Page 14 | To be cross at Costa coffee not letting me go to the loo?

Treatedlikeamaid · 2020-10-20T14:23:07+00:00

I think of all the money I’ve spent in Costa and just now I nipped into a branch, it was empty. I asked if I could use the loo and the young man serving told me not if I wasn’t going to buy anything. I mean..it was empty! I’ve spent 100s in there over the years. ! I’m a lady of a certain age when we need the loo, we need the loo! I’m irrationally angry and then got all embarrassed and tearful. Not pleasant at all. It wouldn’t have cost Costa anything to show a bit of consideration. Humph!

ozymandiusking · 21/10/2020 20:21

I never ask, just sail right passes and use the loo and out again.
I usualy say thank you on the way out.

Eckhart · 21/10/2020 20:21

Challenge them and say what

Quite.

goldenharvest · 21/10/2020 20:24

Buy a coffee. Cost the same as a posh toilet

Original poster

Treatedlikeamaid · 22/10/2020 02:56

Blimey

OP posts:

MariolaIsHere · 22/10/2020 06:26

Usually locked. Need code from staff.

LolaSmiles · 22/10/2020 10:07

VinylDetective
They did, and then when you accused them of not they said thi8:

And I answered. The questions are meaningless without a) having my local council's annual budget to hand and b) because it's irrelevant to the current discussion, which is about whether or not private businesses are obliged to allow random non-customers to use their toilets, not what councils should do with their money.

But anyway:
Why do you consider it the responsibility of private businesses to provide free toilets for the general public?
Why should customers of private businesses be paying for other people to use the services offered by the business?

Original poster

Treatedlikeamaid · 22/10/2020 10:21

Goodness, this is a stirring topic! That’s over 1000 that have voted! I’m amazed! Thanks for all the feedback, I shall leave the muddy boots and meths paraphanalia at home, and buy something. But I’ll also hope we can live in a society that’s courteous and empathetic to each other. The coffee shop today ( hanging out while dd does a course) is a small, privately run and couldnt be nicer. Yes I did buy something and yes I went to the loo, and the staff used their own discretion and it’s not a massive, overpriced chain. I think I’m just not a fan of impersonal chains pretending to be friendly through their advertising yet not being really, and making every where in Britain identikit. But that’s a whole not her thread!
Thanks for the opinions!

OP posts:

howaboutchocolate · 22/10/2020 10:33

I mean, if its OK to use their toilets without being a paying customer, is it ok to use their seating area like a public bench too? Your legs are tired and you need a rest, can't see a bench on the street so just go sit down in an empty Costa. Most people wouldn't do that, so why is the toilet any different?

I've been desperate loads of times, I use the toilet and then buy something. If the shop didn't make money off customers it wouldn't be there in the first place so there'd be no toilet to use anyway.

Uraflutteringcunt · 22/10/2020 10:35

You should have pissed on the floor OP. That would have shown him!

CleverCatty · 22/10/2020 10:36

@VinylDetective

Supermarkets in this neck of the woods have opened their loos. With no compulsion to buy anything either.

Same here.

Was in Waitrose the other week and their toilets were open and when I've been in other supermarkets e.g. Tesco, Sainsburys etc - on the whole they've all been opened apart from one time in Sainsburys when they were out of order.

The Sainsburys local to where I live doesn't have a toilet but is connected to a community centre by walkway and there are toilets (god they're disgusting though!) by the community centre.

CleverCatty · 22/10/2020 10:37

@howaboutchocolate

I mean, if its OK to use their toilets without being a paying customer, is it ok to use their seating area like a public bench too? Your legs are tired and you need a rest, can't see a bench on the street so just go sit down in an empty Costa. Most people wouldn't do that, so why is the toilet any different?

I've been desperate loads of times, I use the toilet and then buy something. If the shop didn't make money off customers it wouldn't be there in the first place so there'd be no toilet to use anyway.

It's politer - generally - and I try to do this now - to just ask when you're at the counter - they usually say yes and I think appreciate you asking first rather than just swanning through as how do they know if you'll buy something first?

CleverCatty · 22/10/2020 10:38

@Treatedlikeamaid

Goodness, this is a stirring topic! That’s over 1000 that have voted! I’m amazed! Thanks for all the feedback, I shall leave the muddy boots and meths paraphanalia at home, and buy something. But I’ll also hope we can live in a society that’s courteous and empathetic to each other. The coffee shop today ( hanging out while dd does a course) is a small, privately run and couldnt be nicer. Yes I did buy something and yes I went to the loo, and the staff used their own discretion and it’s not a massive, overpriced chain. I think I’m just not a fan of impersonal chains pretending to be friendly through their advertising yet not being really, and making every where in Britain identikit. But that’s a whole not her thread! Thanks for the opinions!

Still a rude entitled assuming b*tch though OP.

Pyewhacket · 22/10/2020 10:43

Buy a cup of coffee then rather than have a fit of the vapours and start blubbing.

IcedPurple · 22/10/2020 10:47

I think I’m just not a fan of impersonal chains pretending to be friendly through their advertising yet not being really, and making every where in Britain identikit.

