This used to be a local haunt for me, living in Hartlepool. Sadly, as shabby as it was prior to the refurb, standards have gone down in most other ways, since. I went on the evening of Fri 24th Jan 2020, after a long break from it. It was unusually quiet in comparison to the past. Even so, there was one person at the reception desk, checking his computer, then escorting his customer to their table, while the queue just got longer. He should have dealt with the checking in, while somebody else, did the ushering!! When he seated us, he said the waitress would be straight over to take our drinks order. Nobody appeared and so after 10 minutes, I returned to him, and he himself, took our order. The 5 of us, went to the carvery, and on our return, still no drinks, they did finally arrive, shortly afterwards. We felt that there were too many potato/pasta choices, and too few vegetable ones. The food wasn't that hot, especially the vegetarian gravy. In our opinion, there wasn't any sign of the old efficient management/serving staff. Could this be part of the reason for the dwindling standards!! Had it been busy, we would have understood more!!