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Walked a table at dinner last night (1 Viewer)

I might need to add that there were plenty of trays coming out of the kitchen, just not ours. There were many tables who were sat after us, and they got their entire food order. 

We we paid maybe $25 plus tip for drinks while waiting for a table. That's more than enough for a horrible dining experience. 

 
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Apple Jack said:
It's stealing and comically bad form. Clepto teenager like logic. There's not really any interpreting to do.
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I think Tom Skerritt did not intend to steal.  In his mind, he did not pour all the entrees into his pocket before he walked out.  He simply wanted to seek revenge for the waiting.  For certain personality types, it is not posssible to be "generous" and overlook some else's mistakes even on Christmas Eve.

 
Jed said:
I don't think anyone here thinks he was on the hook for the entrees.

At minimum he could leave a note on the table with his cell and say "the service is terrible, if you feel I owe you for anything call XXX-XXXX"
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maybe I'm reading the room wrong, but that's not the impression I'm getting.

 
McGarnicle said:
That would've been awesome if he did that. Instead he just left without paying.

It's not like the entire staff left to go to the movies. He could've flagged anyone down and asked for a manager. That's what non-horrible people do when they have a dispute with a business.

:no:  sigh
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Gotta love passive aggressiveness.  

I bet OP is a millennial. 

 
For all of the sanctimonious responders... The restaurant was busy, but it was not out of control. Food was consistently coming out of the kitchen. And much of it to tables seated well after we were. We just happened to be the one table that nobody cared about. It happens. I understand that. But I also am not going to pay for that level of service.

My guess is that our waiter did not put in our order. He tried to cover it up. And that would have been fine if our food was next out of the kitchen, but it wasn't. He lied to us again. And then he didn't have the balls to own it and/or apologize. Or he could have had a manager come over. He knew we were annoyed by that point. He just kept lying and asked if we wanted to spend MORE money on more drink while we waited longer for our food that may or may not have been next out of the kitchen. 

 
Peyton Marino said:
maybe I'm reading the room wrong, but that's not the impression I'm getting.
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He stole drinks and salads. No one is saying he should pay for food that never came out. Those entrees may have been wasted but that's reasonable for the restaurant to absorb for terrible service. 

 
Jed said:
It's stealing. Not sure why this is so difficult to understand.
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I think this is probably where the difficulty lies.  I'm not sure that I consider what the OP did to be stealing, and I'm definitely sure that it's question-begging just to assert as much without argument. 

When you go to a restaurant, you're agreeing to an implied contract with the owner.  You agree to pay for what you order, and they agree to serve you.  At some point, it should be obvious that a lack of service on their end voids that contract and relieves you of your need to pay.  For example, suppose my family and I drink our drinks, eat our salads, and enjoy our entrees.  Nobody brings a check.  I ask the waiter for a check, but still no dice.  I ask the manager, and he says he'll get one pronto, but it keeps not coming.  Looking around the room, we're the only people in the restaurant, all the servers are playing euchre, the manager is screwing around on his phone, and nobody is bringing us our check.  It's been three hours, the kitchen staff has mostly left, and we're still waiting.  What are supposed to do, sit here like we're kidnapped?  Of course not.  After you've made a good faith effort to settle your bill, walking out is fine -- the restaurant doesn't get to hold you hostage because they dropped the ball on their end of your contract.  This isn't exactly what happened to the OP, but it's enough to demonstrate that walking the table isn't automatically stealing.

I do agree with the people saying that the OP should have left cash for what he consumed.  That's what I would do in my hypothetical.  But if he didn't have any cash on him, I don't think walking out is obviously wrong.  I'm definitely not in the "I'll come back to settle up later" crowd.  My time is too valuable for that, and the restaurant is the one that broke our contract in the first place.

 
Tom Skerritt said:
For all of the sanctimonious responders... The restaurant was busy, but it was not out of control. Food was consistently coming out of the kitchen. And much of it to tables seated well after we were. We just happened to be the one table that nobody cared about. It happens. I understand that. But I also am not going to pay for that level of service.

