Restaurant overcharge on bill

Bournemouth_Mum

Some help required please from all of you clever people out there. We had our Xmas party last week for 35 of us at a local restaurant. When the bill came it was for £2000. The food bill per head was £25 and the restaurant had added what we estimate at around £500 of booze we didn't consume. In the cold light of day we have been through the bill with a fine tooth comb and there is much that cannot be accounted for. We disputed the bill at the time of paying with the restaurant owner but he claimed that it was correct. Our director visited him at the restaurant the day after to ask for it to be reconciled but he refused. The credit card company are saying becuase we entered the pin on the card (the massive shortfall was put on one card) that we agreed to the bill. Where do we stand?

scheming_gypsy

are you sure the booze wasn't consumed? it sounds like it might not have been agreed that the £25 a head was all that was charged to the bill, and people had been getting drinks from the bar and adding them to the tab.

meer53

Why did you PIN verify the transaction if you weren't happy with it ? By entering your PIN number, you're authorising the restaurant to debit your account, you should have queried fully at the time, never input your PIN unless you're happy to pay the amount showing on the terminal.

Bournemouth_Mum

It was definitely stuff that was charged but we did not have - at least 8 people had nothing to drink at all and those who did (myself included who was liberally 'refreshed') have paid what we owed. Even with a generous consumption, there is still an amount overcharged. As for why it was paid, the director who put it on her card, did it in good faith even though we were concerned, and argued the point at the time.

pelirocco

We had a similar thing one year , let everyone put drinks on the bill , had a huge bill ...........but of course have no real idea whether it was right or not ( tho suspect it wasnt ) . Not much help I know , but we now always pay for drinks on the night with cash

System

i had a similar issue last year at a restaurant in Manchester. We refused to pay the bill (it was well over £300 too much) and it turned out that the restaurant had messed up and put another christmas parties drinks on our bill as well. It ended up us paying alot less as they dropped most of the booze off the bill due to their c0ck up!

In the above situation not sure what you can do now you've paid. Looks like you are all going to have to pay £60 a head each, or let your director be out of pocket herself.

scheming_gypsy

goater78 wrote: »

it turned out that the restaurant had messed up and put another christmas parties drinks on our bill as well. It ended up us paying alot less as they dropped most of the booze off the bill due to their c0ck up!

.

that was my second option, or even a cheeky table who bought drinks at the bar on 'table 5's tab', got away with it the first time and everybody else went mental.

System

scheming_gypsy wrote: »

that was my second option, or even a cheeky table who bought drinks at the bar on 'table 5's tab', got away with it the first time and everybody else went mental.

Yeah i think this happens alot, when there is alot of you on a tab its easy for people to try and steal drinks off another table! I think its unlikely that the restaurant has just added £500 of drink too the bill for the craic. Someone has drank it and if the OP says its wasn't them then someone in the restaurant has been charging drinks to their table!

arcon5

Aren't more and more pubs these days introducing a card system whereby to put items on a tab you need to present the card at the bar?