Advice please - tricky situation with restaurant

[hairbearbunches]

Any advice on this welcome. I'm not sure what to do next other than chalk it up to a poor experience and move on, but I'm pretty cross about it. Went to a pretty upmarket restaurant last week not far from where we live. Second time I've been. DH has been a few times more with work colleagues. The waitress dropped some cutlery behind my chair as she was clearing away the plates of the table next to us - group of 5 women. Loud noise, nothing more than that or so I thought at the time. As we were leaving, DH went to loo and asked me to take the dog who had been sitting underneath his side of the table the entire meal. I took her lead and she started paying serious interest in my coat which was hanging off the back of the chair. When I looked down, it was covered in grease marks, there was pretty much a perfect imprint of a greasy knife up the left hand side of the sleeve as well as other biggish greasy marks. It was quite obvious what had happened so I went and told the waitress who had dropped the cutlery. She looked a bit rabbit in headlights and I got the distinct impression she knew it was already there and had been hoping we weren't going to notice. The coat is a waxed coat from Toast. I got it in the sale but it still cost £175. It can't be dry cleaned, hand wash cold only. I've tried to get the grease out and made a decent stab of it, but it's not the same coat. There are still stains on it.
Anyway, long story short, I finally got an email back from them tonight saying they'd spoken to the waitress and the knife (singular) she dropped was nowhere my coat and therefore they believe that my coat was already greased up before I got there and the dog licking it has made it worse (the dog licked it once).
What would you do? Put it down to bad luck and accidents happen or pursue it further. I'm pretty hacked off with their dismissive attitude. I walked in to their restaurant with a pristine coat and walked out with it in a right mess and they've made me feel like I'm trying to pull a scam on them.

Threaten them with the small claims court. They have indemnity insurance and very poor customer care. You have evidence of recent purchase of your coat. They should be trying to remedy the situation or paying for a new coat.

Well that would be a completely different issue. I think the evidence for that would be pretty strong 😁

I meant as regards the response that the waitress should not be penalised for dropping cutlery, as accidents do happen and she was probably tired.

(NB I use “penalised” because that is what others have said. As I have previously explained, no individual is being “penalised” if OP pursues them for the cost of a repaired or replacement coat. My point is that people’s response of “oh it was just an accident” is often coloured by the impact of the accident, when that is not actually relevant to the liability analysis).

Finding it hard to believe that a knife was that greasy as to cause such huge stains, or is that what it looked like after you'd tried to clean it?

I'm baffled by all the people who think it would come out of the waitress's wages (and so therefore you shouldn't complain and should just suck it up). I worked as a waitress for years, in several different places when I was younger and that never happened. Nothing was deducted from our wages - not breakages, spillages, etc. I once spilt gravy over a woman's very fancy dress (which tbf was her husband's fault as he bashed in to me as I was holding an enormous platter of beef and gravy to serve to his wife) and the hotel paid for the dry cleaning. No mention was made of me paying?!

In fact, a quick google tells you that in the UK it is illegal for employers to deduct anything from your wages except for tax, and that they can only get you to pay for damage to things if its specifically covered in your contract (e.g. damage to a company car).

Its different in the US, so I assume all of these 'the waitress will have to pay' comments are either people based in the US, or people who have watched US films and seen people having their pay docked for mistakes..

I usually dress up to eat at an upmarket restaurant.

Well, I imagine it would be completely different because it's a completely different scenario 😂

Which Michelin-starred restaurants? I’d genuinely like to know, so I can avoid.

Legally, not all that different.

Just google their policy on dogs before you book. Easy.

Go on name one!

I'd write to them laying out point by point what happened, as briefly and factually as possible. I'd tell them the only reasonable explanation is that the waitress dropped the knife down the back of your coat, causing the grease marks. I'd say that whilst I know accidents happen, it's how you react to them that is important and that their reaction has been inadequate. I'd let them know I was posting the whole lot as a review and that I would no longer be eating at their restaurant.

Then I'd contact the manufacturer for advice about the coat and get on with my life. I do wear dirty coats but that's because every time I put a coat on, a horse will insist on wiping mud all over it, so what can you do?

