AIBU to expect parents to control children even in the likes of Pizza Express

[Jewels234]

I know it's more of a family restaurant, but there are children all around me going mental. Screaming, having tantrums, standing on chairs. It's horrendous.

I am probably being unreasonable being here in the first place, but I love a leg gera salad.

Yabu. Leggere pizza is a rip off.

Yabu-Pizza Express on a bank holiday Monday?Are you mad?Pizza Express have those fucking awful tables which magnify noise x 1000.Even putting your glass down is deafening.

We took our kids to a pizza express once. The environment was so awful for noise so we ate quickly and paid the astronomical bill and never went back.

YANBU.

ds3 works there p/t and hates it when parents let their dc run around all over the place. Noise (to a reasonable degree) is a given and customers should accept that because it is a family restaurant as lots of posters have said but it just spoils it for everyone not to mention makes it dangerous when he and all the other waiters are carrying hot food around and dc are running riot.

I genuinely don't think pizza express is family friendly. Whoever designed it with no soft furnishings whatsoever and cold, echoing tables clearly hated children.

I reluctantly sympathise a bit with the parents. Every time I've been to pizza express the service has been shit.

Last time I went (with 2 work colleagues for lunch) we had a 40 minute wait for food which was not mentioned when we sat down. It was only mentioned when we complained and were told we'd be next. We left as we only had an hour for lunch. There was one other small table filled in the restaurant but apparently they had a lot of preparation to do for the evening.

There was a small child kicking off then with a mum at the end of her tether but they'd been given a drink plus starter so thought it best to wait for their lunch rather than start again somewhere else.

Children should certainly be expected to sit quietly for 30-45 mins but when it becomes more than an hour I feel a big sorry for them rather than slating the parents.

I avoid Pizza Express even weekday evenings because the acoustics are so dreadful. All those hard surfaces make it difficult to hear what friends are saying, let alone when noisy children are thrown into the mix at weekends.

Also, it's not good value for money, imo.

But of course children should not be allowed to wander around or make noise for the sake of it in any restaurant.

It is strange isn't it? I was in Pizza Express in Manchester on Saturday. First time for me. There were lots of little girls all prettily dressed with their Nanas Grandmas and Mummies, and we were all having a meal prior to going in to the Palace to see the ballet Swan Lake.
All were beautifully behaved, colouring in etc no trouble at all. So perhaps we just got lucky that day.
The ballet was one of the " My first ballet " series and was a shortened version with a narrator, it was absolutely fantastic.

Pizza Express has plummeted in standards the last few years and become a total ripoff - and tried to get more families in with those vouchers that just mean you aren't ripped off if you have jumped through the hoops to get one.

We're still at the stage of trying to teach our children to behave and not panic and cry when something isn't 100% as expected (6yo with ASD and probable ASD, and 3yo who hasn't but copies the 6yos), so PE is a good place to try regularly. Usually there's a party being 10x louder than us.

Though bringing kids' activity packs after 30 min is pointless, and changing the menu from what is actually listed on the kids menu is just mean - ds was pretty good at being told he could only have what was on the menu, made a choice, but then being told he couldn't have that did Not Go Well. Though not as badly as the time I spent over an hour outside a noodle place in Greenwich with him, while dn and DP enjoyed their meal.

PE - stop changing the bloody menu every five minutes! I've been tempted to throw a tantrum myself. More to the point, my parents have been loyal customers since 1969, until the last couple years.

Not sure why "kid friendly" gives carte blanche for people to foist badly behaved offspring on the rest of us.

If I take my daughter out I would choose somewhere child friendly - doesn't mean we want to sit there and witness horrendous behaviour from other children

Rookiemere - No he said nothing just walked out. We were all so amazed by it - we just sat there in shock that anyone could that.

Noo it's about the only place we can take dD where her occasionally challenging behaviour fits in.

Oh please. YABVU. Children make noise, get over it. If you want a quiet meal go out at night or to somewhere that does not advertise itself as family friendly!