My guess is that our waiter did not put in our order. He tried to cover it up. And that would have been fine if our food was next out of the kitchen, but it wasn't. He lied to us again. And then he didn't have the balls to own it and/or apologize. Or he could have had a manager come over. He knew we were annoyed by that point. He just kept lying and asked if we wanted to spend MORE money on more drink while we waited longer for our food that may or may not have been next out of the kitchen. 
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My guess is whoever should work your table did not show up (or had to run out to do some last minute shopping) and your waiter had to cover for him/her.

 
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Tom Skerritt said:
For all of the sanctimonious responders... The restaurant was busy, but it was not out of control. Food was consistently coming out of the kitchen. And much of it to tables seated well after we were. We just happened to be the one table that nobody cared about. It happens. I understand that. But I also am not going to pay for that level of service.

My guess is that our waiter did not put in our order. He tried to cover it up. And that would have been fine if our food was next out of the kitchen, but it wasn't. He lied to us again. And then he didn't have the balls to own it and/or apologize. Or he could have had a manager come over. He knew we were annoyed by that point. He just kept lying and asked if we wanted to spend MORE money on more drink while we waited longer for our food that may or may not have been next out of the kitchen. 
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You missed out on the MoP move -- getting the server fired.

 
When you run a business and provide a service, there are reasonable expectations of what should be provided.  When a business fails to meet those expectations, they don't necessarily deserve to be compensated for what they may have already done.

Since some have already equated this to stealing jewelry after waiting 15 minutes ( :lmao: ), I'll use some "extreme" examples as well to illustrate what I'm trying to say:

1)  You go to a restaurant and order chicken wings.  They bring you the wings and they are fully undercooked and raw and inedible.  You ask to have them cooked some more and they explain that's how they make them.  You decide that there's no way you'll be eating this and decide to leave.  Now, those wings plus whatever other ingredients/sides came with them cost the restaurant money.  But that's their loss for failing to live up to reasonable expectations of what a restaurant serving wings should provide.  A customer refusing to pay for those wings is technically stealing but there is no way they should be expected to pay for that product.

2)  You bring your car to get detailed.  It's a 2 hour job and you make an appointment.  You take your time out, bring it in, and they tell you it will be ready at 3pm.  It's now 5pm and you get a call that they were able to vacuum the vehicle and wash the outside, but they still haven't done the actual detailing, waxing, etc and won't be able to finish today.  You can bring it back tomorrow morning at 8am and they'll finish it for you.  Except you're not available tomorrow morning because you needed the vehicle for an appointment (hence the detailing).  Sure, the business spent some time but they only provided a partial service and failed the expectations that they were hired for.  Should you pay them for what it costs to vacuum and wash a car?  Or should the business be responsible for that portion?  I wouldn't give them a dime because of their failure to meet reasonable expectations for what I brought my car over for.  If I pay them for the vacuum and wash, they are out $0 and I am out significant time and still haven't received what I was expecting and have to go elsewhere to do so.

With what the OP is describing, the restaurant failed miserably in providing what is expected when ordering food at a restaurant.  Add up the time from when they went in to eat:  45 minutes to sit (not unreasonable), 15 minutes to even see a server after sitting (not reasonable but overall not terrible), 30 minutes with no food and no explanation (not terrible, but starting to add up, then another 15 minutes where waiter says it's next and then another 10-15 minutes where waiter is making trips in an out.  That's 2 hours in the restaurant with no dinner and no reasonable expectation that it was coming immediately.  Even if you remove the 45 minute wait time, that's one hour and 15 minutes from being seated where you still have no food and are getting ignored.  So unless this to be expected at this restaurant and all other patrons are waiting the same, then this is unacceptable and they haven't fulfilled their obligation just because they gave him some drinks and brought out a salad during that time. 

Again, if you talk to a manager about that situation, I can't imagine them trying to charge him for the drinks and salads at that point.  I think we would all agree that 95%+ managers comp their food/drink at that point and apologize.  Just because the OP, now with a hungry family, decided to forego that step, doesn't make it "stealing" any more than if the manager offered the food to them for free.  The reason we all know it would get comped is because his time was worth that amount of food/drink and you don't need a manager to "approve" that transaction.  The fact that the restaurant is out that money is their fault for not providing a reasonable dining experience.  I'd say an hour 15 minutes + without a meal is rarely going to be reasonable in a normal restaurant.

