How to Book a Table?

[PoliteBoy]

This happened at work today.

So a table of eight is leaving, no big deal, everyone is happy. Then comes the hiccup at the counter. One of the ladies wants to book another table for next Sunday. thing is, she is asking for two separate tables for her and her friend. They were both gonna bring in their own groups of people. Even worse is that they both have internet vouchers (love those things) and want to use them.

I was making drinks at the time, but I caught all this in my ear, and it ended up with her and my manager getting into a spat. It finished when the lady sad that she's not gonna come and my manager said something very sarcastically to her face.

Let's look at it this way. I'm not sure if they wanted to come in at the same time, but if so then there's a bit of a problem. If you have two separate tables but are gonna be interacting with each other, wouldn't it be easier to just ask for one big table? That would be easier instead of asking to sit separately.

And on Sundays, we can't exactly spare two tables when we could just have one big table. If you have at least 6 people in each group, then we can make a big table of twelve, instead of having you occupy two tables of six.

The problem about all this is the vouchers we offer. Basically when you reserve a table, you can also show up with a voucher that gets you a set amount off the food. So I guess they wanted to use both vouchers to eat cheap. It's only one voucher per table so that's even more of a headache. I think the easiest solution is to divide the bill up into the number of people eating and leave it at that.

If we have REALLY large groups then we put a smaller table at the end of a larger one or have two large tables linked by one bill. But again, people want to eat cheap so they try to find holes (that they think exist) and exploit them. If it's a whole group of friends that are eating together but are asking for separate bills, then that's something we can't do.

So is it OK to come in at the same time and have a table separate from each other with different bills, or should it always be that you group together and pay one bill together?

One thing's for sure, we're not getting that customer back and we're gonna get a bad review on Yelp.

[Gilhelmi]

It it helps, I do not use review websites at all.

[notalwaysright]

It it helps, I do not use review websites at all.

lol, me either.

Sounds like they were just trying to get around the one coupon per table rule. At first when I was reading it I was like "two tables, what's the problem?" But I get it, if they have 12 people, they get the big table. They don't necessarily get to say "I need four tables for 12 people." Because that would cause headaches and just doesn't make sense.

Whenever I see the table issues that you post about I think of this place in town which is really little. I haven't seen anyone cause a fuss, but it would not be tolerated, and probably the other customers would join in throwing a SC out. But yeah, it's small and no amount of whining will make it bigger.

[wolfie]

It it helps, I do not use review websites at all.

It's a mixed bag. It hurts because the absence of sensible people boosts the proportion of crazies/SCs on those sites, but it helps because sensible people recognize that these sites are heavily populated by SCs and therefore take the ratings with a grain of salt.

If it weren't for my ancient machine, I would have signed on with Yelp to review a restaurant I really liked, but wanted to deter people from going to - it had closed down, so prospective customers would have wasted a trip.