I hosted a party at the Irvine location and it was a hassle from beginning to end. The one positive thing I will say before I get into the sorted details of my event was that the food was good. That is the only thing that went right.
Nirmal Anand is the looser, typical ""Desi"" who is the manager of the Irvine restaurant. I knew going into to Chakra it would be more expensive than other Indian standby restaurants, but I was not expecting to be quoted hotel wedding prices for items like alcohol. We visited a few times before signing the contract and he always had a different price for alcohol. Then when he finally agreed to give us his happy hour prices, he lied and over quoted us. I called his restaurant anonymously and got lower prices quoted. When I approached him with that info, he finally acquiesced to lower prices.
You would think that would send up a red flag to me, but I was determined to use that restaurant because the food is superior to most other Indian restaurants and the decor was nice. We went for the regular Saturday buffet of $15 and paid full price per head with no break for bringing in 100 people for the event. So he did us no favors.
The event went OK for the most part until we came to the end. When we initially signed the contract Nirmal stated it was OK if the event went over by 30 mins. It is a Desi party, that is expected. Well, 10 min before our time was up he started harassing my guests to leave. He didn't even bother to approach me so I could let my guests know time was coming up. I was thoroughly embarrassed and that is only thing my guests remember from my party.
When we tried to pay the bill he was no where to be found and when he finally showed up, he didn't have the bill ready. When he finally did produce a bill, he charged us $250 per 15 min we ran late (which is not written anywhere in the contract).
We stayed 2 hours after our event bickering over the bill. He ran the amount without my authorization twice on my credit card and maxed it out. After a lot of yelling and screaming, he finally gave us the correct bill and admitted he shouldn't have over charged us to begin with.
I had to wait 3 days for the overcharges to clear on my credit card before I could go back and pay the bill. When I did go back, I gave him one last chance to modify the bill for his stupid behavior. He had the audacity to tell me that he did me a favor for charging the regular amount for the buffet, that is was actually a $40 menu. His Sunday buffet is max $23!!!! Where the F*** did he get $40 from???? Typical stupid Desi.
I even called the owner of the restaurant, Mr. Ravi, he didn't care.
So there you have it...if you believe it is worth the hassle to have the party there and deal with the village idiot, have fun!
Pros: good food
Cons: several
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