 
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Rohn Jambo said:
My guess is whoever should work your table did not show up (or had to run out to do some last minute shopping) and your waiter had to cover for him/her.
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That happens.  Had the waiter mentioned that, asked for a bit of indulgence, and maybe brought them an appetizer and some fresh drinks to tide them over I am betting O.P. would have understood and been gracious.  He might have even increased hi tip.  This is a service industry and service is part of the contract.

 
jvdesigns2002 said:
No offense--but that is not a decision that is up to you to make.   Every human being has a different set of standards--and this is why it is not up to customers to decide when it is appropriate to justify stealing. If you go to a restaurant--and are unhappy with the service--you ask for a manager--tell them why you are not satisfied and tell them why you don't plan on paying and then leave.  I manage a small but fine jewelry store--a business where "the overall" customer package means everything.  On the days leading to xmas--there were times where we had 12-15 customers in our shop at any given time--with our entire staff of 7 people each helping a person.  That led to cases where sometimes customers had to wait 15-25 minutes to get served.  If each of them found it appropriate to steal a Rolex or take a diamond ring because their time is money--how would you feel about that?   As the manager--when I see a customer is waiting--I'll apologize to them--thank them for their patience--and will even sometimes give them a gift card from the Starbucks that is in our same shopping center and have them enjoy a drink on me--and will personally walk over there/and or send them a text when I have an available associate to help them.  For the OP to essentially steal (he didn't say a word to a manager)--and then to complain about it is  reflective of terrible character.  Dude probably stole what would have been a bill of $30--he already said earlier that he assumes that the stuff he stole probably costed the restaurant $5. So you go somewhere--get $30 worth of food---don't pay a penny--and then turn around and complain about it? C'mon man. 
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You clearly understand good customer service and I bet that means your business is successful.  I hope you had an awesome holiday season.

That said, the analogy would be more apropos had one of your sales staff promised they would be right with those waiting customers, ignored them, and then watched the time tick away so that all the jewelry stores were closed except for some mall kiosk selling costume jewelry.

 
Ditkaless Wonders said:
I bet the manager of the restaurant would have loved for a chance to make your experience right and to win a customer for life.
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I don't disagree with you.  My guess is that a manager would have comp'd the food in question and most likely would have comp'd the rest of the meal or issued a coupon for free food on their next visit. When one enters a contract- it's just normal and professional to actually voice displeasure and communicate to the involved party why they are breaking that contract.   I personally have no problem with him not paying- I have a problem with him doing so without saying a word or having a conversation with an agent of the establishment first. I don't think that's too much to ask.

 
Tom Skerritt said:
For all of the sanctimonious responders... The restaurant was busy, but it was not out of control. Food was consistently coming out of the kitchen. And much of it to tables seated well after we were. We just happened to be the one table that nobody cared about. It happens. I understand that. But I also am not going to pay for that level of service.

My guess is that our waiter did not put in our order. He tried to cover it up. And that would have been fine if our food was next out of the kitchen, but it wasn't. He lied to us again. And then he didn't have the balls to own it and/or apologize. Or he could have had a manager come over. He knew we were annoyed by that point. He just kept lying and asked if we wanted to spend MORE money on more drink while we waited longer for our food that may or may not have been next out of the kitchen. 
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So you are OK with the waiter picking up the tab for the salad and the drinks that you didn't pick up at the bar?  I'm sure he loved working for free on Christmas Eve.

 
matuski said:
There was context.  I believe McGarnicle was taking flak for implying OP could go to jail over it.  So yea, you are right.
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When Rudy went about attacking the rampant crime in NYC, he started by eradicating the graffiti. 

Today it's theft of service at a restaurant, tomorrow it could be grand theft auto. We need to deter these miscreants before there's mass chaos imo.

