Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Who is unreasonable here - the staff or the potential customers?

141 replies

blankpieceofpaper · 10/09/2016 23:55

A reasonably busy tourist city today at lunchtime: we enter one of those vintage style tea and cake/ lunch tea rooms about midway through the lunch peak time. We meet the staff just after entering and its established that we do want lunch - not just drinks and begin to make their way to a table. It's in the next 'room' of the cafe and we are tersely are told its a table for four. Bit of confusion here over us thinking that means its reserved and we then make their back into main part of cafe there is a raised section with four out of five tables free so we begin to head there - it is quieter and there are window seats. We are stopped again - no, those are tables for four/ five (maybe ... if two people squashed on benches!). There is a table for two but it is currently dirty and full of plates, she will clear it for us. This table is squashed right by the serving hatch in the busier area. I've experienced this before and would prefer not to... but no, same blunt tone - this is the only table we can have.

Anyway, long and the short of it is, we leave a cafe about a third full and find a great one a few streets over. Happy ending all round - they kept their table rules and we were eventually fed.

I was just a bit amazed! They have great reviews on tripadvisor, but I spoke to a friend who went in there as a single person and was asked to move tables. Does this happen anywhere else?!

OP posts:
Nanny0gg · 11/09/2016 12:30

The late Michael Winner would definitely not have put up with that table or that service!

bakingaddict · 11/09/2016 12:32

You are a weird one trifle so it's now entitled if you enter a cafe where there are plenty of clean free tables but the waitress directs you to a dirty unsuitable table and tells you have to wait 10 minutes and in your world that's perfectly acceptable. Do you not eat out a lot?

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 12:36

It's not unacceptable. It's just what they are willing to do to secure your business, compared to what they're not willing to do (give a table meant for five people to two people). As I said, I don't think the OP was unreasonable to leave either. Both parties have a choice.

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 12:38

Lweji: Possibly, but if I was running a cafe in a busy tourist area, I probably would have the luxury of being able to watch a couple of people walk out of the door without feeling the pinch too much.

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 12:41

YoutheCat: The restaurant owners get to decide how many people they need to be serving in order to offer them a particular table. In this case, they didn't want to offer a table that could potentially bring in £50-100 of revenue to a pair who might only spend £20-40, only to have to turn away the bigger group. Maybe they anticipated getting busy shortly, so they didn't want to take the risk. That is up to them and it is entitled to insist on getting your own way about this, when actually it's their business and they are happy to let you go elsewhere.

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 12:42

Roundabout: Well, it's their business, ergo their problem, isn't it. No-one is forcing the OP and her friend to eat there Hmm

bakingaddict · 11/09/2016 12:49

Given that there was several tables capable of seating 4 people and not withstanding that other diners might finish and vacate tables it's quite preposterous to turn away paying guests on the assumption that in excess of 25 people are going to rock up at the same time OP is having her lunch. It's bad decision making on the part the restaurant

Lweji · 11/09/2016 12:58

Yes, unless a huge group showed up (no large group would bebso stupid to show up in the middle of service without a reservation) they wouldn't have to turn away anyone, certainly not more than 2 or 3 people in excess of those already in.
This means they lost 30-50 pounds for a potential, but unlikely, extra gain of 15-150 pounds. Because it could easily be that the larger party was only of 3 people.
And unlikely because there were quite a few empty tables.

It's not entitled to think that you can get a table in a place that is only 1/3 full. It's very reasonable, rather.

Memoires · 11/09/2016 13:05

I'm interested in the sofa that you made yourself Grin

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 13:05

They could have a table, Lweji. Just not one that might be needed for a bigger party. I think the cafe is better placed to say when their busy times are going to be than people on MN...

Lweji · 11/09/2016 13:06

Me too. (Had to re-read that sentence)
Did you knit it?

Lweji · 11/09/2016 13:09

might be needed

That's the key "might".

I've never been turned away or felt less than welcome with DS only, even in busy restaurants, with lots of reserved tables and that they knew would fill up soon, and only larger tables were available. Because they are not unwelcoming or arseholes.

