By Ian McConnell
GLASGOW is second in the league table of restaurant no-show hotspots in the UK, according to a survey by booking platform TheFork.
The restaurant booking platform estimated that what it described as a “new spread-booking craze”, where consumers make reservations at multiple restaurants to ensure they have options to choose from but only intend to honour one of them, could cost UK restaurant owners £6.2m over the next four weeks.
The research by TheFork found that "the most loyal and devoted diners with the least amount of no-shows" were Liverpudlians and Edinburgh residents.
London was the worst for no-shows, the survey found, with Manchester in third place just behind Glasgow.
Nineteen per cent of UK residents admitted to failing to arrive for a restaurant reservation since indoor dining returned after the most recent lockdown, research by TheFork showed.
And the survey showed 30% of respondents who failed to show up for a recent booking were no-shows because they were "spread booking".
READ MORE: Mobile phone roaming charges in EU: Brexit and the sad end of protection – so what next?: Ian McConnell
Patrick Hooykaas, managing director at TheFork said: “It’s great to see demand for dining returning and reservations increasing across the country, but restaurants still face a huge challenge to get back on their feet. It is more important than ever that diners show their support for local businesses, and the biggest way they can do that is to only reserve the tables they really need.
"When diners no-show for a booking, it results in a loss of revenue that restaurants can ill afford. In the UK, it is costing businesses millions. Of course, there are times when diners have to change their plans and can’t fulfil a reservation, but when that happens our advice is to always give the restaurant as much notice as possible so they can offer the table to another customer."
READ MORE: Ian McConnell: Reports of Scottish economic collapse are much exaggerated
He added: "It is also important that booking platforms play their part by not facilitating unfair behaviours such as spread booking. Here at TheFork, we do not allow customers to make more than one booking during the same time period on our site. The message from us is simple, if you do not plan to attend your restaurant booking, cancel. We can all do our bit to help get this important industry back on its feet.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel