Restaurant Fail

[Rageaholic]

The only thing that can describe this. I have to do bullet points.

-What kind of a place charges people to use the bathroom? Anyone who does that alone deserves all the angry customers they can get.

-They confronted her after she did her business. Even if you think the bathroom fee is somehow okay, they should have had the decency to let her know before she did it. They expected her to just pay up afterwards? FAIL

-She refused to pay and you'd think they'd just let it go. But not these douchebags! They had the freaking sherriff send a note to her demanding she pay.

-Then when she actually offered to pay, they refused to accept it, stating that they wanted to make a point.

It's almost like they were trying to get bad publicity.

[MadMike]

I didn't think that sort of thing was legal.

[protege]

It's almost like they were trying to get bad publicity.

...and possibly getting their restrooms trashed in the process.

[Panacea]

Still, I am not sure I think it's bad for a restaurant to have a policy like this. People tend not to take care of bathrooms, and there's an expense to keeping them up.

A charge for non-customers should be posted, but I see no reason why one can't get charged.

[Seifer]

I...huh. I don't know what to say about this one.

If the establishment is one that sells food, by law they have to have a certain number of bathrooms available to the public. Charging money to use the bathrooms technically goes against that law since, while restrooms are available, not everyone will be able or willing to pay to use them. This would in turn be making the bathrooms non-accessible to customers.

[Nyoibo]

If the establishment is one that sells food, by law they have to have a certain number of bathrooms available to the public. Charging money to use the bathrooms technically goes against that law since, while restrooms are available, not everyone will be able or willing to pay to use them. This would in turn be making the bathrooms non-accessible to customers.

The fee is only charged to non-customers, they are freely available to customers.

[AmbrosiaWriter]

I work someplace where our bathrooms are available to everyone, customer or no. There are plenty of people who walk in, ask to use the bathroom, and I gladly tell them how to get there. Then they just leave. *shrug*

We don't charge any money.

We clean the bathroom as part of the normal routine of cleaning the store.

Honestly, there is nothing a bathroom requires for cleaning (except toilet bowl cleaner, a brush, and then to stock it with toilet paper - all things that are really, really cheap through our vendor) that we don't use for other things. Hell, we have a few brushes that are meant for toilets that we use for cleaning other things - that we obviously don't use for cleaning the toilets.

Charging for it because "Oh people trash it and there is a cost to maintain it" - yeaaah... no. I don't buy it. I've seen bathrooms trashed, just means one person has to go and clean it up. That person who would've been paid that X amount of time to be in the store anyway.

Cleaning the store (and bathrooms) has already been factored in to everything else, taking account of sometimes the bathroom will just need a quick mop, glass cleaned, toilet cleaned, and other times someone will be in there for a while to clean it up.

So, personally, I think it's not a good idea to charge non-customers to use the bathroom. Actually, I just think it's a dumb idea.

Especially since - in my experience only - it's not the "I just need the bathroom" people who make a mess, they typically do their business and get out. It's customers (or customers' childrens) who trash it or leave crap all over the place. This is just from working in retail (McD's, Target, current location).

[SongsOfDragons]

-What kind of a place charges people to use the bathroom? Anyone who does that alone deserves all the angry customers they can get.

Charging for bathroom use is pretty much standard practice in Europe - every other public bathroom charged about 50c in Holland alone last summer - and in many London Underground stations now.

[NorthernZel]

Charging for bathroom use is pretty much standard practice in Europe - every other public bathroom charged about 50c in Holland alone last summer - and in many London Underground stations now.

That depends. Yes, public restrooms (like the automated ones, or the ones where the janitor is always around) do charge over here, but most cafés or restaurants, not that much. The only exception would be restaurants in central places where the door to the restroom has a code lock where one should punch in a 4-digit code (the code is written on the receipt so either you get the code free when you purchase something or you purchase the code only), but that is mostly for deferring drug addicts from shooting up in the stalls.

[Aethian]

The only exception would be restaurants in central places where the door to the restroom has a code lock where one should punch in a 4-digit code (the code is written on the receipt so either you get the code free when you purchase something or you purchase the code only), but that is mostly for deferring drug addicts from shooting up in the stalls.

I honestly like this idea for the smaller places.

I wonder how it would work for the places that allow us posties, police, and firemen to use their restrooms when they technically don't have restrooms for public use.

[s_stabeler]

I suppose you would ask and they'd give you the code for free.

but yeah, i don't have a problem with a reasonable fee for use of a bathroom for non-customers, but a) it should be made obvious beforehand- I would actually recommend it being impossible to get in w/o some kind of token or paying the fee (give customers a token upon request) and b) don't send a bill if you are just making a point. c) $5? that's a bit high. in my experience, it's more usually 30p (roughly 20 cents)

but yeah, business owner is sucky, albeit the woman probably shouldn't have refused to pay.

[Lace Neil Singer]

Charging for bathroom use is pretty much standard practice in Europe - every other public bathroom charged about 50c in Holland alone last summer - and in many London Underground stations now.

Yeah, and it's not much; it may have gone up since I was last in London, but I only had to pay 20p to use the Charing Cross public loo. Even that was compensated to me by the fact that I found a nearly full packet of fags by the bathroom sinks.

As per the issue of trashing, the Greggs in the next town had issues with people not only trashing the loo, but also doing drugs there so they locked it and put up a sign to tell people that if they want to use the loo, they have to ask a member of staff to unlock it. I haven't seen any less people in that Greggs since that order.

[mikoyan29]

If they have signs posted that restrooms are for customers only, then I would have no problem with this. Otherwise, it doesn't seem right. It seems even less right when the person charges her after the fact.

[Mytical]

By refusing payment, they pretty much shot themselves in the foot here. I believe if it goes to court, and the person says "I've tried to pay, twice, and they have refused payment." The judge would throw it out so fast it would not be funny.

[Rageaholic]

but yeah, business owner is sucky, albeit the woman probably shouldn't have refused to pay.

You see, this is where I disagree. I think she was right in refusing to pay. It's bad enough that they charged her to go to the bathroom, but considering she wasn't aware of it until it was too late, paying that could open to the door other "fees" they make up on the fly.

There comes a time when you have to tell a business "Hey, I'm not putting up with this". This is one of those times.