[FDOS_UK]

A first for me, tonight.

When settling the bill, the waiter asked me if I had read the leaflet they had left on the table (suggesting adding a donation to their favourite charity, to the bill amount).

– Has anyone else experienced this#
– If you have, how did you feel – pleased to be asked, embarrased, felt coerced etc?

Interested in your opinions and will not criticise any views.

[CathayLoyalist2]

Given the recent press coverage of service charges in restaurants not being passed on I would politely decline unless it was a restaurant I know/used frequently and knew the staff/owner well. Certainly not hears of that before

[FrequentTraveller]

I have had charity donations added to my bill in restaurants and hotels. Except I have never received a leaflet / verbal warning from the waiter or checkout clerk this has been done. As I always carefully check the bill is accurate I query anything I don’t recognise. I feel angry when charity donations are added in this underhand way. So I insist these are removed from the bill before I present my credit card to complete payment. When I want to make a charity donation I prefer to select the charity based on my own research. Not just so some restaurant or hotel can gain some publicity for themselves by later stating they had raised X amount for charity Y.

[esselle]

I have had suggested donations added to restaurant bills, which seems to be becoming a more regular occurrence, and in the past to hotel accounts, although this seems to happen less now.

I have a small number of charities to which I contribute regularly, and so I never accept additions to my bill.

[FDOS_UK]

Thanks for commenting.

I thought leaving a card on the table was just about acceptable, but being asked if we’d had time to read it struck me as being impertinent and applying emotional pressure (guilt trapping).

[LuganoPirate]

I agree with FrequentTraveller and Esselle. Each to their own, and if the restaurant wishes to support a charity then fine, but don’t try to force me to do the same by sneakily adding a donation to my bill.

[GivingupBA]

Every time I check out of the Sheraton Amsterdam airport [though the last time was a year and a half ago], I am asked if I want to make a small donation to a / their chosen charity on top of my bill. I do make it. But I feel I’m being pressured, and I don’t like that.

[seasonedtraveller]

I have been to several hotels recently, though not restaurants, where a tip has been added to the bill to support a chosen charity. Most recent was the Doubletree at LHR.
Without exception, I ask for it to be removed immediately.
Since it’s my company credit card, they’re actually asking my company to donate, not me.

I’m never rude to those asking but quite often, it feels like they are looking down on me when I refuse, be that hotel or in the street.

I do not feel mean spirited in any way, as part of a fraternal group for many years, I choose which charities I support/donate to.

[Martin36]

I have experienced this in a couple of restaurants and in several hotels. I make charitable donations, but always direct to the charities I specifically wish to support, that way I know my donations have actually been received! Same with optional service charges which I now ask to be removed from the bill and hand a cash tip directly to waiter/waitress.

[MartynSinclair]

I learnt a simple solution to the added charity donations to hotels and restaurant bills.

I ask the waiter/manager/receptionist to match whatever donation I donation I leave….

The looks I get from this astound me.. from 1 GM matching a donation to what admittedly was a favourite charity of mine, to a restaurant manager calling me an idiot for making such a rude suggestion

[esselle]

The Sheraton Hilton has (or perhaps had) an even dafter way of behaving. Charging extra for ketchup in the coffee shop.

I know it is quite common to do so in Holland, but when you order a club sandwich for 18 euros, it rankles a bit when they charge you 1.5 euros for ketchup.

[LuganoPirate]

Something similar happened to my son in France, though I can’t remember the establishment. He then said he wouldn’t eat it and I said I wouldn’t pay for it. Ketchup arrived with the chefs compliments!

Just recently at Carne (don’t go there) in Cape Town the chef refused to allow ketchup. He was most upset when I popped out to the car where we had a few McDonald’s sachets (don’t ask, but Mrs. LP always takes the unused ones with her) and satisfied the youngest’s desire for the stuff with his steak and chips!

[canucklad]

I find this whole charity thing, quite distasteful.
Clearly charities need funded, but I wonder at what point the relentless saturation of good causes into our lives will work start to backfire.
For me, discretion is the better part of valour
Ohhh, and what I’d love to know, is if they’re so desperately short of cash, how on earth can they afford to flood my vestibule with plastic bags

Loved the ketchup story, and like MrsLP I also have a couple of sachets—just like Paddington and his marmalade sandwiches.

[ImissConcorde]

I much prefer to give time rather than money to a charity.
There are more than 195,289 registered charities in the UK with a turnover of abour £80 billion a year. Together, they employ more than a million staff – more than our car, aerospace and chemical sectors – and make 13 billion ‘asks’ for money every year, the equivalent of 200 for each of us in the UK.

[MrMichael]

I don’t think I have come across this in a restaurant, but have done so in hotels and also travel websites. All my business travel is charged back to the public sector of a number of countries. It would be impertinent, against financial rules and possibly illegal if I were to make a donation to charity of public money. So when I have to insist its removal or uncheck a box to not make a donation it annoys me immensely. I had an argument in a Dutch hotel on the subject, I asked the manager if he felt it appropriate that public sector employees should make donations to charity without authority of those elected or the electorate. He saw the pint……grudgingly.

[Author]

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