Cafe wouldn’t let pregnant woman use toilet

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I’ve just ordered some breakfast for collection from a local cafe round the corner and had a quick flick through the reviews first. The most recent review is:

‘As a heavily pregnant lady went in desperate for the bathroom and they refused to let me use their toilet despite me being in tears and not close to anywhere else open. In a packed shop full of customers, they said no with no heart, no remorse, no feeling. Have never been more horrified, myself and my husband will never be using this place again’

I feel like it’s a bit harsh and the bit about there being nowhere to go close by is very untrue. There’s a Morrison’s maximum 5 minutes walk away with toilets. As a (second time) pregnant woman myself I wouldn’t get annoyed if an establishment didn't let me use staff toilets, I’d just find somewhere with public ones. The cafe gave a long response as to why they couldn’t let her use the bathroom. Mainly because their insurance didn’t cover customers in the staff area of the cafe and there were lots of boxes etc. laid about. If the pregnant woman had hurt herself then it probably wouldn’t have been good for them. They also said they managed to get the keys for the toilet in the opposite pub so it’s not like the reviewer didn’t get to use one. I think it was quite kind of them to go to the effort of making sure she used a bathroom.

Do you think she’s being reasonable or not? I think she’s being a bit U due to there being a Morrison’s so close by! (I’m not the cafe owner just interested in people’s views). My DM thinks they should have let her use it no questions asked purely because she was pregnant, I’m a little unsure

Utter poppycock (love the word) on pregnant women having some divine legal right to access toilets.

Even the Law Commission has gone into print to debunk this myth

www.lawcom.gov.uk/app/uploads/2015/03/Legal_Oddities.pdf

@nestisflown- it is merely a discretion not to charge, nothing more

Ah seen now there was no customer toilet. The woman was still a CF. The sense of entitlement of some people is ridiculous. Going into a cafe or shop and expecting to use a staff loo is CF behaviour. Would people waltz into other places like a school, an office, a care home etc and expect to use the facilities ?

School yes.
Covered reception quite a few times and I'd heard the rumours about the occasional cf'er buzz and ask. At least I thought it was rumours until one day could see a car pull up to the gates, driver gets out and buzzes. Some random person demanding to be let in to use the toilet. The word taxes were also mentioned.

When I googled kust mow too find out what it said regarding pregnant womens toilet rights there was a newspaper report of a woman complaining that she wasnt allowed to use the toilet in a police station. (She just wandered in and asked hadnt been arrested) so I guess peoole do wander in anywhere that is open.

Those pp mentioning the CF "no children" airbnb/virtue signalling MNer reactions -

What about the people who inherited a tenanted house (?hazy on details?) and ended up being told to GIVE it to the tenants as the kind thing to do!

Batshit.

That one should have been in Classics, Buzz. And also the one where the OP's elderly and mentally fragile mother discovered a homeless person had broken into her garden shed. Cue dozens of MNers falling over themselves to tell her to let the guy move in there, bring him 'flasks' of tea and soup (sorry, but, even a good, cheap flask is a tenner, not exactly something you'd be giving out willy nilly) and bedding, give him the WiFi password, invite in to get showered, make up a 'welfare pack'.

FFS. It was such bollocks.

Her review was rude and unnecessary but I also think it just would have been the kind thing to do to let her use the loo.

Her review was rude and unnecessary but I also think it just would have been the kind thing to do to let her use the loo.

We just come back full circle then, though, as everybody has a valid reason to need the toilet, sometimes quite desperately. Ergo all toilets except for ones in private homes (even staff-only ones in cafes/shops/businesses/schools/etc) essentially become a free-for-all.

If people understand that providing a toilet therefore means providing it for absolutely everybody, they will think twice before installing one at all, if they can get away with it.

After unlimited toilet use for everybody who claims to need it, should we have cafes expected to provide free food for everybody who identifies as hungry, whether they can/want to pay for it or not? Free taxis for everybody who needs to get somewhere that isn't on a bus route, whether they have the money to pay for it or not?

What about the people who inherited a tenanted house (?hazy on details?) and ended up being told to GIVE it to the tenants as the kind thing to do!

It's absolutely absurd and hilarious to read but it's the logical extension of businesses (or even private houses, as upthread) being expected to provide free toilets for all.

Folk will read this and call me ridiculous, saying how can letting one person use your toilet possibly compare with giving them a house? But it isn't just one person using your loo - in busy and large population areas it could be hundreds of people every single day.

