Accidentally not paying a bill in a restaurant...

[LukeBird]

Soovy said:

AB said:

He hasn't done. Using an excuse of 'being too busy'.

Ah well. It's done.

Chances of them tracking him down??

Stupid thing is its a restaurant that we've all been to before and that any combination of people from the office will probably go to again.

I hope he is done for theft.

Scumbag.

+1

He's a tt.

[LHD]

I did it when on a product launch in Spain.

A large drinks bill was unpaid at the local taverna as everyone thought someone else had paid it.

I ended up posting them a cheque with a covering letter in (very) bad Spanish.

I got a letter back in perfect English thanking me for my honesty.

It's only about being a decent human being.

[Flintstone]

Ooooh, big man. His reputation must be rock bottom if (in his eyes) it's able to be elevated by the theft of a measly £20. By the sopund of it though it's where it should be.

He's a thief, there's no other way to describe him.

[Deva Link]

Haighermeister said:

My in laws took the whole family out for their parents anniversary.

Went to a local (quote posh) hotel. 12 of us having a meal, then their parents staying the night.

Hotel offered to send a bill after a few days. After a week, no bill had arrived, FIL rang to query and they had no idea what he was talking about, no records of names for meal or the room.

After FIL protesting for a bit, the hotel refused to take any money off him and explained he must be ringing the wrong hotel.

Result is a £1000 bill not having to be paid, FIL buying a new tv, guilt free.





Oh, and no, I wouldn't go back :P

Your missus had already paid the bill.

[anonymous-user]

Rude-boy said:

I'd add him to my list of people to avoid urinating on if found alight.

ROFL, you just woke my baby with that line!

(headphones on and not realising how loud I was laughing)

[1A]

I'm a serial 'forget-to-pay' when it comes to coffee in hotel foyers. Every time I end up meeting a business contact in hotel I usually also end up walking out completely forgeting to pay. I once did it in the Grand hotel in Brighton and suddenly remembered a couple of hours later driving through Arundel. I did what I always do, I turned around and drove back to pay.

[Some Gump]

Always go back.

Firstly, you had it, you pay for it. Anything else makes you a theiving pikey.

Second, depending on the establishment, some ahole jumped up "team leader" is probably tearing the young innocent waitor / waitress a new one because you forgot to pay for your pudding. I used to wait tables in a resteraunt / pub when I was getting through school. In one of the sttier places I worked, walk outs were taken out of your wages ("they did pay, you just had it away as tips" mentality). stty deal, but what can you do?

So, for those that think it's alright, that 20 quid might just be 4 hours work to the person that just served your meal. Is that fair?

Edited by Some Gump on Friday 7th January 23:36

[Tango13]

I was at a bike show a few years back and saw a bargain of £100 off a £350 helmet, so I selected one that fitted and paid with my recently issued credit card.

The following week I went to pay the CC bill to discover the transaction hadn't gone through, after a few phone calls I was informed that I had needed to activate the card before I could use it and what I had thought was a reciept was in fact a card rejected slip! Neither I nor the girl who had served me noticed at the time so I was up a £350 helmet.

When I finally tracked down the trader to explain the cock up he didn't believe my storey so I told him to check his receipts and I'd call him back. Sure enough when I called back his till was £250 light. He was stunned that anybody could be so honest and asked why I had insisted on paying?

I replied, "Would you ride about wearing a stolen crash helmet, karma etc?"

[Major Fallout]

I went back.

Turns out someone had already had.

Turns out it was the waitress.

So I did.

[GC8]

xr287 said:

Rude-boy said:

AB said:

He's said he'll enjoy the £20 more than the large chain restaurant will.

But perhaps slightly less than the waitress who will possibly now be £20 light on their wage packet. The £20 that to them was the difference between a week of chicken based meals and a week of 10p beans meals.

Nice bloke.

I'd add him to my list of people to avoid urinating on if found alight.

I'm pretty sure it would be illegal to dock the money from someones wages if the shortfall is due to a customers dishonesty/theft.

An employer cant legitimately make deductions from an employees pay in order to cover shortfalls such as these.

[Some Gump]

GC8 said:

xr287 said:

Rude-boy said:

AB said:

He's said he'll enjoy the £20 more than the large chain restaurant will.

