Courtesy Twitter
Recently we saw a local social media post about an area restaurant, that had begun charging for items that had, up until now, been served as a free service by that restaurant. The discussion thread became long, as people weighed in on the subject. Turns out, this is a national trend.In fact, it is called the COVID-19 Surcharge. But what is it, exactly? Fox News says,
Though businesses around the country are getting the green light to partially return to service, the coronavirus pandemic has crippled the restaurant industry in many ways.
The forced closures of dining rooms resulted in incredible financial losses for restaurants, which had to rely on delivery and takeout to pay bills during the last couple of months.
Meat shortages and food supply issues have caused distributors to raise prices. This, in turn, as forced restaurants to adopt new practices.
Those ‘new practices’ include such things as showing the extra charge on the receipt, which, in this case is 5%, in a West Plains, Missouri restaurant. At this restaurant, a notice is placed prominently on the front door and in the drive-though window, so there is no misunderstanding.
What do YOU think of the COVID-19 Surcharge? Is this appropriate for restaurants to implement, in order to recoup their losses over the last several months? Or, is this a rip-off? We’d be interested to see your comments.