I remember the time when councils did routinely provide taxpayer-funded public toilets, but even then, they often had a coin slot in the door and you were expected to pay if a kind person didn't hold the door open for you or leave it jammed open - and yet a profit-making business is expected to provide them to all and sundry completely free, it seems.

When I worked in a shop people would get shitty if we didn't let their kids use the staff toilets. Ridiculous there was a marks and Spencer over the road with customer toilets.

When I worked in a shop people would get shitty if we didn't let their kids use the staff toilets.

I hope that’s not literally!

When I worked in a shop people would get shitty if we didn't let their kids use the staff toilets. Ridiculous there was a marks and Spencer over the road with customer toilets.

Some people are so entitled that they take great pleasure in causing an unnecessary scene to gain attention for themselves when there's a very simply alternative solution. It's the same kind of people who insist that other people move in the cafe because they're at the entitled person's 'regular' table, even though there might be 10 pretty-much identical ones free.

When I worked in a shop people would get shitty if we didn't let their kids use the staff toilets.

I hope that’s not literally!

Eeuuww, dirty protest!!!! Hand them the mop and offer to lend them a cork

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll

It would have been the kind thing to do. I didn’t say obligatory, mandatory or necessary.

Jeez, can’t people just be kind anymore?? Would being kind be that controversial and lead to society completely falling apart?

Agree cola. It would be the kind thing to do. Sod the rules

Jeez, can’t people just be kind anymore?? Would being kind be that controversial and lead to society completely falling apart?

Why are you being such a kindness martyr about it when the thread is quite clear?

I need some kindness, folks. I'm pretty desperate with Xmas coming and need to use someone's facilities for free, okay? It's the kind thing to do.

I remember when my teens were tiny toddlers they used to love asking shop staff if they could use their loo. Invariably they were treated with kindness and sympathy. I think it was often a ploy to interrupt the boring grocery shopping but they were so convincing hopping about. I assumed all toddlers, pregnant women etc would be treated like this. I live in a city but maybe it’s just a kinder place than some.
The older I get the more I think that kindness and compassion are the most important qualities.

I think individual people are still kind. But modern employment practices do not allow for using discretion. It's toe the line or leave. So people toe the line.

The Pret A Manger in Bath has loads of seats but there are no toilets which I find really weird. There are public ones outside a minutes walk away but that's not much good if you want to go in the middle of your meal. I thought it was law there had to be one.

@BuzzShitbagBobbly it’s my opinion, surely the point of people posting here is for us to offer back our opinions. And I hardly think I’m a “kindness martyr” for suggesting someone not let a pregnant woman risk piddling herself in their cafe because they could offer her the use of the loo.

I don’t know, I keep thinking of Notting Hill and Julia Roberts character standing in front of Hugh Grants characters “I’m just a girl, standing in front of a guy, asking him to love her”...

She was just a pregnant woman, standing in front of someone with a toilet, asking if she could wee

@ThisMomentIsMyLife I agree unsurprisingly, and too have been lucky to experience similar with my daughters. It’s always much appreciated and I try to pass it back on by being kind where I can.

@isabellerossignol That depends on the employer and I would say you are right, sadly very many probably would find that’s the case. Maybe I grew up someplace a bit exceptional in that the employee would be more likely to have gotten kicked out for not letting the lady use the loo!

@dontalltalkatonce Hope you find yourself a mysterious benefactor

It would have been the kind thing to do.

And I was just trying to point out that it's not that straightforward as where do you draw the line?

If businesses have toilets for customers and/or staff, they generally have enough for the number of people likely to use them. If they need to double or treble them to accommodate all-comers, that costs them a lot more in business rates and/or lost sales-space, cleaning, supplies etc. Either that or they have people queuing. If you ran a business, would you want to pay somebody to stand waiting in a long line for a staff toilet, whilst customers were going unserved and leaving in a huff, off to leave a negative review about how they need more staff?

The problem is that the people asking to use the toilet will not have been the first to do so and won't be the last. For all you know, a business might have been 'kind' to a hundred people that same day, seen the queues preventing their staff from working efficiently, depletion of supplies, maybe the mess left, the inconvenience and decided that enough was enough. The 101st person comes along and asks to use their staff toilet, they say no and that 101st person thinks, "Well, that was unkind - surely they could just let one person quickly use their toilet."

@Colabottles64 @Vulpine @ThisMomentIsMyLife

If the café doesn't have a customer toilet then it must have less than ten seats so there would likely only be one member of staff. Should the member of staff leave all the customers and food in the middle of being cooked to escort the person needing the toilet or should they let them wander around a secure area - stock/money/staff belongings unsupervised?