 
Nugget said:
So you are OK with the waiter picking up the tab for the salad and the drinks that you didn't pick up at the bar?  I'm sure he loved working for free on Christmas Eve.
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Seriously? The only one paying anything is the restaurant, and they should. 

 
jvdesigns2002 said:
I don't disagree with you.  My guess is that a manager would have comp'd the food in question and most likely would have comp'd the rest of the meal or issued a coupon for free food on their next visit. When one enters a contract- it's just normal and professional to actually voice displeasure and communicate to the involved party why they are breaking that contract.   I personally have no problem with him not paying- I have a problem with him doing so without saying a word or having a conversation with an agent of the establishment first. I don't think that's too much to ask.
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Except you (and others) called it stealing.  There's a big difference in that and this last post of yours.

I completely agree that it would almost certainly be comped and I also agree that talking to the manager would have been best. I would have done the same and not just left. At the same time, if it was to the point that he just didn't want to waste any more time on a holiday outing with family and wanted to just get going, I find little fault with that. Not ideal, but not egregious at all, and certainly not stealing, IMO.  When you acknowledge the manager should have and likely would have not charged based on the events, then you don't really need the manager's validation to remove the stealing label.

 
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I did something similar a couple months ago. Don't feel like writing out the whole ordeal. It was just two bottled waters I left unpaid for. Just reached my boiling point with a too long wait and seeing people that sat down after me getting served by the guy supposed to be serving me. 

Walked down the street to another place and had probably a better meal anyway. 

I believe in a situation like this the amount of hunger one is feeling is proportional to amount of anger one feels. 

 
It's pretty telling when the ones justifying the stealing have to write a 1,500 word essay. 

 
"We sitting in here -- I'm supposed to be the bill payer, and we in here talking about salad. I mean, listen: We talking about salad. Not a entree. Not a entree . Not a entree . We talking about salad. Not a entree . Not the entree that I go out there and pay for and pay every bill like it's my last. Not the entree. We talking about salad, man."

 
Cold Dead Hands said:
Many places charge the waiters for any uncollected money. 
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It is illegal to charge waitstaff for walkouts. From the Department of Labor:

Where deductions for walk-outs, breakage, or cash register shortages reduce the employee’s wages below the minimum wage, such deductions are illegal. When an employer claims an FLSA 3(m) tip credit, the tipped employee is considered to have been paid only the minimum wage for all non-overtime hours worked in a tipped occupation and the employer may not take deductions for walkouts, cash register shortages, breakage, cost of uniforms, etc., because any such deduction would reduce the tipped employee’s wages below the minimum wage.
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For a server to fight this, however, would be a pain in the ###.

 
gianmarco said:
Except you (and others) called it stealing.  There's a big difference in that and this last post of yours.

I completely agree that it would almost certainly be comped and I also agree that talking to the manager would have been best. I would have done the same and not just left. At the same time, if it was to the point that he just didn't want to waste any more time on a holiday outing with family and wanted to just get going, I find little fault with that. Not ideal, but not egregious at all, and certainly not stealing, IMO.  When you acknowledge the manager should have and likely would have not charged based on the events, then you don't really need the manager's validation to remove the stealing label.
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That's where you and I differ. Because the establishment wasn't notified about why the customer consumed a product without paying--it absolutely becomes theft in my eyes.  I think it's clear that both you and I believe that if the OP approached any member of the restaurant and had a conversation- the likely outcome would most would have been free food. However- him just bailing and not getting confirmation from the restaurant that they would not be charging for the consumed products is skipping a huge and necessary step.  in any case- you bring up some great points and I enjoyed the discussion.  Merry xmas to you and your family.

 
Nugget said:
It isn't illegal if it doesn't drop the waiter below minimum wage.  $30 over 80 hours in a pay period doesn't likely drop the employee under minimum wage. 
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In 16 years of work in hospitality, I rarely saw a server work 40 hours a week. I worked for three establishments (one chain, one mom and pop, one owner et al) and not once was a server asked to eat a check on a dine and dash. I have seen employees fired for comping drinks/appz/desserts to friends and such.

Furthermore, with a handful of exceptions, restaurants/bars utilize point of service computers/software that attributes each order (sale) to a server. At the end of each shift servers are expexted to print out a sales report and claim the tips they accrued that shift according to their sales. If an employer claims a server made sales that were not collected, and do this with multiple servers, they are defrauding the IRS, too. A servers is taxed on income by pay rate and a percentage according to sales.

