Birthday dinner ruined - restaurant refused eat free offer!

[Heatherstory]

NC’d for this.

Birthday meal out at a local restaurant - they do an offer where the birthday person eats free as long as 1. It’s their actual birthday date and ID is provided to confirm and 2. There’s a minimum party size of 5.

It’s an all you can eat concept where food is brought to the table rather than you go and get it, a great deal as the food is lovely and the offer saves £30.

When we asked for the bill, we mentioned it was my birthday and I said I’d get my ID out of my bag. Someone came over (not the person we asked for the bill) and explained we were not eligible for the offer as only 4 of us had the all you can eat. My 2 year old DD was with us and obviously had a small meal (which we were to pay for).

My DH asked to speak to the manager - the person who came over said that he is the manager and refused to budge. We reluctantly paid.

We’ve checked the offer wording and it’s clearly stated it’s based on 5 dining (doesn’t specify it has to be the all you can eat) which we fulfilled.

It really soured the evening and we will not be returning which is a real shame as it’s a lovely restaurant, but they have been so underhand with this.

I hope your review is honest. I hope you say that the food is lovely but you didn’t get the offer because one of the diners was 2 and only added £5 to the bill. I reckon most people reading that would react much like most people here and think you were chancing your luck a bit. It would be very shitty to say anything else negative about the restaurant.

Of course it meant 5 adults! How entitled are you?

Margins are so tight in the hospitality industry, giving you the offer would probably mean they made a loss on your table. Nobody in their right mind would class a toddler as a minimum dining number, you’re trying it on!

I think it’s pretty obvious really that it’s going to be 5 adults in a party, not including kids meals.

I doubt any of their minimum wage workers will be losing any sleep over it, either.

Sounds like a Brazilian place near us, meat brought to your table; do have to get up for the salad bar though 🙁

I'm astonished at the responses here. I'd always assume that "based on 5 dining" anticipates / is aimed at a standard family group of 2 adults, 3 children, unless children are expressly excluded.

Ok in this instance your child is 2, but she had a kids meal - my 10yo still has a kids meal and I'd never assume that she wouldn't count towards a person if kids meals weren't excluded!

And I bet your husband will lie and exaggerate to make the restaurant look bad. What a lovely couple you are.

Your husband sounds like he’s got too much time on his hands.

I agree ☝🏼 you should have told them it was your birthday before you ordered!

I've just done a quick Google and various restaurants offer all you can eat with a free birthday meal. They all specify the party size and that all of the meals must be adult meals.

as long as he is accurately describing the situation, people reading the review will agree with most posters I am afraid.

You sound more and more unreasonable as you post. It's pretty obvious you knew but thought you cleverly cheated the offer, and are miffed that they put their foot down and refused.

Writing a bad review in order to get a voucher is really low. I feel sorry for the restaurant.

Here's hoping the restaurant links to this thread in their reply 😂

Even if they don't, this review will presumably have her husband's real name on it. I wonder if she's considered that local restaurants talk to each other? She might find it difficult to get a booking in future. Next year's birthday may be celebrated over a Happy Meal

When we asked for the bill, we mentioned it was my birthday

This is where you went wrong to be fair, whenever I have used an offer of any kind there is always a stipulation on it that you present it when booking or on arrival, I've sometimes forgot and they've still done it but it is always the same wherever I've had an offer for.

I think you should double check the terms and conditions on the website/offer before you leave a bad review, as you may make yourselves look silly. If there's a small "T&Cs apply" on the offer then you would need to check what they say.

I think this is on you OP that you didn't check it wasn't adults only before ordering.

I don't think most people would assume they meant children.

Of course it wouldn't include the toddler's meal. Your replies insinuate you're certain you're in the right but tne restaurant's stance and the poll would say otherwise...

It would be obvious to the vast majority that kids' meals wouldn't be counted, and it must be so bloody frustrating for businesses having to state the bleeding obvious to protect themselves from chancers.

I can't believe you're hoping to get a voucher! Would you really show your face there again?

Some lack not only sense, but also any sense of shame.

Unless it's a kids restaurant, it wouldn't even occur to me that "kids" could count as one dining, and if it was important, I would check, not assume.

Now if one restaurant was excluding a guest because they chose the veggy option and vegetarians were excluded, I would complain loudly. But toddler meal? Come on.

The brass neck of you!! Don’t have the balls to write your own review though….. embarrassing

Its such a bizzare offer in the first place for a birthday its usually free with one paying adult maybe 2 at a push 5 is such a random amount

Why is OP getting such a hard time.

If there were no stipulations about age of the diners then the restaurant is in the wrong and it's as simple as that.

It does not matter what people would assume or what other restaurants do.

If the place fucked up by not adding suitable terms then they need to honour the deal and withdraw the offer until they have added the terms.

Happy birthday OP.

I think that the restaurant were a little mean. I own a cafe and I’d have let it go and at least given you a discount on something instead so you felt special. Yes hospitality is tough at the moment, but it probably would have only lost me a tiny bit of money to have a happy customer.

How spiteful.