I love my restaurant customers. I genuinely get a kick out of seeing people come in, enjoy a great meal with the good wine and company and then leave happy. I’m delighted when they return and thrilled when they recommend me to their friends. My staff and I work really hard to ensure all this happens and, when something does go wrong, we work just as hard to make it right.
However, there’s a small minority – say 0.1pc – who I’m not so keen on. They are rare, but their behaviour is often astoundingly bad and suggests a fundamental misunderstanding of what a restaurant is about.
All this is interesting as there’s been massive shift in the balance of power between restaurants and customers towards the latter. I’m actually mostly in favour of this. Who would want a return to the 1970s when you were terrified to tell your waiter that the wine was corked? However, a lot of coverage still takes this 70s milieu as its starting point. The customer is the little guy, bravely standing up to the big bad restaurant. In fact, the reverse can sometimes be true.
Of course, not all customers are great or terrible. There are plenty of people are basically decent, but a bit thoughtless – and who do little silly things that make staff’s lives harder. For them a few minor changes can mean quicker service and a happier waiter.
With all this in mind, here’s my restaurateur’s guide to the kind of customer you should try not to be. Because I want everyone to have a great evening and that includes my staff – and me.
1. TripAdvior Extortionists
These are the worst people who eat out in the world. The typical scenario pans out something like this. Everything’s going swimmingly and then, suddenly, they tell the waiter they’re doing a review for TripAdvisor and could they all have a free meal please? They’re told no and start inventing faults with their food before leaving and writing a terrible, false review.
2. Drunken Lechers
Don’t drunkenly try and pull the staff. I’m not talking harmless flirtation here, I’m talking ogling, pawing and propositioning. It’s just wrong. Do you chat up staff in shops? Or at banks? No. So don’t do it in restaurants.
Also, how would you feel if a client came into your office and started hitting on you in the middle of your working day? Before you say “that’s not what it’s like,” that’s exactly what it’s like.
Finally, as the waitress you hit on will almost certainly be younger than you, chatting her up doesn’t just make you look like a creep, it makes you look like a dirty old creep.
3. Bill Splitters
There are two categories of bill splitters.
The first, honestly, are a minor annoyance. They’re the tables of ten who split the bill equally and then pay on ten individual cards. So, if you want to be nice to your waiter or waitress, get one or two people to pay and sort it out amongst yourselves later – or pay in cash.
A far more major annoyance are the groups who forensically split the bill based on what they’ve had – and spend 20 minutes arguing over who had two glasses of wine and the steak. Life is too short. You look too cheap. Your waiter has other tables to look after. So, for the love of God, split the bill equally: the difference rarely amounts to more than a couple of quid either way.
If you suspect you’ve paid £3 more than your mate, then think of it as a deposit in the bank of service industry karma.
4. Bad Tippers
There’s an expectation in any decent UK restaurant that you pay a 12.5% tip, unless the service is poor. You know this and I know this. Yeah, yeah, I know the tip is notionally “optional”, but it isn’t if you’re a decent person. (Special hate here for the people who are charming and lovely to the staff all night and then leave £4 on a £150 bill. That’s mean-spirited and cheap.)
Please don’t start proclaiming that’s “This isn’t America.” If it was you’d be tipping 20pc without thinking twice.
5. Middle-Class Food Allergists
If you have a real food allergy that’s been diagnosed by a real doctor, you have my sympathy and my kitchens will do everything they can to accommodate you.
If you’re a fussy middle class person who thinks they have a fashionable allergy, based on something you read on Goop, I’m a lot less interested. Especially if you complain about everything. Especially if, after the kitchens have bent over backwards to accommodate your dairy allergy, we see you eating a piece of cheese because your self-diagnosis allows you to do this.
Funnily enough, I’m OK with you telling me you’re a fussy, faddish eater – just not with you claiming it’s a medical condition.
6. Mobile Users
Why do normally polite people become utter oafs when it comes to mobiles? Seriously, in any situation bar dire emergencies, the most important person is the man or woman who is a foot away from you, not your mate in Leeds who’s phoned up for a yak. So if you are at table with six other people for dinner, talk to them. If your waiter arrives to take your order, talk to him. If you are watching a show, watch the show. If you must make a call, go outside with the smokers.
A while back I watched a guy on a date spend eight minutes talking his phone. During this time, he ignored his date and brushed off the waiter who had come to take his order. By the time he’d finished, everyone within a two table radius hated him. Don’t be that guy.
7. Restaurant Lawyers
After five glasses of wine, we’re all lawyers, just not very good ones. So, if you’ve ever been tempted to shout, “I know my legal rights” when you’re unhappy at a restaurant, here they are. You have to pay for all the booze you’ve drunk regardless, but if you have a genuine complaint, and supply proof of your name and address, you can refuse to pay for food.
Please think quite carefully about doing so. “The dish was burnt” is a genuine complaint. “It had anchovies in it and I hate them” is not a genuine complaint if the anchovies were listed on the menu and you missed them.
Interestingly, a lot of people who think they know their rights also threaten to write bad reviews on TripAdvisor after they’re told their rights do include free food and wine.
8. Forgetful Diners
This isn’t so much a gripe as just one of those little things you can do to make the world a better place. Your waiter may be looking after a dozen tables with an average of six people on each. Over the course of an evening he has to remember hundreds of dishes. You have to remember the two that you ordered. If there’s a table of 15 and ten of you forget, it’s a nightmare and has everyone shouting at each other. So, remember your order. Your waiter will love you for it.
9. People Who Pull Rank
Even if you do know the owner, don’t mention it to it your waiter. It’s the very definition of a dick move. If you want special treatment because you know the owner, the person to tell is the owner – and before you go to the restaurant. Telling the poor waiter is just some cheap power play.
Also, what are they supposed to do? They don’t know whether you’re the owner’s best mate who eats for free or some chancer. So don’t put them in that position.
10. Rude Humans
Would you like to be summoned by someone who clicks their fingers? No. Would you like to be shouted at by someone who has chosen a bottle of wine they didn’t like and so is claiming that it’s corked? No. Would you like to be a 23-year old who has been standing up for seven hours and is now being told by a drunk 48-year old that he can “make life very difficult for you, love.”
These things aren’t even about being a good diner, they’re about being a good human being.
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