Restaurant begs for ‘common decency’ after 20 no shows in just one night

Cookfella’s Wine Bar and Eatery, in Guisborough, North Yorkshire, has an impressive five-star rating on TripAdvisor based on 736 reviews. However, owners Wayne and Helen Leonard have spoken out against the increasing number of “no-shows” they are experiencing.

They claim they had one night where “20 covers” did not turn up or let the owners know.

Taking to Facebook, they told how this happens “on a daily basis” and that it is damaging their business, reports The Mirror.

The couple wrote: “So, in our nearly 10 years of trading as Cookfella’s, Helen and I have never written a negative post, but…. We are experiencing an extremely high number of ‘no shows!’

“Tonight alone we have had two large tables (over 20 covers) not turn up for their booking nor have they had the common decency to contact us to let us know so that we could resell the tables. This is all before 7pm!

“Saturday evenings are our bread and butter and are in such huge demand that we often fill up the prime times weeks in advance.

“Our industry is on its knees with the economy/energy price increases/commodity price increases/living wage increases (totally understand that one), staff shortages & many other challenges.

“We have invested heavily in an easy-to-use reservation system. It is also so easy to cancel a booking.

“Simply by responding ‘cancel’ on your confirmation email.

“If you are one of these guilty persons, please have the common decency to call and let us/any restaurant know to enable them to potentially resell the table.

“For information, our new fancy system logs those numbers/emails/names that do not show and allows us to block them from booking again.

“Apologies for this message but it is happening on a daily basis now and is damaging our family-run local business.”