But perhaps slightly less than the waitress who will possibly now be £20 light on their wage packet. The £20 that to them was the difference between a week of chicken based meals and a week of 10p beans meals.

Nice bloke.

I'd add him to my list of people to avoid urinating on if found alight.

I'm pretty sure it would be illegal to dock the money from someones wages if the shortfall is due to a customers dishonesty/theft.

An employer cant legitimately make deductions from an employees pay in order to cover shortfalls such as these.

When you hav a pocketful of tip money, and a missing bill, you;re on a sticky wicket. NO teenager records their tip income for income tax - and some crappy managers know it.

[TotalControl]

I honestly believe that thieving a £20 meal today may catch up with you later on and lose you money. Never would do it.

[H_Kan]

Soovy said:

smartie said:

Landlord said:

Depending on the restaurant, the employers may stop the equivalent of the shortfall out of the pay of the waiting staff who was responsible for ensuring the bill was paid in full. So there's that on his conscience too. Low paid person stumping up for his meal. Could feasibly mean they end up working for nowt!

That's illegal.

Yeah right, and the poor kid who has just got the job fresh off the boat from Polan will really be standing up for their rights.

Sorry, I cannot bear tightness.

Yes, not paying for the meal is wrong- but I don't think you can attribute the staffs pay being docked to that. That is down to illegal practices by the employer, who are arguably acting worse then the thieving customer by docking pay in such instances.

In any case, I personally would just pop back in and pay. If the mistake is not my fault then I'd probably wait until I was next in the area or by phone if far away. If it was my fault then I'd do it as soon as I can.

Only had it a couple of times in takeaways where they've thought I'd paid already and needed prompting to actually tell me how much I owed them.

[escargot]

sidekickdmr said:

I would go back and pay!

If it was a local mcdonalds that forgot to take money then i could understand but otherwise unacceptable

The local mcdonalds is probably a franchise owned by a bloke who poured his life savings into it. How is that different?

[Gaspode]

I have done this, I simply telephoned them as soon as I got home and paid.

Stealing is wrong. What is difficult to understand about this?

[toxgobbler]

Karma. It gets everyone in the end.

[FamilyGuy]

I've often drawn attention to missed drinks or side orders on bills. I've gone back into supermarkets and pointed out they have missed an item. I took the product so I pay for it. (I seem to be turning into vonhosen - damn!) As another poster said with impressive succintness - Integrity.

BTW - There seem to be a quite a few "entrapment" threads around here at the moment...

[Engineer1]

Mazdarese said:

jpringle819 said:

How would people deal with this similar situation.

A group of 15 or so employees of the same company had a meal which was paid for by one person to be claimed back on expenses. It was agreed that everyone would put in cash to cover the tip and carry on to a pub. One of the most senior people stayed to pay the bill on their credit card and then joined everyone else and bought a couple of rounds.

It turned out that this person had pocketed all the tips and used the money to buy the rounds of drinks.

Senior or not, he's a . People chipped in as they thought they were contributing to a tip for the restaurant, not a round of drinks for everyone.

Virtually every time I have been out with a group of mates someone has done the pay the bill on their card trick as they know that everyone will have rounded up their portion of the bill so do it right and you get a free meal. Of course this only works if you can cover the bill for the whole table.

[jas xjr]

how could you enjoy the meal knowing you have not paid for it ?

[Martial Arts Man]

O/T but related:

About 6 years ago I pulled up outside one of my business premises and was approached by a guy offering to sell me a brand new video camera for £100. I knew it was freshly stolen. I knew it was wrong. I bought it anyway.

About 2 days later, I pulled over somewhere to pop into a shop or something and left the roof down on the car. I'd totally forgotten about this video camera behind the passenger seat. When I returned, it was gone.

Now that's Karma and I deserved it for knowingly buying stolen goods. Won't be doing it ever again.


There's a guy who lives in my apartment building who drives a V10R8 Cab. Openly describes his "job" as "fraud" (sic). Lovely. Something bad is gonna happen to him one day I hope.


It's not surprising that patrons are shocked when an honest customer rectifies a mistake. I have people attempting to scam services out of me on a daily basis. Added to the people who think they can sign up to a leisure membership then cancel the direct debit and hope it goes away whilst feigning innoncense and still trying to use the facilities. Don't even get me started on those who try to sneak in or out of a class actively attempting to avoid payment. Grrrrr.