Plain Water is Chargeable in 62 Restaurants

[makapaaa]

<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%"><TBODY><TR>All stirred up over drinking water in restaurants
</TR><!-- headline one : end --><TR>Some eateries are upset over blogger's list of places that don't serve free water </TR><!-- Author --><TR><TD class="padlrt8 georgia11 darkgrey bold" colSpan=2>By Lee Xin En
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->A blogger, upset that a restaurant would not serve her tap water which she needed to take her medication with, is urging diners to boycott such outlets.
<TABLE width=200 align=left valign="top"><TBODY><TR><TD class=padr8><!-- Vodcast --><!-- Background Story --><STYLE type=text/css> #related .quote {background-color:#E7F7FF; padding:8px;margin:0px 0px 5px 0px;} #related .quote .headline {font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:10px;font-weight:bold; border-bottom:3px double #007BFF; color:#036; text-transform:uppercase; padding-bottom:5px;} #related .quote .text {font-size:11px;color:#036;padding:5px 0px;} </STYLE>WATER ETIQUETTE IN DINING CAPITALS
Paris: While waiters will always try to push bottled water on their customers, customers can always ask for a 'carafe' of water, which refers to tap water.


Usually, bread and a jug of tap water are provided free.

... more​

</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>Miss Veron Ang - urged on by some netizens - went further and posted on her blog a list of 62 restaurants that she claimed do not serve free water.
It provoked angry reactions from several of the eateries which said they do serve water without charge.
One warned that the list Miss Ang, 24, a Web developer, created was 'libellous'.
Miss Ang said that in May, she dined at a restaurant in the west that refused to serve her water although she needed it for her medication.
After she 'Twittered' the incident, her friends urged her to create a list of similar eating places. She compiled an initial list from her own experience, as well as going to reviews on a food website, and asking friends on Facebook and Twitter.
After her list was posted on blog aggregating site Tomorrow.sg, other contributions started flowing in.
Her initial list, first posted last month, grew to 62 restaurants. It has been circulated by many Twitter users and websites.
The restaurants that do serve free water, but yet ended up on the list, are not amused. The Tapas Tree is one.
The marketing and sales manager for The Tapas Tree Group, Ms Lyn Yip, said: 'We find this list to be libellous, and will not hesitate to engage our lawyer if we are not removed from the list and the situation is not rectified immediately.
'We live in a time when the influence of Web opinion cannot be ignored, so bloggers have to approach their entries with responsibility, especially when composing defamatory lists.'
The list was still available at Miss Ang's blog when The Sunday Times checked yesterday at 4pm.
When contacted, 10 of the listed restaurants that admitted to a 'no free water' policy defended their position.
The managing director of Italian restaurant La Forketta, Ms Gracie Vitale, said: 'Our patrons are serious diners and come for our food, not to taste water. It's the customer with a budget who insists on tap water.'
She added that, outside Singapore, 'nobody really asks for tap water'.
Mr Jeffrey Jumahat, manager of Cafe Le Caire which does not serve free water, also shrugged off the list's boycott exhortation.
'To be frank, I don't think customers will just boycott because of water. There's no urgent need to take action at this point of time,' he said.
Mr Jack Chin, co-founder of Mad Jack's, said his chain of four restaurants does not serve free water because manpower is needed to refill and wash the glasses. He added: 'People who complain are not educated about business costs because nothing is free.'
Bakerzin, which started serving free water in April last year, said it incurred costs of $25,000 to install special water filters at its 10 sit-down dining outlets.
Taking the list seriously is Alps Cafe owner Danny Ang, who is rethinking his policy of 'free water only if you ask for it'.
His cafe had stopped serving water at dinner only late last year, but he does serve free tap water to customers who want it.
He said: 'I'm worried about the list. If customers really want it, I might consider raising the price of the food to give everyone free water.'
Several patrons contacted dismissed the reasons cited for not giving free tap water.
Sales manager Renee Koh, 32, said: 'Serving plain water for free should really be part of the service experience and I find it hard to think that the costs are that high, given that the water served is just chilled tap water.'
Mr Aun Koh, director of media and lifestyle consultancy Ate Media which published Asia's first restaurant guide The Miele Guide, said: 'In Singapore, there is no excuse other than snobbish vanity to drink bottled water and no reason other than an attempt to increase revenues for restaurateurs to refuse to offer tap water to their patrons.'
[email protected]
Would you patronise an eatery that does not serve free water? Email [email protected]

 

[po2wq]

... He added: 'People who complain are not educated about business costs because nothing is free.' ...

yalor ...

go ask gahmen 2 reduce rent ... c dey reduce anot? ...

