sod's law strikes again, sorry about the table

saturday night, a table free. not free but unoccupied. we are waiting, we are waiting, the phone rings.what should we do? the table is booked but we 45 minutes have passed since and still no-one here. take the booking. ten minutes later and they arrive. but who is it. of course it is the table, an hour or so late but they are here and we cannot seat them. we feel terrible but what can we do? what should we have done?

go back 24 hours. the night is dead. wales are playing rugby and the wru owe us big time. only four tables are booked and thankfully one of those is a big party. of the other three tables, two don't show. what should we do? i've done it myself, so we don't ring. we have the number but we don't ring. sometimes you want to ring more than others. when you are full, you want to ring.

'we could have sold that table' you want to scream down the 'phone, 'where are your manners?'

but we don't ring. what's the point? to make myself more angry. i can do that without other people being involved so that's what i do.

on friday, it's not such a problem. a no-show when all the tables are free anyway, so what.

on saturday, i can only apologise. but in my defence, in three years, this is the only time that the no-show has been a show. every other time we just stand and look at the empty table.

and that's not good. the margins for us are very small. we are cheap and that is a policy. but sometimes this means that customers treat you cheap and that is not on. i keep the prices down because the only other solution is to shut the place down. that is why we shut at lunchtimes, because the other route means VAT and that means closing; we simply could not pay it. and that means three nights, some very quiet, thursday and friday, this week, and others busy, saturday last. the people who work for us deserve better than we can offer and that is why we do as much for you as we can. sometimes these people are treated very shabbily, and that happened last week. the upshot of this will be a new policy from next week. i rely heavily on the team that we have and if you value us, then please value them.

a bit sad now

wayne