Restaurant Allegedly Said, “Cannot Afford Then Don’t Eat” to Diner After Dispute Over Coupon Redemption

Service establishments are always expected, mostly by customers themselves, to live by this one motto: the customer is always right.

Of course, that’s not always the case, and there are times where customers overstep their boundaries.

Other times, when there’s no clear right or wrong, misunderstandings can escalate into both customer and restaurant to lose their cool and end up dealing with each other badly.

Still, nothing excuses being rude either way.

Customer Wanted To Redeem Coupon

It all began when one woman purchased a coupon off Fave, which offered her a heavily discounted price for San Guo Kao Yu’s set meal.

Originally costing $116, the coupon provided customers with a special price of only $59.68.

However, the terms and conditions stated on the page for buying the coupon failed to mention that the voucher was only applicable for the use of four diners. Not knowing that fact, the woman wanted to make a reservation for four diners and two additional children.

Calling the restaurant on 19 March, she was informed by a male employee that the set meal coupon in question could only be used by four diners.

The woman maintained that she did not know about it prior to her purchase as the platform did not state that fact.

As such, the staff explained that due to the pandemic, there were limited seats in the restaurant. If large groups were able to take advantage of the deal and order a four-person set meal while dining in, business would be affected negatively.

He then asked her to pay an extra $10 for each additional diner, she recalled.

She Called The Manager Later

Still confused about the mention of additional charges, the woman decided to make another call to the restaurant to speak to the manager instead this time.

Unfortunately, it didn’t go so well.

After the woman explained the situation, the manager allegedly uttered that if she “cannot afford, then don’t eat.”

Which is a pretty classist and rude thing to say to someone, right? But you can’t blame the customer for this, because there’s really no one who wouldn’t jump at the chance to get deals at a better price.

“This isn’t about the money, this is about his attitude. I just wanted to make a reservation,” commented the angry customer.

The restaurant’s policy, as confirmed by a female employee later, was indeed to only serve the four-person set meal to four people as it was supposed to be. Groups of customers with more than four people were given the options to either order more dishes or pay $10 for every additional diner.

It Was A Miscommunication

As with every story, there’s always two sides to it.

While the manager admitted that he had indeed scolded the customer, he said it was only in response to her saying that the restaurant had “taken her money”.

Thus, he felt that it was unfair as Fave only pays the restaurant after customers dine-in to redeem the coupon, yet all the customer did was call them to enquire – how could she say that they had taken her money when they hadn’t even charged her?

“Whenever customers ask how many people can come and dine, we’d always hope they would order more dishes instead,” the manager said, claiming that the options were communicated to the customer.

However, the woman claimed that she was not informed of the choice and that the male employee to who she first spoke had insisted that she pay extra for the other two diners.

When the deal was first launched, the restaurant had already asked Fave to indicate the dining policy in the coupons’ terms and conditions, but to no avail, the manager explained.

In order to prevent similar incidences from happening again, he hopes that the platform would take action to rectify the terms and conditions shown to customers.

Still, the deal’s terms and conditions remained the same at the time of writing, although the name of the deal has been updated to include the fact that the set meal serves four people.

The woman advised other customers to pay more attention to the fine print of such deals and stressed that they should always clarify the details with restaurants before purchasing the coupons.

Oh well, let this be a lesson to all of us, especially for avid coupon buyers.

Featured Image: Google Maps