A good thing too, because I often write TripAdvisor reviews.

ilovesooty · 11/09/2016 13:11

I'd have left too.
I've more than once - on one occasion in an empty restaurant at 6pm that had only just opened - been refused service altogether because I was eating alone.
Perhaps trifle thinks I shouldn't dine out at all.

limitedperiodonly · 11/09/2016 13:14

if I don't like a table when we are being seated I will ask (politely!) if we can move to another table straightaway. 99% of the time they are happy to oblige

That's what I do Olenna. One of the benefits of getting old. A birthday dinner in a very expensive restaurant was ruined by the arctic air conditioning - it was when indoor smoking was allowed so they were catering for fat men who smoked cigars. It would have been cold anywhere but they put us right at under the unit, so it was noisy too. The table was on the main way through so it was like eating on the hard shoulder of a very cold motorway. It was warmer outside. I ended up wearing my husband's jacket and the waiters didn't say a word. I should have complained and I would now. If they didn't have another table, I'd walk.

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 13:15

Of course I don't think that, Sooty. You would just be needing a small table. I would think you very unreasonable, however, if you went into a restaurant alone and asked for a table for four Hmm

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 13:16

Lweji: Are you one of those people who likes to weaponise TripAdvisor if you don't get every bit of your own way? Yes, those people are irritating too.

limitedperiodonly · 11/09/2016 13:20

I ate alone one night in Rome. When I turned up they'd set up a small table - I think it was a card table - but it was in their main dining room, not shunted off by the loos in the back room. The waiter said they were worried I'd be lonely so they gave me a good spot Grin

ilovesooty · 11/09/2016 13:22

So you don't think I should have been refused a table for two trifle?

Because it's happened on more than one occasion.

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 13:28

Sooty: Of course not, no.

Original poster
blankpieceofpaper · 11/09/2016 13:28

Sadly the sofa is not of my own making, no! No talents in that area.

You are right though Sooty by Trifle's own logic two seats are for two people, the restaurant could earn 20-40 pounds more for those two that show up.

Maybe such places should keep lap trays or fold up tables for such people to eat from, so they don't develop that sense of entitlement from wanting to sit at an appropriate table.

OP posts:
Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 13:32

No, she isn't right. It is reasonable for Sooty to be offered the smallest available table so that the restaurant can keep other tables for threes, fours etc. Not complicated.

LeaveMyWingsBehindMe · 11/09/2016 13:33

I think this is pretty common practice for very popular places that are busy at peak times.

If the table looks unpleasantly squashed in or too small to eat off comfortably, or in a noisy thoroughfare I always request a bigger or better table. Sometimes they refuse as they want to pack 'em in, in which case I politely tell them that I totally understand and I would rather go elsewhere.

It's the risk they take. Popular places usually get away with it.

Roseformeplease · 11/09/2016 13:33

I wonder what they do with groups of 3? Perhaps we should all turn up in threes, at 5 minute intervals to see what they do.

Trifleorbust · 11/09/2016 13:37

Rose: Three goes to table for four. Two goes to table for two. These are simple conventions.

2kids2dogsnosense · 11/09/2016 13:49

This happened to a lady and her kids a few years ago at the Lakeland Plastics cafe (some fancy over-priced chef - can't remember his name).

You "clocked in" and were given a sort of walkie-talkie to take round he store with you. When you got to the top of the list, they buzzed you to come for your table.

DH and I were part of a party of 4 - got buzzed, went up and were shown to a table. Another woman who didn't realise that you had to wait to be escorted arrived with 3 little 'uns and sat down at the only remaining free table, which was for six.

The waitress/manageress/head witch/whatever-she-was shot over and loudly castigated and embarrassed her in front of her children and everyone else in the place. "You DON'T just sit down, you wait on the threshold, we'll come and get you when a suitable table is cleared, this is a table for SIX, there are only FOUR of you" etc etc etc. It was appalling! Had it been me, I would have stuffed my walkie-talkie up her snotty arse into her wildly gesticulating hand and stormed off exited with quiet dignity. As it was the woman just accepted the blocking and sat where she was put (probably too knackered to do anything violent).

Ironically, a couple of elderly women arrived shortly afterwards (all Jaeger and Aquascutum) and plonked their entitled arses at the 6-er table. She didn't say anything to them.