How should one get a waiter's attention?

I thought your friend did the appropriate thing, the alternative would have been to what? Shout across the restaurant? And really, the reprimand while walking away is a bit snide and passive aggressive.

I thought it was nastily done too.

I agree with @canidmajor.

The way your friend summoned the waiter is the way I do it. If they keep passing and not seeing me, I might say “Excuse me.” If I really need them and they continue to not see me, I have no problem getting up and finding them or asking another staff person to find them. “If you see our waiter, can you please tell him we’d like our check?”

If he had stopped to talk and I had thought of it, it would have been interesting to ask, “What should we have done?”

I don’t see anything wrong with how your friend approached the situation but I usually just speak up and say “excuse me, when you have a minute could you….” fill in the blanks.
I agree the waiter was rather rude and passive aggressive making the comment they did while hoofing it off. I could understand that if your friend snapped his fingers or clinked his water glass with a spoon to summon the waiter in a demeaning manner of servitude, haha
People, there is no accounting for their pet peeves.

@Coloma He was at a distance but I agree in general.

He was being nasty, in my opinion, with his comment. One thing I wouldn’t appreciate when dining out is being reprimanded by the wait staff.

Wait, the waiter reprimanded your friend for waving? That seems really strange. What did he think you guys should have done instead, wait patiently until he moved near your table?

No, his job is to wait on you, not the other way around. You were polite and respectful. Your waiter was not.

I once had a waiter insult me when, after waiting patiently for about 20 minutes or longer for our appetizers and bottle of wine to be served.
I inquired when we could expect our wine and the waiter replied ” Why, do you need it right now?”
Um…pardon me!?

I was hopping mad and had a nice little chat with the manager. This was a very nice, upscale restaurant and his remark was completely unacceptable.

I hope that kid got fired over his incredibly rude behavior!

I’d probably give him a less generous tip for being rude to me. I don’t pay to go out to
eat to experience a rude waiter.

@jca I hope he was having a bad day or something because that’s completely unacceptable behavior.

In this case, as he sounds like a jumped up pantry boy who doesn’t know his place, i’d suggest brisk clapping & a sharp gesturing motion with the head.

He actually wasn’t the person who waited on us; she was very nice but not around.

Yo Adriane

I usually whistle and shout, “Hey, sweetheart!”

Just to waiters though. It would be rude toward waitresses.

Well, if they are doing their job properly, the customer should never have to get their attention. Any kind of admonition from a waiter for this is wrong. Period. They should be apologizing on behalf of the person who left you adrift. Okay, I’m Canadian. YMMV.

My preferred method is to wait until they are looking in my direction, and then make eye contact and wave. The alternative is to get up and go talk to the waiter.

Those are really the only two options I would use.

@dappled_leaves What does YMMV stand for?

@Brian1946: Your Mileage May Vary.

I would do what your friend did. A subtle wave to let the person know I would like to speak to them. If wait staff pulled that on me, I’d let the owner/manager know. Their behaviour seems damned rude to me. As @canidmajor asked, how exactly did they think people should attract their attention?

I have done it. For first try (and second and third) I try to use eye contact (perhaps nodding), but if I did not get a response, I would wave my hand. I think the waiter was too sensitive.

I asked my husband what he’d do if a waiter said that to him, he said he’d give him a verbal tip but I’m too polite to repeat it here.

That remark is unacceptable. You eat out to have an enjoyable and relaxed experience and the waiter’s job is to ensure that is what you get. I would have been tempted to reply “for future reference you should not speak to your customers like that”. Are there restaurant rules for how to summon waiters? I think not, though chucking a bread roll at him might be overstepping the line.

It all happened so fast and he said it as he was walking away, my jaw kind of dropped but I didn’t have time to respond.