 

[Jabba]

very soon..u will have to pay for ketchup and chilli sauce...

 

[Baimi]

We paid for plastic container when ta-pao
next, we will pay for plastic fork, spoon and
chop-sticks.
Now some coffee shops charged the same
for kopi-o kosong, it used to be 10cts less
than kopi-o

 

[kensington]

very soon..u will have to pay for ketchup and chilli sauce...

At some places, you already pay for those.

 

[drifter]

coffee shop ice kosong also must pay , right ?

 

[Baimi]

coffee shop ice kosong also must pay , right ?

It's free when you order beer.

 

[streetsmart73]

hi there


1. if ms ang feels that she cannot "afford" tap water being served, she could have simply go into the washroom, and get herself a mouthful of tap water for her medication, free.
2. a molehill in the making.
3. what a big deal.

 

[jimmyfallon]

Actually it is a big deal. It was a rather hot topic in britain last year. Press consensus was favoring the public wanting free tap water.

Tap water, sir? We don't do it
Posted: September 2, 2008

Patrick Collinson, The Guardian, Saturday August 30 2008 - Two weeks ago Dr Anne Guilding and her friends were relaxing in a restaurant, celebrating her son's wedding the day before. The food, wine and conversation were flowing. But then it suddenly turned ugly. No, there wasn't a bust-up between the in-laws. It was because one of the diners dared ask for some tap water so she could take a tablet.

"We had already spent hundreds of pounds, buying wine and expensive sparkling water. So I was gobsmacked when the waiter refused to bring us a jug of tap water, or even a glass. He told us it wasn't the restaurant's policy to serve tap water," says Guilding, whose party at the Brasserie El Prado in Bridgend included a member of the Welsh Assembly and a visiting American astonished that British restaurants don't automatically serve free water.

"I asked to speak to the manager, and explained that we had bought plenty of drinks and wanted some normal water. One member of the party needed to take medication and we did not consider asking for a jug of water unreasonable. He flatly refused to let us have any, reiterating that it was not the restaurant's policy."

Guilding left the restaurant angry, embarrassed and humiliated. But ultimately the restaurant was the loser - the group decided not to leave a tip. The restaurant's owner, Jesus Decelas, says: "Water costs us, the ice costs us, the lemon costs us. I have to charge."

According to the National Consumer Council, Guilding's experience is depressingly common in Britain. Its research found that nine out of 10 restaurants fail to offer free tap water.

A look at the Consumer Council for Water's website, where restaurant-goers can post reports of restaurant behaviour, reveals widespread anger and indignation about charging for tap water.

One poster, "Sharon", says: "When I was in Burger King recently, I started coughing and asked for some tap water. They refused even though I had tears running down my cheeks, as I struggled to stop coughing. They did offer to sell me a bottle of water; however, I decided to buy a coke instead as that was cheaper. Apparently, they don't 'do' tap water!" Burger King told Guardian Money that the restaurant was wrong. It is company policy to provide customers with tap water on request.

At a wedding in Birmingham, the hotel demanded £5 per bottle of water placed on tables, and resisted fiercely when the couple asked for jugs of tap water instead. Pubs are named and shamed for charging as much as £1 for a glass of tap water. Airports and railway stations are regularly cited as money-grabbers, removing free water fountains and effectively forcing travellers to buy bottled water at food outlets.

Some restaurants even tell customers that water can't be provided for "health and safety" reasons.

Dame Yve Buckland, chair of the Consumer Council for Water, says: "As a country we have put £70bn into the water industry. Tap water in Britain is now of the very highest quality and we urge restaurants to offer tap water to customers for free. You shouldn't have to feel like a cheapskate because you ask for tap water."

But can you force a restaurant to give you free tap water? The tales on CCW's website (ccwater.org.uk) reveal widespread confusion over consumer law.

Some tell of heated arguments in restaurants where diners insist that restaurants are required by law to provide free tap water. One says that under a law passed in Gladstone's time to promote temperance, restaurants are obliged to provide free tap water.

Some in the trade believe that they are required to serve free water. "As a retired hotelier and restaurateur, I was always led to believe that, by law, an innkeeper cannot refuse a traveller free water even if they do not spend any money at the establishment," says one poster on ccwater.org.uk.

