl drove 45 minutes and several drove an hour and 15 to be there for an hour.

  Business Response

  Date: 08/21/2023

  This customer did have a party at our facility on 8/20/23 which had a party room scheduled for 1 hour of use from 3:00PM to 4:00PM.   As per the party agreement. we allow the children attending the party to play for the duration of the open hours that day, in this case they would have been allowed to play from noon until 4:00PM as that was our scheduled time for Sunday.  Then the party room would have been used for cake, presents, food or visiting from 3:00 PM to 4:00PM.  This is the typical use of a 3:00PM party.   As can been seen on the attached screenshot the party booking states that the party room is for 1 hour.  We show our hours on our website, google and our Facebook and we regularly post the hours of cafe on our social media pages and we believed at the time of the complaint that all of these places had the correct times posted.  The customer stated that they did not know that we closed on 4:00PM on Sunday.  We did find out today, that there was one section of our website that showed inaccurately that we were closed on Sunday and we understand that this could have caused confusion.  After we found this discrepancy, we used our website by removing the section completely and only show out hours on the page titled "Hours" to prevent this issue in the future.  We also issued a full refund to this customer today 8/21/23 which can also be seen in the attached receipt.  We sent an email directly to the customer today with an apology and let them know of the refund.

  Customer Answer

  Date: 08/22/2023

   
  
  Better Business Bureau:
  
  
  
  I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID ********, and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me.
  
  
  
  
  Sincerely,
  
  
  
  ******* *****