Dining Out With The Kids

Ok, so I have been wrestling with this one pretty hard. It would be very easy for me to turn this into a discussion on parenting Do’s and Don’ts. 
  

However, in the interest and spirit of what I’m trying to accomplish with these posts, I will do my best to keep it about awareness in a professional manner. Wish me luck! 

 1) Keep your child in their seat - Children that are allowed to get up and roam the restaurant freely can actually cause serious accidents. Younger children are not really in the line of sight for servers, or even other patrons. This could be potential danger when there is a possibility of collisions which involve hot food.  

2) Be aware of other guests - While many will understand that you can’t spend every night at home, a dining experience should be pleasant for EVERY guest who enters the restaurant. What does this mean? As a parent and a conscientious human being, you should be ready at a moments notice to ask for your check and retreat in the event that a child becomes unruly, loud or bothersome to others. I can ASSURE you that your server will attend to taking care of cashing you out, getting food to go, and in many cases even helping where needed to make this happen as smoothly as possible.  

3) Cleaning - I understand that kids are kids. And quite often, some of my funnest experiences as a server have involved tables with families and kids of all ages. Please be respectful of the area around you. YES, its our place to clean up, but let’s use some common sense. If you are not going to at least attempt to keep the mess in check, then you should be compensating those that you leave to deal with the ensuing disaster. TIP APPROPRIATELY.  

4) Your server is NOT your babysitter - While you will find that most servers will at least in some form attempt to entertain the kids, and even treat them as equals in some respects (age dependent usually), we DO have other tables and guests to take care of.  

Coupons

This one is a source of contention for many people because the main issue involves tipping.

Here’s how it SHOULD work. 

Regardless of your idea of what is appropriate in way of a tip, you should ALWAYS be tipping on the total of the bill BEFORE your coupon was deducted. After all, you DID order the food and drinks. You DID eat the food and drink the drinks. Therefore you should TIP based on the food and drinks you consume.

Its great to save a buck here and there. But you shouldn’t be punishing the server at the same time.

Dining Out With Groups

If you are going to go out for lunch with a large group in the middle of the week, keep these things in mind:

1) If this is a work group, please plan your time accordingly. This means…….. Do not show up all at different times. Come as a group. It helps the server AND YOU on time and organization. 

2) Usually, you have a certain amount of time to get in and out. That being the case…… When your server is speaking to you, PAY ATTENTION. Again, this helps with YOUR time constraints and the overall flow and organization for the server. 

3) If you are going to need separate checks for ANYONE at your table, AGAIN, please plan your time accordingly. It takes LOTS of time to separate, and then run numerous credit cards, or make change for many people. 

4) When a server asks you “Is there anything else you need or I can get you?" PLEASE for the love of Pete, take the 5 seconds to assess your situation and figure it out. When a server has to constantly run back and forth, it detracts from YOUR experience, and it affects others as well.

5) MOST IMPORTANTLY - PLEASE remember…… its ALL of you…… and ONE server. Though we have team members who can sometimes help us out. OFTEN, it is just your server, and ONLY your server who is helping you. And they likely have other tables that they are (or are TRYING) to take care of.