Hotel Du Vin - £29.00 review

[Richieb]

HDV are offerin a £29.00 for 2 people, 2 courses (each) and a bottle of wine.

pros

Nice resturant.
Lovely food
£29.00

cons
Limited menu options
its never going to be £29.00 lets face it


ok, so we arrived (H-D-V Bristol), lovely atmosphere and surroundings, shown to our table. the waitress explained the choice options, 4 starters and 4 mains. Nice.

order bottle of red.
order starters.
order mains.
so, first "additional cost" was side orders, i order goose fat chips (£3.00)

great food, good chips etc. really nice.

me and the missus decide to have a pud. (£7.00 for sticky toffee pudding, which was exceedingly good).

then the Bill.

£29.00 ( 2 courses + wine )
chips £3.00
Pud £7.00
service £3.90 !!!!!


overall £43.00 for a meal for 2 is great value, and around what you should be paying for that kinda food, i have paid nearer double that to eat in the same resturant, so not bad. however, the service charge annoyed me, and the fact your " 2 courses" dont come with potateos or a filler.

all said and done, good value.

go to the website to take up the offer (open till end of april)

Rich

 

[madandra]

Was service included in the bill or was it optional???


That is one Americanism that really gets on my goat. Why should I have to pay more than the printed price for something like that? I could just see me adding 15% service charge to one of my customers bills.... they would string me up by the Gladstones.

Am I beong a typical Scotsman or am I normal? Is service charge a rip off.

 

[Twire]

All I do, is if there's a service charge I don't leave a tip. If there isn't I leave 10%

But I would rather it be my choice.

 

[Richieb]

the service charge was detailed seperatly and is normally "discresionary" (sp?)

i agree with you, it is a rip off, people should not have a service charge levied, and tip should reward GOOD SERVICE. i have told the server in Pizza express that i wasn't tipping becasue the service was crap, the manager overheard and gave me 20% off aswell.

good service should be rewarded, not put on as a "meal tax" which goes into the owners pocket.......

 

[madandra]

Richie, I took the family into Pizza Hut in Edinburgh last summer (a Saturday)and it was a disgrace. The toilets were filthy and the floor in the eating area was slippery with spilt food so I asked for the manager and Renton from Trainspotting rolled up pished as a fart and apologised for the conditions and said the cleaner was back in on the Monday and he would have a word. I emailed their head office and received a £20 voucher which eased the trauma of eating out in Edinburgh

 

[vig]

I always tip good service... it shouldn't be obligatory.
we've had a couple of free meal vouchers given when we have complained. Never used them cos they only get one chance with me

 

[Dodger]

Richie, I took the family into Pizza Hut in Edinburgh last summer (a Saturday)and it was a disgrace. The toilets were filthy and the floor in the eating area was slippery with spilt food so I asked for the manager and Renton from Trainspotting rolled up pished as a fart and apologised for the conditions and said the cleaner was back in on the Monday and he would have a word. I emailed their head office and received a £20 voucher which eased the trauma of eating out in Edinburgh

Renton!! Ha ha sitting here pishing myself laughing with a vivid picture in my mind of you sat there non plused....wonderful!

 

[RGDave]

I've had this a few times. I just strike it off and then refuse (after speaking to a senior bod) to pay either the charge or indeed a tip.

When everyone is well and truly sick of the sight of me and my rant, I casually drop the waiter/waitress 10% in cash, apologising for "allowing" them to feel undervalued.

Then, I don't go back.....

Unless service is terrible, I always tip. I never put it on my card, and never into a communal pot. CASH, straight into the pocket, EVERY TIME. Works for me.

 

[madandra]

I also tip ... when it is deserved.

When we were up at the MacDonald resort in Aviemore it cost a bloody forune tiping but the service was second to none and I didn't mind it. But when some person who looks as though they are doing community service and would rather have their eyes plucked out with hot spoons than serve you food wont see one brown penny of my hard earned and they should go and find a job they will enjoy.