Stars66 some level or childhood noise is acceptable. Perisisten shrieking, running around etc isn't whether it is child friendly or not. That just ruins the meal for the rest of us

We went last night. Had some Tesco vouchers to use. No kids there at all! We went at 8.30 though.
If we're eating in chain restaurants, we always try to eat late, so there's less chance of kids being there.
Agree it's a rip off without some kind of voucher. Would never pay full price in Pizza express.

Some people's definition of 'family friendly' seems to be 'friendly to whatever my family want to do, regardless of the impact on other families'.

I get very tired of telling 3yo DS that he can't run around making a nuisance of himself or shriek, despite what the other (often older) children are doing.

When we went to Pizza Hut once they forgot to put our order in.

After an hour of waiting DS and his pal were on their feet, putting their balloons as high as they could ( not running around though) and having a crayon fight, normally I would not tolerate behaviour like that, but family friendly restaurants really need to ensure that food is out in a timely fashion).

Mind you our local buffet restaurant is worse. Why on earth people think it's safe to let their small children run across the floor with hot food displays and people carrying large platefuls, is beyond me.

We've stopped going since our family outing on valentines day where I had the misfortune to be hit in the face by firstly a packet of wet wipes and then a fork from the toddler at the next table.

We didn't eat out when the kids were too small to sit still. I have trained my dc to behave in this type of place and they know that if they misbehave, the next time we go to pizza express, they will be staying home with a babysitter whilst me and dh have the treat of pizza express for ourselves. They would be sooooo gutted and never dream of misbehaving in pizza express .

I hate going to places like this full of kids because it all becomes a bit Lord of the flies - misbehaving kids breeds more misbehaving kids. I can get mine to behave in a restaurant if others are sitting nicely but if there are kids running around then they'll want to join in and get stroppy when we stop them. So I avoid things like giraffe and go to less chainy type places. Today in a pub garden, wonderfully behaved for 2 hrs. Our local pub is pretty bad too though, climbing frame in beer garden and kids go feral.

thing is, if i ever take my children out to a restaurant even if they are well behaved i dont enjoy it because i fear people making comments/thinking thoughts along the lines of comments on here.
i find it really sad that in our society as a whole children are not welcome or enjoyed by the majority of people. in other countries such as brazil or italy, children can run about in public and people play with them, laugh with them, enjoy their company.
i think people with no children are extremely negative and lack basic understanding and compassion with children, and that's NOT the children's fault.
for instance, i know it is easy to see a parent just sitting on their phone ignoring their children in a restaurant and judge them, but maybe they have just had a really, really hard few days with no sleep and they know that if they are at home they may well end up hitting their children out of anger, and equally they are so depressed that they just need to go to a restaurant to be in a more adult space so they can try and have a break.
just a thought.
also, if children are annoying you, you have every right to tell them off/try to get them to stop. sitting there giving them evils does absolutely nothing.
yes it is the parent's job to look after their children and teach them good manners, and i dont agree with letting them run riot, but please could everyone try a little compassion and less judging?
it's bloody hard work going anywhere AT ALL with a small child, but the answer is not to sit at home all day getting depressed, you still need to get out and live.
and if it's a baby crying then get over it. they cry sometimes.

YANBU at all. Family friendly means children are welcome not treat it as a playground.

DH and I were on holiday in a family friendly hotel last week. Some parents allowed their children to run around the dining room in the same way that they would at the park. How they never got burnt by hot soup or didn't knock someone over is beyond me.

i find it really sad that in our society as a whole children are not welcome or enjoyed by the majority of people. in other countries such as brazil or italy, children can run about in public and people play with them, laugh with them, enjoy their company

I do enjoy the company of other children.

I also expect to eat out with MY child and not have my meal disturbed/ruined by poorly behaved children.

The two are not mutually exclusive

Question...How many of us Adults were allowed to run around/scream, shout and disturb other people in this kind of situation when we were kids? Not many I bet.

Because I was taught from an early age, that a going for a meal outside the house was a privilege/treat not a right.

You are not being unreasonable. I saw a waitress get hurt when a pair of kids were chasing and ran straight into her as she was carrying hot food. They were ok. Parent didn't react. Bit weird to be honest.