CANCEL CULTURE

We’re sure you’ve noticed that many restaurants have begun introducing stricter-than-ever cancellation and no-show penalties in recent years. Some take money from your credit card at the time of booking, others will charge a specified amount if you don’t turn up or cancel within a certain time frame, usually 24 or 48 hours.

There’s a very good reason for this. Like any business, restaurants need to accurately budget and allocate their resources: food and staff. Get the ratios wrong, and they’re left out of pocket, decimating their already slim margins.

A lot has been made of these fees: are they fair, are they reasonable, are they evenly weighted to take care of the competing needs of both the diner and the restaurants? Here’s our take.

Every Gourmet Traveller reviewer has had to cancel a reservation on occasion. And sometimes we’ve had to cop the cash hit if we’ve pulled out before the stated cut-off.

But more often than not, if we’ve rung or emailed the restaurant and explained things, we’ve worked something out. Sometimes fees have been reduced, or we’ve found a way to reschedule our visit, or they’ve kindly waived the cost. Not always, but the key is to remember that everyone in this transaction is a human. And when we all treat each other like humans, we can generally come to a détente.

It’s called hospitality for a reason.

Restaurants aren’t out to get anyone. From our experience, if you’re polite and transparent, they’ll do their best to come to an arrangement where everyone’s happy.

But it’s a two-way street. Don’t take advantage. Try your best to stick to your end of the bargain unless you really have a serious reason to pull out. As Smith & Daughters’ Shannon Martinez recently told GT, “I think a lot of people have twigged on to the fact that you can cancel and use the Covid excuse and not get charged.” Don’t be that person. Because, as Martinez says, too many last-minute cancellations could be the difference between restaurants closing or “just hanging on”.