But these assertions are pure hokum. The truth is that in Britain there is no legal requirement on restaurants to provide free tap water to customers. Some pubs and other premises permitted to sell alcohol may have a clause in their licence that does require them to offer free tap water, but it's on a localised basis only.

Sue Penniston, spokeswoman for the Drinking Water Inspectorate, part of Defra, says: "There are a lot of misconceptions, some of which arose out of the Leah Betts case. In the wake of her death, a lot of large premises had clauses put into their licensing agreements which obliged them to offer tap water free of charge.

"But apart from that restriction, restaurants do not have to give you water and do not have to supply it for free." She adds that it's nonsense for establishments to refuse tap water on health and safety grounds. "If a restaurant is on the public mains supply, the water is potable and there is no reason for it not to be supplied on health and safety grounds."

In the absence of legal compulsion, Buckland is encouraging good practice among restaurant chains. Pizza Hut has said it will always give customers free tap water. Strada, a pizza chain, already serves customers free chilled tap water in a designer bottle. "Strada is pleased to provide tap water free of charge throughout its restaurants as part of standard service," a spokeswoman says.

Restaurants and retailers are also facing intense pressure from green campaigners. Earlier this year, environment minister Phil Woolas condemned the bottled water industry as "morally unacceptable". Mineral water suppliers on average use two litres of water for every litre put into a bottle. Much is transported from overseas, from as far away as New Zealand and Fiji. Four out of five bottles are plastic, most of which end up in landfill despite recycling initiatives, where it can take four centuries to decompose.

Consumer campaigners Which? estimate that the number of plastic bottles sent to landfill each year would fill Wembley Stadium twice over. Which? describes bottled mineral water as an unnecessary drink that costs us £1.68bn a year. The good news is that sales fell by 9% last year, and in the credit crunch sales are expected to fall further. "Our reasons for buying bottled water are drying up," according to Which?

United Utilities, one of the biggest UK water companies, has begun a campaign called "tap into water" that brings free tap water to events such as football matches and street festivals. Philip Green, UU chief executive says: "At a time when we are facing such huge environmental challenges, buying bottled water at the rate of 3bn bottles a year in the UK is clearly unsustainable. I hope the hospitality industry will recognise their customers are environmentally aware and offer them free tap water without prejudice."

[email protected]

 

[drifter]

It's free when you order beer.

Can we order mix veg rice in coffeeshop and ask for ice-kosong ?

 

[liketogossip]

how about just askin for ice? will they charge?

 

[besotted]

really bo liao, so many problems in this workd and they use one whole page write about this

just boycott the damn restaurant. there are thousands of restaurants around

 

[Cestbon]

There is nothing wrong with plain water charges. If don't like to be charge then don't go/visit such place/restuarant.
If plain water free next time many will just order plain water. Drinks volume like soft drink/tea/beer/...............will reduce.
What is the big deal if a plain water cost 50 cent. Even coffee in hawker cost at least 80 cent and cost of the coffee(coffee powder/milk/suger) are less than 20cent and profit margin is 60 cent/cofee/tea.
Just small matter make is big problem.
The bigger issue like GST should be solve. Scrap the GST all price will automatic reduce by 10%.

 

[SamuelStalin]

It's free when you order beer.

Sky juice is free flow when you eat at home too :p:p:p

 

[shelltox]

In the first place, the restaurant was trying too hard to save the poor guy from mixing medicine with alcohol
\

 

[Baimi]

Can we order mix veg rice in coffeeshop and ask for ice-kosong ?

Ask for soup from the veg rice seller, it is free
ask for ice kosong from kopi seller, you have to pay

 

[eatshitndie]

The managing director of Italian restaurant La Forketta, Ms Gracie Vitale, said: 'Our patrons are serious diners and come for our food, not to taste water. It's the customer with a budget who insists on tap water.'
She added that, outside Singapore, 'nobody really asks for tap water'.

bullshit. there are many customers out there in the world who ask simply for "carafe" or "water", and many restaurants would oblige, especially here in the bay area. the tap water here is many times more regulated and inspected than bottled water, and it should be safe.

 

[scoobyhoo]

then why you pay for this pain water?

 

[babachai]

This Ms Vitale seems to be a frog in a well. In Korea, plain water is available easily. At their food court, there are machine for you to collect plain water.
I will definetely boycott this restaurant.
BTW, too much bottle mineral water is bad for you.

 

[po2wq]

then why you pay for this pain water?

dun drink, no nid 2 pay ...

dun pay, no pain ... water ... :p