A Christmas lunch at the troubled Stage Post Inn at West Lavington ended in disappointment for a group of office workers.

The party of seven admin workers from Erlestoke Prison had booked Christmas lunch last Thursday but when they arrived they found their table was not decorated and no food was ready.

One of the workers, Paulette Larmour, said: “We phoned the order through at the beginning of the week but when we arrived there was no food cooking. The landlord told my manager that his staff had let him down but that he would go and cook the food and he suggested we wait an hour while he cooked the food which was no good to us because we had to be back at work.”

The employees had not paid a deposit for their meals and they requested a refund for the drinks they had bought but were refused.

Mrs Larmour said: “The landlord said he would reimburse the drinks but said he couldn’t give us a voucher now as he had no printer.”

Mrs Larmour said they had booked the Stage Post for Christmas lunch after visiting in November.

Instead she and her colleagues were due to have their Christmas lunch at the prison canteen yesterday.

Last month the pub hit the headlines after previous tenant Emi Smith left the pub in early November after settling rent arrears totalling thousands of pounds owed to pub owner Punch Taverns.

She was replaced with Stuart Cudlip who took over as the temporary tenant of the Stage Post in early November while the pub’s owners Punch Taverns look for a permanent tenant.

He said: “All the food was prepared for the prison staff’s meals but due to two members of staff not turning in I said there would be a 15 minute delay and that was unacceptable to them.

“We let them down and I do apologise. They wanted reimbursing for the drinks and I said ‘I really do apologise but I can’t do that.’ “Two staff members came into the pub just as the party were leaving. If they had stayed there wouldn’t have been a problem. The food that we had prepared for the meal had to be thrown away.” Mr Cudlip said all his other Christmas party bookings had been honoured without a hitch.

He said: “We have had a lot of Christmas bookings and all of the customers have been happy.”