To have assumed this about breakfast?

[YouWhatLove]

Staying in a country pub with rooms for a couple of nights away with my dc. We went down for breakfast this morning and the waitress asked if we wanted the continental breakfast for £7.95 or the cooked breakfast for £10.95 (slightly cheaper for dc but can’t remember the price). We all had the cooked breakfast, she took our orders and went off.

I then went to the continental buffet bit and got juice for dc, a cup of tea for myself and 2 slices of toast to go with our cooked breakfast. She delivered the cooked breakfast, it was all very nice and then she presented us with the bill that charged us for 3 x continental breakfast and 3 x cooked breakfast. I said she’d charged us twice and she said that she’d seen me go to the buffet so had to charge me. After a bit of a fuss she agreed to only charge for the cooked breakfast but said to not do it tomorrow and that if I wanted tea/ juice/ toast I had to order it with my breakfast.

I haven’t stayed in that many places that offered a continental and cooked breakfast at a separate price but was I being cheeky to assume the cost of a cooked breakfast included juice and toast from the buffet bit? I’m sure when I’ve stayed in Premier Inn or similar that’s been the case or maybe I’ve just been nicking stuff without realising it 😬

I would have asked when ordering the cooked breakfast how the drinks ordering system worked esp. if no drinks were on the menu to start with. That is the key to the answer I believe.

If I am being served the meal, I would expect they would serve whatever drinks I ordered at the same time.

However I definitely would not have gone and helped myself to toast. That should have been part of your cooked breakfast.

Seems really unusual. My dad has just retired from running a small pub/hotel
Juice/tea/coffee/cereal and fruit included with whatever else you want. No menu but he cooked to order so you could have scrambled eggs or a full english or just some cold meats and cheese
Included in the room cost

Is there a global rule I’m unaware of that whatever the Premier Inn does is what should be expected everywhere else by everyone 😕?

There were two things to choose from: A and B. A and B commonly overlap in terms of tea/coffee. Not toast, because who has toast with their American blueberry pancakes (for example). And not juice because that costs the proprietor more (cheaper to throw in a grapefruit or three oranges, which are totally different items and commonly lusted as sides in their own right).

OP chose A, but took more from B than the overlapping bit.

How on earth is that reasonable?

Or, put more plainly (and truthfully to the actual OP): would you like the steak frites or the all you can eat salad bar? I’ll have the steak frites pls…..and then helps herself to a side salad from the otherwise-paid-for salad bar because that what the Premier Inn (or whatever) allows?

Theres no logic or common sense to this having it all thing.

It wasn't naive at all. At hotels where coffee pots, boilers, juice and toast machines are on an unmanned table in the breakfast room, then they are included in the breakfast. In 40 years of intensive travel on almost every continent, at every level of paid accommodation, I have never experienced any different.

I’d have assumed the same as you, and would say that was the norm

Or, put more plainly (and truthfully to the actual OP): would you like the steak frites or the all you can eat salad bar? I’ll have the steak frites pls…..and then helps herself to a side salad from the otherwise-paid-for salad bar because that what the Premier Inn (or whatever) allows?

It's not the same as this at all. I have genuinely never stayed in a hotel where a breakfast buffet (if there was one) wasn't included in the price of the hot breakfast option. It's quite normal in all sorts of hotels, not just the Premier Inn!

I'm another one that would have done what you did. I have never stayed in a hotel where the cooked breakfast didn't also include the buffet. And I've stayed in a lot of hotels in a lot of countries.

Tomorrow I'd go for a walk and find somewhere else to have breakfast.

Not read the whole thread. For the past few years all hotels I've stayed in have charged separate for the continental and the cooked breakfast. Must be the next new crazy. Personally I'm not in favour of it as it's confusing about food and prices.

I always assumed they were separate.

But orange juice could usually be one of the drink options with the cooked breakfast maybe, along with coffee and tea. And a decent one would have plenty of toast.

She should have just asked what drinks you wanted with your breakfast and the toast should have come with the cooked breakfast surely ?

I would have also assumed the drinks were there to be taken as part of either breakfast and would have taken juice or tea/ coffee. I wouldn’t have taken the toast or any of the buffet food though as I wouldn’t assume that was there for people having a cooked breakfast.

I stayed at a Premier Inn this week and the cooked breakfast price includes unlimited continental breakfast items.

I would've thought juice, toast and hot drinks would be included in the cooked price anyway though. If you'd taken cereals, fruit and pastries then that would be extra under their system but drinks and toast should really come with a cooked breakfast.

At this point I can't think of anything nicer than an hotel with a breakfast menu and waiters/waitresses.

Full English
Scrambled egg and smoked salmon
Egg(s) any way one wants them tbh
Smoked haddock with a poached egg
Kippers
Bacon, egg and mushrooms anything from a full English tbh but not as excessive
Devilled kidneys

......and toast with butter, jam or honey.
......and tea or coffee in pots and served in cups with a saucer.

Tables with a nice white cloth and damask napkins, side plates and a butter knife, and fish knives and forks for fishy things. and no sachets of anything ketchup and sauces on request but brought in a little China pot.

I get my breakfast on room service in hotels usually if I have it and it’s a big treat and they always have been whatever cooked items you want plus any cereals, breads and pastries, fruit, juices and hot drinks included. Or less money for it without the cooked items. So I don’t think you were cheeky at all.

i guess if you have never been in a similar situation you don't know but no, you don't get to have from both.

At a Premier Inn you can pay the extra for the cooked breakfast and it includes anything from the continental buffet as well. It's not unreasonable to assume the same is true everywhere
This is hilarious! So because Premier Inn does it all establishments follow the same rule? That’s not how anything works.

Besides, a country pub with rooms is a different proposition to a hotel. I’ve only ever stayed at CPWR that have specific menus for breakfast, vs the Premier Inn-style glutton free-for-all. Even with a buffet option on the side it’s usually been clear on the menu that that’s X option for £X, something else is Y option for £Y, but they’re entirely separate options. And £10.95 for a cooked breakfast without a buffet too would be entirely standard for a CPWR in the south.

I think YABU, OP: why when ordering didn’t you say “cooked breakfast and a cup of tea, does the breakfast come with toast? And two kids’ cooked breakfasts with juice” or similar? Not ordering drinks is odd.

I would have assumed the same - but wouldn't expect toast to be part of a continental. Surely a continental is pastries, meat, cheese, bread, jams, yoghurt?

If she didn’t ask you if you wanted tea, coffee, juice and toast then you’re completely in your rights to help yourself to what’s on offer

I'd have assumed the same as you OP.

If they expect people not to go to the continental buffet, toast should be included in the cooked breakfast and a drinks order taken with your food order.

It's really not odd, as the vast majority have said, the drinks and toast were there as self service, so why would you bother?

I would always assume the cereals, juice, coffee and toast are there for the taking OP!
Like you, I must have been nicking it all these years!

What is this new fuckery! Is it cheaper places?

@YouWhatLove

it's actually irrelevant what her it includes those items or not. It was incredibly badly handled. Charging you for 2 breakfasts, instead of approaching you to say the continental elements are not part of the breakfast you have paid for, but not to worry about the drinks/toast would have been much better, but you should have been asked what drinks you wanted & if you wanted toast when she took your order.

I wonder if she's new? A lot of staff are right now, a word with the manager might be in order!!