Food Court complaints

Oct. 21, 2004
By Katie Kerr
Staff Writer

The new food court has brought a lot to the university center, including complaints.  On top of all the criticism the cafeteria receives, food service is being served even more problems with the new food court.

When the university center first opened students were really excited, now halfway through the semester they are starting to voice their concerns.

The two main complaints that have been brought up are the time spent waiting in line for food, and the high priced items.  As the complaints piled up, Student Government Association started to notice.  SGA president Ben Kiel has the job of taking these complaints straight to the administration and finding out what can be done to fix these problems.

Although some complaints about the waiting time were excessive, Kiel says they weren’t all that off course.

“It was a big issue; I had to wait in line for 20 minutes,” he said.  “Part of the reason for that is they’re still training people to be more efficient.”  In addition to training Kiel says steps will be taken so that a supervisor is out in the front more instead of in the back kitchen so that everything will run more smoothly.

While steps are being taken to quicken the waiting time, high priced items are still an issue.

“Right now nothing is currently being done in terms of lowering the prices,”  Kiel said. Soda was lowered in the beginning of the year however Sodexho can’t do a lot to lower the prices.

“Sodexho isn’t able to pay wholesale like other grocery stores.  So since they have to pay a high price and they are a for profit industry, there is little they can do,” Kiel said.

Another issue of concern is the flex dollars.  Students were given $100 to spend at the food court, which is supposed to last them the semester.  Changes were made so that students can now add money to their flex dollar account and can also add money to other student’s accounts.

But a problem that is sure to arise is that the balance of flex dollar accounts will go back to zero after each semester.  Money added will rollover, but what is left of the original 100 dollars will be eliminated after each semester.

Kiel says in order to prevent future problems there may be sales in order to help students spend their money towards the end of the semester.

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