Hang on. You said in the OP that you were a regular customer of Costa, having spent hundreds of quids there over the years, and should therefore have been allowed to use their toilet, but now you're telling us you're 'just not a fan'?

Which is it?

But I’ll also hope we can live in a society that’s courteous and empathetic to each other.

I'm not sure how "courteous and empathetic" it is to run to MN to whine about a man - probably on minimum wage or little more - for simply doing his job.

IncandescentSilver · 22/10/2020 10:48

I can't think of any other country which has less provision of public toilets. Its madness.

I've sat in on planning meetings where local counsellors have actively mentioned as one of the benefits of granting pp an increase in the provision locally of toilets available to the public, so YANBU.OP.

SchrodingersImmigrant · 22/10/2020 10:51

Supermarkets have dedicated cleaning staff trained to clean bodily fluids and more. No one has to dash off the till to go deal with toilets because someone, yet again, couldn't figure out that body waste goes into the toilet, not all over. They also don't have to worry about paying customers then writing bad reviews (so being told off by bosses later) because someone before them shat partially on a toilet seat and so on.

The Sainsburys local to where I live doesn't have a toilet but is connected to a community centre by walkway and there are toilets (god they're disgusting though!) by the community centre.
This is how cafe toilets would look if they were indeed public toilets.

People are generally pigs.

Rosebel · 22/10/2020 10:52

Presumably he would have had to clean the toilet after you left and as you weren't even a customer he didn't want to. That's fair enough really.
It's not even really that though. It's not a public toilet. I'm surprised so many are still shut. The ones in my area have been open for weeks.
Next time but something cheap and then use the toilet.

VinylDetective · 22/10/2020 10:53

pretending to be friendly through their advertising yet not being really,

This is the crucial bit you seem to have missed @IcedPurple. It’s the behaviour she’s not a fan of, not the chain itself.

VinylDetective · 22/10/2020 10:55

This is how cafe toilets would look if they were indeed public toilets

Obviously not true otherwise supermarket and unlocked cafe loos would look like that. They don’t.

SchrodingersImmigrant · 22/10/2020 10:55

Yes I did buy something and yes I went to the loo, and the staff used their own discretion and it’s not a massive, overpriced chain.

Staff didn't have to use discretion. You were a customer at the moment. If you were a customer in that Costa at the time, you wouldn't have a problem either

IcedPurple · 22/10/2020 10:58

@VinylDetective

pretending to be friendly through their advertising yet not being really,

This is the crucial bit you seem to have missed @IcedPurple. It’s the behaviour she’s not a fan of, not the chain itself.

So she gave hundreds of quid to a business whose 'behaviour' she's not a fan of?

Oh, and she was also whining about how Costa are "making every where in Britain identikit" so seems she has nothing good to say about the chain of which she claims to be a 'regular customer'.

All this, because she was denied a free piss.

CounsellorTroi · 22/10/2020 11:33

Besides, how can you prove that you're a 'regular customer'? Did the OP offer any such proof?

I’ve got a Costa Club card but I would still buy something before using the loo.

CleverCatty · 22/10/2020 11:41

@SchrodingersImmigrant

Supermarkets have dedicated cleaning staff trained to clean bodily fluids and more. No one has to dash off the till to go deal with toilets because someone, yet again, couldn't figure out that body waste goes into the toilet, not all over. They also don't have to worry about paying customers then writing bad reviews (so being told off by bosses later) because someone before them shat partially on a toilet seat and so on.

The Sainsburys local to where I live doesn't have a toilet but is connected to a community centre by walkway and there are toilets (god they're disgusting though!) by the community centre.
This is how cafe toilets would look if they were indeed public toilets.

People are generally pigs.

SchrodingersImmigrant

But that's the thing - I've been in countless Costa/Caffe Nero etc toilets - both controlled via key pad or not and whilst some are clean you wouldn't believe the mess (splattered urine) everywhere in them, these are in town/city centres and London.

The ones which I don't like and rarely use unless really caught short are the ones in petrol stations (not the Welcome Break kind) where obviously there are men etc using them - not saying men are any less clean than women, but they do piss.

CleverCatty · 22/10/2020 11:42

@CounsellorTroi

Besides, how can you prove that you're a 'regular customer'? Did the OP offer any such proof?

I’ve got a Costa Club card but I would still buy something before using the loo.

Or as I've done - just ask first and say you're buying something! In the Starbucks I was in recently they didn't even say I had to buy anything as I asked first.

I wanted one of their calorific ice cream with whipped cream drinks anyway but even if not - it's no skin off my nose to buy a drink, snack etc.

LindaEllen · 22/10/2020 11:47

Sorry but you don't have a right to use a toilet just because there happens to be one in a property. That's like knocking on someone's door and asking could you use it. Would you do that? You'd be welcome to if you were using their property as a place to visit as a guest, but you're not. Same with Costa.

Alright, there are lots of places that have loos that you can use (your best bets are supermarkets, shopping centres and department stores, by the way), but the last thing the staff want at the moment is people going in, as they have to clean the facilities more often anyway, when they're not even going to buy anything.

I have anxiety which leads to me needing the loo a lot, and even I don't see that I have the right to use any loo I fancy. I make sure there are public loos where I'm going.