Sussex couple 'sick with disgust' after finding maggots in McDonald's ketchup

Connie Bulgin, 18, said she went to the fast food restaurant yesterday morning (Thursday, June 23) to get lunch.

She said: “I was with my boyfriend who got some ketchup from the pump in the restaurant, which was clearly running out.

"At first, without knowing there were maggots I dipped a chip in the ketchup and ate it before I realised it tasted weird, took a look and there were maggots crawling around in it.

"We brought the ketchup pot to a worker and were taken to the manager, who gave us a full refund and apologised several times.”

She added: "They then began to take apart the ketchup pump and brought it to the back of the restaurant to be cleaned.

"My boyfriend saw what he described to be hundreds of maggots in the pipes of the pump as they brought it through the restaurant.”

She said the shock had been traumatising and added: "I feel sick with disgust, knowing that I ingested this ketchup. We both feel that a refund and an apology is nowhere near enough to compensate for the trauma and we wouldn’t wish for anyone to experience this.”

Connie said she made an official complaint to customer services at McDonald’s following the incident at the branch in Hastings town centre.

A McDonald’s spokesperson said it was conducting an investigation into how this happened: "Food safety and hygiene is of the utmost importance to us. We're extremely disappointed to see that we have fallen short on this occasion.

"Our condiment area and dispensers are checked for cleanliness on a daily basis, and when the matter was brought to the attention of our restaurant team we immediately took the dispensers out of action.

"We are conducting a thorough investigation to understand how the incident occurred on this occasion.

"The Environmental Health Officer has also attended the restaurant this afternoon, and confirmed they are satisfied that the correct procedures are in place at the restaurant.

"Our Customer Services team are in contact with the customer to offer our apologies and find a resolution.”