Booked to go before an event, to be close to the Stadium. What a mistake. Service was not what we expected. The table we got happened to be in a poor location. Wait staff seem very inexperienced or just poor at communication. One could not even understand us at all? The burger is a no-go. Seriously, both our patties tasted like boiled mince with no real flavour. Have you heard of the maillard reaction? Even the fries that you have to pay extra for were absolutely horrible! Like they had been baked multiple times, and just over-cooked.
The best part was having your card taken "to open a tab at the bar", which screams to me that something was not right, looking back now. Then, as soon as I paid, my bank blocked my card for potential fraud. This screams dodgy stuff happening here!
You guys better get your $h!t sorted out. You will never see me there again...
Update for owner: I don't have to unblock my card each time I have used it at a bar or Restaurant (in fact, I have never had to, and this was the first time it has happened) so the fact that it happened this instance was not a good experience. Fact: Banks don't randomly block cards. There must be a pattern of behaviour that was picked up. And the fact that the message from the bank specified the transaction at The Duke as the reason for blocking the card, there was no question about my understanding.
Sorry if I hurt your feeling(s), but with the number of things that did not go well for us, I cannot put it down to being "too busy". If you're booked to capacity, then you should be able to prepare for that. Bottom line. And the fact that your food is over-priced while being horrible is just another jab. I didn't have time to negotiate with staff that hardly understood me (I didn't have Google translate this for me).
This may just be a one-off occurrence for you, but it left a horrible taste in my mouth, literally and figuratively. There are too many good experiences elsewhere in Wellington that have been much better than this.