Incredibly disappointed.
I was planning on going to Poetry Jazz Cafe on NYE with some friends who were visiting out of province. Of course, everything is crazy in the city on NYE, so I called ahead of time to make sure this was a tangible plan.
I was told over the phone that there were no reservations for NYE; seating for the night would be determined on a first-come first serve basis. $20 cover charge. No problem, sounded great! My group had absolutely no problem with showing up incredibly early just so we could reserve a seat. There were only 4 of us total.
So we end up at Poetry Jazz Cafe at around 8pm. The place is completely empty, with a sign out front that says something to the effect of, "Closed for Private Party". Confused, I flagged down an employee who was working near the entrance. He confirmed he sign, then told us, "If you come back in a few hours, I *might* be able to do something for you - but it's $20 each cover fee." This was stated as if he was doing us some huge favour.
We had been on the phone with these people not 3 hours before to double-check the situation. How did they *completely fail* to mention that the entire place was closed for a private function?
I was really looking forward to trying this place out and hopefully becoming a regular, but the way such a simple request was handled with utter disorganization and condescension is severely off-putting.