 

[backwoodsman]

If there's a discretionary service charge on the bill, I always ask the waiter(ess) "will you get the money..." The answer is nearly always "no" in which case, I just say can they take it off the bill as I'd prefer to leave something on the table.

A point to remember is that, generally, waiting staff are on sh1t rates of pay, and in most instances are expected to make up their money through tips. So, for me, leaving a tip is usual - unless the service is particularly poor. An ar5e about face way of doing it I know - but think of the poor sod who's serving you...

 

[viscount17]

nope, tip <u>only</u> for good service. why tip for poor or mediocre just because they are on minimum wage, the wage doesn't excuse the service.

 

[Cernunnos]

I don't know whether its still printed on menu's but over here in the UK it always used to say : Service is included.Meaning you are under no obligation to leave a tip, but encoraging you to tip extra if you thought the service was particularly good. Hence why I always used leave a couple of quid regardless of how much or little I've spent, if & only if I've thought the service was particularly good.

However, these days unfortunatly its rare to recieve particularly good service or even particularly good food anywhere.

That said, Frankie & Benneys seems to still offer both good food & good service, at least in my town & with the exception of the steaks I had a few months ago which were not the quality I would normally expect, so on that occasion we only left a pound, mainly as the welcome & service was so friendly, the young chap serving our table always does a good job.

One thing I hate is this new way of leaving a tip when you put your card in the machine it always asks if I wish to leave a tip. Now I really don't think in any automated system the waiter is going to get that tip, so I always leave cash.

The most I've ever left is a fiver, as I really cannot afford to go splashing around money I don't have to splash. Hence why we rarely these days appart from a few exceptions leave anything.

We had a fantastic welcome at Celtic Manor when we played the 2010 & booked into the hotel, unfortunatly as I am on such a tight budget I could not really afford to leave tips with any of the staff, no matter how good the service. The conciege service was second to none, but I regret to say I wasn't going to leave any tip no matter how good that service, at least this time, as most of the staff there probably earn more than I do before tips than I do after overtime.

 

[madandra]

We were in The Olive Garden in Cleveland Ohio in '96 and to be fair it was my first trip the the USA and I wasn't familiar with their idea of tipping so one night we were a bit short and only left a handful of small change as our tip and left. As we got to the door the waiter came over and handed it back announcing to the restaurant 'Here, have your 83c back, you abviously need it more than me'


We crawled out feeling 6" tall and never went back.

 

[Richieb]

just a point, i normally do ask for the service charge to be removed and leave the same in folding/shrapnel. dont know why i didnt.

anyway, my first review was off topic, but seems to have provoked some debate, will think about other random stuff to review this weekend.

 

[Macster]

madandra _ so you should feel 6" tall after that !!

This takes the pize so far possibly:

Denver 3 weeks ago........'Ruby Tuesdays' - a chain of thier's, and the best meal we had all week to be fair, damn great portions of superb food, Steaks/ Mash, Prawns, excellent.
Only marred by an ever so annoying waiter trying to be funny, and then casually asking 'whether we found service better in the US', purely as a ploy to drop into conversation, to which we agreed it was, and he then followed it with 'ahh thats because we dont get paid and rely on tips' just to make sure we 'knew'.
I looked away as I didnt want a 'scene', whilst my buddies continued to 'converse' with him.

The Bill arrives, and printed on the bottom is a reminder of what Tips might come to......20% would be $....15% would be.......10% would be.....
which was all cheeky enough....

But capped off by the fact that he had ringed the 20% and then handwritten next to it 'recommended tip' !!!

At that point I stated that the fecker should be called over, dressed down, and reminded that we do have Restaurants in Britain, and despite the fact that we may look stoopid, we werent, and as a result of his rather 'in your face' attitude to letting us know how much we 'should leave', he could feck off.

My 2 buddies with me didnt quite have the same stomach for a scene, and felt that as the meal had been so good, and good value, we should leave the 20%.

I couldnt beleive it, but as we had our sons with us, I didnt feel inclined to yell about it.

I like the States, but sometimes I just really dont want to go back.