As others have said, DIY rewax with Barbour jacket wax, doesn’t take long and covers everything and then move on, perhaps don’t go back to that restaurant for a while, take your business elsewhere.

I do think it matters the pricing of the restaurant. I wouldn't expect a greasy spoon to replace a £200 coat but I would expect an upmarket one. If they want to add an enormous charge on my food for ambience etc then I expect to get out without my items being damaged.

Did anyone offer to hang up your coat when you went in? If not I'd make this clear as well.

I agree with a letter before action and I would sue them. Fuck them - they could at least apologise and offer to get it cleaned. They could have offered to give you a voucher for the restaurant the same value as your coat - which would only have cost them a quarter of the retail price. Instead they're losing customers over an incident that clearly happened in their restaurant.

I have, tried a few of our local ones, still to find a dog friendly one.

Ok. I mean it's pretty easy to work out what to search for but if you can't do that maybe just stick to the ones you go to that you know aren't dog friendly.

https://www.petspyjamas.com/s/travel/dog-friendly-michelin-star

HTH! Literally the first thing that comes up when you google "DOG FRIENDLY MICHELIN STAR RESTAURANTS"

I got told I couldn't have been in one on here once because there was a child in it 😂People are out of touch. Michelin stars are awarded on the quality of food not the quality of clientele.

I would be interested to know why you think balance of probabilities would favour OP in this case. There is a bad mark on a coat, that does not look like it could possibly have been caused by a knife skimming past as it is dropped. I would say on the balance of probabilities this did not occur in such a fleeting second but rather was more likely to have occurred at any other time that OP has owned the coat. She would not have a hope of winning this should she take it to court.

I haven't RTFT but my go-to for grease stains is talcum powder. Put it on, rub gently in, leave for a few hours or overnight, then wash out - even with cold water should do the trick.
Because it's so absorbent it soaks up the grease and then you wash it away. Not sure how it would interact with a waxed surface, though, so probably worth trying on an inconspicuous spot first.

Maybe read my post again.
I think that the dog was interested because it was a fresh food stain.
OP says her coat was not stained before the dinner.
The evidence is that a large load of cutlery was dropped, only the restaurant is saying it was one single knife. It would have bounced everywhere and quite probably several bits of dirty cutlery directly touched OP’s coat, with a fair amount of force through either falling directly on to it or bouncing form the floor (it’s bottom of sleeve, would have been quite near floor). Not sure where you got “skimming past” from.

Personally I think that the stain looks absolutely consistent with having greasy cutlery dropped on the coat.

Thanks @Revealingall I appreciate your helpful reply.

interestingly, having checked a couple on the list provided (Le Manoir, Whatley Manor) although they accept dogs staying they don’t permit them in the restaurants.

Ok, so i now have an update. The general manager has emailed this morning in response to my 'i cannot believe you are suggesting my coat was already stained or I dropped a knife myself' email last night and apologised for the email that was sent by them because it was 'completely inappropriate'. So far, so good.

He is suggesting that given the circumstances as I describe them, it is very plausible that the damage happened in the restaurant. He says they are happy to dry clean the jacket (it's not dry cleanable, but that it is not their issue) but if the coat is damaged beyond that I will have to claim on my own household insurance because 'we cannot be held liable for the replacement costs of damage to guests items - which could be unlimited'. I should point out they are also a small hotel, as well as a restaurant.

They are also offering a £50 credit for a meal should I wish to come back and eat with them. I was never looking to get a brand new coat from them, cost of replacing would be £350 if I could still get it, which I can't. But I don't see why I should have to claim on my insurance either, and (now I'm really going to come in for some shit on here!) the bill for our lunch last week was pushing £200 so a £50 credit on our next meal leaves us having to shell out a further £150. So heads they win, tails we lose.

WWYD? Shall I accept this is as good as I'm going to get, or push back and say if the coat remains damaged I'll go to small claims court? I've also been in touch with Toast this morning who have asked for pictures to send to their production team so they can offer best advice for restoration.

At this point, the restaurant don't know the cost of the coat because I haven't mentioned it yet.

Thanks to everyone for their comments.

Frankly, any restaurant that allows dogs in is unlikely to be any good.

Most of those don’t allow dogs in the dining room.