09/09/2008 by Pete.

BBC has revealed Banqueting Managers at Dorchester have been deducting money from their staff’s service charges and adding it to their own. Read full story

This comes as no surprise to me if some people I used to work with in another famous place are still in there. One is Operations Director and the other one a head waiter. The Director used to do the same job in a place I worked and when he moved to Dorchester, he poached the head waiter to come to work with him. As if that wasn’t enough, he later asked if my (by then ex) boss who ws an Operations Manager, would come over and sort out the banqueting in Dorchester. Terms he was offered were very  good, even the six month trial wasn’t anything unusual.

I never liked nor trust the director and warned my ex boss (we baceme very good friends) from moving over but the offer he got was too good to resist. So there he went and worked 16 hour days  improving standards, cutting waste and reducing cost without cutting staff. Four months later most of the problems they had had in there were sorted and their costs were reduced almost 15%. Two weeks before the trial period was over, the director and my friend had a meeting in which he was told that the contract would not be confirmed for him. They had decided to hire someone else. In short, he was used by a man he thought was his friend and thrown away the moment he had achieved what they wanted to get done.

The head waiter was hated by all the staff we had and they did pretty much everything to get away from functions he was running. He was also cheating and abusive to his wife whom he pretty much married for the passport in the first place. At the end of the events, we normally asked the organiser to sign the final invoice and without the fault we got rather nice gratituites (usually around 10% of total bill) in cash. Of that, we shared half with the staff, and one third of the other half, with the back of house people, we kept 20% of total. None of us ever made difference between the permanent and casual staff. except this particuler head waiter who only gave something for few wine waiters and nothing to waiting staff.

Put these two to work together and it’s no wonder the staff in Dorchester suddenly started to lose their tips.

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08/09/2008 by Pete.

I wonder if the licensees here ever learn a simple fact that stuffing your bar with staff when your establishment is full doesn’t increase sales nor make service faster. If you go to any bar, or “modern” pubs, and place is full, you’ll see 5 or more bar staff bouncing on each other behind the bar that can accommodate max 3 people. It really isn’t that difficult to figure out that when your staff can’t pass each other to get the orders and if they somehow manage to fill the order, then queue to the till, your sales don’t increase, quite contrary. Great entertainment as it is to watch the hapless staff trying to get something done, it soon becomes an irritation when you can’t get the drinks you ordered.

Instead of stuffing your bar with cheap, unskilled, labour, how about hiring few trained professionals for twice the price? The way owners see it is that they save money by paying minimum wage to six students to bounce around selling as much as two professionals do. Of course, an average punter isn’t that much smarter. They think they’re getting better service when their order is taken in two minutes, and receive their drinks ten minutes later, that’s good service for you. Waiting three minutes to give your order and have it in front of you in five minutes is bad service in their opinion, after all, you had to wait full three minutes to have your order taken, how terrible is that?

So, now we have both management and customers thinking that bar stuffed with staff who can’t move around without bouncing on each other is better service and brings in more money than bar with few professionals who can actually deliver the orders they’ve taken. For the management it’s the £5.52 per hour times six and sales half against three times, let’s say, £10.00 per hour and twice the sales. Which one you think is cheaper? For average licensee only sees £5.52 v. £10, not the real cost of the staff and loss of sales.

For the customer it isn’t much better, two minutes wait to give your order and ten minutes wait to receive it versus three minutes wait to give the order and less than five minutes to receive it. That’s twelve minutes versus eight minutes. No need to tell you which one I prefer.

I worked a season in a private members bar on the West Country. We had two bars, the “main” bar and “small” bar. We only opened the small bar for the weekends when both sides of the club were full. In the main bar were usually working three staff and the club steward, I volunteered to work in the small bar. Without a fault, my takings in that small bar were approximately half of the takings in the main bar - with one third/ one quarter of staff. How was that possible? Not only I take any job I do seriously, but I also had the space to work. I didn’t have to queue to the beer pumps, I didn’t have to wait for liquor dispenser to be vacated nor had I to wait to get to use the till.  The funniest thing with all it was that people came from the main bar to order from me because they got faster service from one staff than four. It really is simple, but not short-sighted, math.

The thing is, everyone here is so used to get bad and slow service in pubs and bars that they don’t know better. But given a chance, and owners understanding the total cost of your staffing, things could easily turn better. Remember it’s not just raw sales versus cost of sales. Spillage, for one, is money off the owner’s pocket as well. As is general tidiness of the bar and maintenance of the equipment. If you consider your job as a profession, you generally want to become better at it, but if you just do it to get some pocket money to carry you through university, you don’t really care. And with the wages they pay for bar staff, you can’t expect to get professionals. You pay peanuts, you get monkeys.

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08/09/2008 by Pete.

Next time you visit a bar, club or any other place serving drinks and that place uses free-pour, watch carefully what is happening. Most probably you will see the bartender putting ice in the glass and shake it a bit before he pours liquor in it. When you look at the glass, it appears he filled the glass half-way up. In many places, the ice is often also slightly melted, allowing use of more ice and less space for the drink.

Before he puts in the mixer (if you asked some), ask an empty glass and pour the liquid into it. See the difference? Suddenly your half-full glass is three quarters empty. If you don’t believe this, order, lets say, a whisky on ice and ask your friend to order other one neat with a glass of water. Drink the water and pour your whisky into that empty water glass and compare which one of you have more to drink.

Of course, it is simple really, more ice in the glass leaves less room for liquids but gives an impression of filled up one to poor punter. Smart punter asks his/ her drink(s) without ice, because most of times, they don’t dare pour as little liquor as they would in a glass filled with ice first. Once the liquor is in the glass, ask few cubes ice. After all, you can always change your mind.

Of course, with low margins, bars have to maximise their profits any way they can, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have the drink you want - as much of it as you possibly can. After all, you pay for it.

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