As  far as the OP...he has a point. Could have handled it differently, IMO.

 
pollardsvision said:
And please keep a few things in mind when you find yourself in a situation where a restaurant is clearly understaffed and wait times are horrible. These are underpaid, no benefits jobs here. The only way a restaurant could afford staff itself for every massive rush is to charge prices you don't want to pay. Even that wouldn't work, of course, because the drop in business would make it worse. So, this is what you get. We try to avoid these situations, but sometimes, it just happens.

Speaking of no benefits. We don't get and can't provide all this fancy paid sick and holiday leave. Staff goes out of town on the holidays leaving you short? Not much you can really do. We don't give holiday pay, and therefore can't complain much when they take their own unpaid holiday leave. If there's a handy way to replace them quickly, we can do that, but outside of that, them's the breaks.

Signed, restaurant owner that just got home from work on Christmas day after getting up at 4:30am to work and prep for an upcoming week where half the staff is out of town. A week where no matter how much I tried to prep beforehand, #### is just going to go haywire, and possibly to a Tom Skerritt situation.
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Now I understand why there are so few restaurants. 

 
pollardsvision said:
And please keep a few things in mind when you find yourself in a situation where a restaurant is clearly understaffed and wait times are horrible. These are underpaid, no benefits jobs here. The only way a restaurant could afford staff itself for every massive rush is to charge prices you don't want to pay. Even that wouldn't work, of course, because the drop in business would make it worse. So, this is what you get. We try to avoid these situations, but sometimes, it just happens.

Speaking of no benefits. We don't get and can't provide all this fancy paid sick and holiday leave. Staff goes out of town on the holidays leaving you short? Not much you can really do. We don't give holiday pay, and therefore can't complain much when they take their own unpaid holiday leave. If there's a handy way to replace them quickly, we can do that, but outside of that, them's the breaks.

Signed, restaurant owner that just got home from work on Christmas day after getting up at 4:30am to work and prep for an upcoming week where half the staff is out of town. A week where no matter how much I tried to prep beforehand, #### is just going to go haywire, and possibly to a Tom Skerritt situation.
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Worked my way through college in hospitality and it is understood that you are to work all holidays.  We got holiday pay but it was with few exceptions just a paid day off during the same pay period.  People who didn't work on holidays had their hours shortened when shifts were in demand and were replaced or left because they weren't getting the hours.  Don't reward them when they need you if they are no where to be seen when you need them.  The best ability is availability.

 
Ned said:
It's pretty telling when the ones justifying the stealing have to write a 1,500 word essay. 
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Yeah, I get that, and I agree that OP should have dropped some cash on the table.  I just think that at some point this becomes a run of the mill breach of contract, and there's no need to get all moralizing over $40 worth of food and drinks when the restaurant didn't follow through on its end of the deal.

 
pollardsvision said:
And please keep a few things in mind when you find yourself in a situation where a restaurant is clearly understaffed and wait times are horrible. These are underpaid, no benefits jobs here. The only way a restaurant could afford staff itself for every massive rush is to charge prices you don't want to pay. Even that wouldn't work, of course, because the drop in business would make it worse. So, this is what you get. We try to avoid these situations, but sometimes, it just happens.

Speaking of no benefits. We don't get and can't provide all this fancy paid sick and holiday leave. Staff goes out of town on the holidays leaving you short? Not much you can really do. We don't give holiday pay, and therefore can't complain much when they take their own unpaid holiday leave. If there's a handy way to replace them quickly, we can do that, but outside of that, them's the breaks.

Signed, restaurant owner that just got home from work on Christmas day after getting up at 4:30am to work and prep for an upcoming week where half the staff is out of town. A week where no matter how much I tried to prep beforehand, #### is just going to go haywire, and possibly to a Tom Skerritt situation.
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I understand alot of what you are saying, but my last serious girlfriend was a waitress and my experience was a little different.  When she graduated college, her major quandary wasn't holiday days, but it was her best job offer was giving her 20% less that what she made walking pizzas out while wearing a tight tank top.  I'm not crying for these girls.  Underpaid?  Not in my experience.  She made more than my college job.

 
I don't thing it's a big deal. If I had cash on me, I'd drop some on the table to cover the drinks and salads. But if I didn't have any, I wouldn't worry about it. 

 
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