To expect parents to clean up after their children?

[MotherofBingo]

I work in a restaurant, I know children can be hardwork, I have two and they are no angels but I would never dream of leaving the table in the absolute states that many parents do! I'm talking food and rubbish all over the floor - literally piles of it - stickers stuck to the furniture and pen/Crayon marks on the tables, walls and menus, half chewed food left for us to pick up (and occasionally other bodily fluids left for us to deal with too!), food smeared everywhere and general rubbish ALL over the table. Just why? I'm assuming these parents wouldn't allow it at home.

It's not just the mess either, it's the parents who come in and enjoy a bottle of wine between them while their darling 2 year old is running around unattended into the kitchen and out to the carpark - of course the parents get extremely irate when we point out how unsafe this is. It's so common!

To make it worse, the majority of parents who do this always seem to treat the waiting staff like scum - looking down their nose at us like there's a bad smell and speaking extra slowly as though we are too stupid to understand basic English. It's becoming very hard to give the same attitude back sometimes.

I get you. I waitressed for years. Of course kids are going to drop the odd chip or pea which is normal but some of the states people leave the table in! Ripped up menus, food everywhere, I've even had dirty nappies left on tables.

It is not that YABU but there is a big onus on restaurant management to set and enforce acceptable behaviour in their establishments. Especially when a child's behaviour could lead to an accident eg running around. You don't have to tolerate it so why do you?

Surely it's up to the parent to parent, not the staff?

Because as a server I don't have the authority to tell someone to leave and I'd be in a lot of trouble if I did. As well as that, I get enough abuse from customers for things such as things being out of stock or the food being subpar, I don't get paid enough to be shouted at and threatened and occasionally physically assaulted as it is.

Usually the same kind of people who can't be bothered to clear up after themselves in fast food places like pret

@MotherofBingo so what do the managers say? Are they OK with this behaviour and, if not, why don't they act?

And if they think the behaviour is acceptable and the customers think its acceptable then I guess its people like you and me who are out of step.

when I was in college I worked in a Harvester running the bar. Every Sunday, without fail a couple would bring in their two kids, who would then make a right old mess for an hour.

Being young and naive I said nothing, but looking back now I’d be absolutely mortified at the thought of my own kids making such a mess.

YANBU. They must be the ones who bring their kids to my work afterwards and allow them to run around or take half the toys from the shelves and leave them all over the floor. We are not a soft play, we are a retail store! (charity shop).

YANBU I waitressed many moons ago (as my daughter likes to remind me in the last century) and some families just took the utter piss. They honestly thought they were lord/lady of the manner and us staff were just there to clean whatever detritus they left behind. I can imagine with the rise of entitled behaviour this has gotten much worse.

My mother made us tidy up after ourselves no matter where we went, and you'd better believe we behaved. McDonalds or restaurant, we'd leave the table and floor in a similar condition to how we found it. I've drummed the same into my two. Serving staff are there to make the dining experience more relaxed, they shouldn't be required to deep clean between customers!

YANBU. I always ask for a dustpan if there are crumbs I can't clear but staff never expect me to go to that level 😅. I happily would though!

Tell me you've never worked in retail/hospitality without telling me you've never worked in retail/hospitality...

YANBU OP. I haven't worked in retail for many years now but whenever I go out to restaurants/cafes these days, this is so common. Many parents don't care and management are too cowardly to deal with it.

One of the best cafes near me tried to ban children under 12 due to this sort of thing - it resembles a zoo whenever I go in - but they caved due to a social media campaign from the mums. As if there aren't so many other places where they can go and turn into a soft play.

I feel sorry for the staff - they're not paid enough to put up with it.

I was recently in a pub and there was a big group spread over four tables (mixed age, family birthday). One of the kids threw-up all over one table and the floor underneath. They all moved and bunched up on other tables and carried on while staff were on hands and knees cleaning up their kids vomit.

Couldn't believe they left the staff to it.

People are entitled mingers these days. The whole country is filthy and covered in rubbish and these types are part and parcel of the couldn't give a fuck attitude so depressingly prevelant.

Thats why more and more allow dogs in. Dogs don't make half as much mess and customers with young kids are much less like to come where they are dogs around!

No, the onus is on the parents to parent their children. Why should some poor 17 year old on minimum wage have to get in a row with a drunk family?

Watched a woman with a toddler the other day basically let him smush up a whole scone and chuck it all over the floor in a cafe without trying to stop him or apologise to staff

Thankfully I haven't but as a customer you explain it to me. Why tolerate a small(ish) percentage of customer pissing off your staff and other guests/customers?

Because the customers that tend to do this type of behaviour will tell you to fuck off if you try to challenge them. They’re the ones who have had 3x double vodkas, no mixer since coming in. They’re the ones that bang on the kitchen doors demanding a refund. They’re the ones that try to knock plates out of servers hands. They’re the ones that when you tell them it’s dangerous for their kids to run around/climb on that or that they can’t bite other children they tell you to mind your own fucking business and what gives you the right to tell them how to parent their fucking children. No other customers will step in to tell them they’re being dicks for fear of being assaulted. They’re usually the ones that only piss off after the police turn up. Meanwhile they’ve created a scene for all you other customers. You’ve spent the entire shift apologising for their bad attitude and hoping it doesn’t impact your tips. You’ve spent the entire shift dodging them so you don’t get hit or called a bitch. So sometimes it’s easier to just leave the behaviour unchallenged, most other customers will then side eye the bad customers but then do usually feel sorry for you as a server.

Can you imagine what their homes must be like!
My student dc is a restaurant assistant and they say the most badly behaved customers are men with children. They leave a mess and talk to the staff like crap. It's no wonder some restaurants are starting to ban children, the awful minority spoil it for everyone else.

Firstly, staff are on minimum wage and often young. The former means that it's often not worth intervening with these parents (it's always a fight). The latter means that it may be difficult, even if prepared to intervene, for them to have enough authority for the intervention to actually work.

What you need is management that's prepared to do that on their staff's behalf. That's rare, either because management is cowardly, or because they prefer to piss off their staff and take the money from the parents, than stand up for the staff and lose the money. Moreso in difficult financial times.

As I mentioned upthread, a cafe near me actually did try to sort this out with an outright ban (previous interventions proved hopeless), only to be faced with a horrible social media campaign.

Should it be tolerated? No. But the reason it is tolerated in so many cases is because of the above.

The places we eat in have signs saying they will chuck you out if your child or dog doesn't behave.

Oddly children and dogs behave in them.

Though I do know a landlord who barred someone's dog.

I used to take over the dustpan and brush and say with a smile 'looks like you need this!'.
Worked every time.

I don't really get the filthy mess some adults think it's ok to leave behind tbh.

I totally agree, OP. Some people are vile and are (actually not) 'bringing up' the next generation of horrors. All very depressing.

I don't know what the answer is - but I would think it's the job of a manager to get out front of house and sort these issues out. Waiting staff have enough to do serving customers.