One in five Britons admit to no-show in the past four weeks, cost to UK operators could hit £6.2m in July

In the past four weeks, almost One in five people in britain (19 percent) has made a reservation in a hospitality venue and subsequently failed to honour it, according to a survey by online booking service TheFork.

Ongoing restrictions on hospitality operations are one of the main reported causes, as guests book multiple sites to ensure they can secure at least one - a practice known as 'spread-booking' - but fail to cancel the others early enough for the restaurant to occupy the vacant seats.

Of all UK cities, restaurants in London, Glasgow and Manchester have been the worst hit by the phenomenon, whilst operators in Liverpool and Edinburgh had the lowest number of reports of no-shows.

The research undertaken by the TripAdvisor subsidiary backs up complaints made by numerous operators since reopening in April, whose financial struggles resulting from the pandemic and Brexit have been compounded by the additional loss of income.

As a result, an increasing number of operators have reluctantly begun taking deposits upon reservation, and whilst they are thought to be an effective deterrent, they do not make up for losses in the instances when guests choose to pay them instead of honouring their booking.

Hey, just an FYI, we take deposits for bookings. We send 3 different reminders with our policy on cancellations or no shows when you book. So writing silly trip advisor reviews giving us 1 star rating because we charge you for cancelling 2 hours before you booking is pathetic

— Guy Owen (@guy_owen) July 3, 2021

Only 35 minutes into evening service and another 12 no shows and 4 cancellations.

Disgusting behaviour!

When did this become acceptable.

Rant over! #edinburgh #gutted

— Dine Edinburgh (@DineEdinburgh) June 26, 2021

Please note:

If you have a table/booking on Saturday and are now considering watching the football instead, please do the decent thing:

Pick up the phone. Let them know. Give them the chance to offer the table to someone else.

No more no shows.

— Sacha Lord (@Sacha_Lord) June 30, 2021

Like its main competitors in the reservations space, OpenTable and RESY, TheFork app does have measures in place to prevent no-shows from happening, such as reservation reminders, one-click cancellations and a 'Customer Rating' setting for operators to identify repeat offenders. 

Even with these, the company has called for increased public awareness of the losses incurred by businesses when they fail to honour a reservation, and the knock-on effect these have on their viability. 

Patrick Hooykaas, managing director at TheFork said: “It’s great to see demand for dining returning and reservations increasing across the country, but restaurants still face a huge challenge to get back on their feet. It is more important than ever that diners show their support for local businesses, and the biggest way they can do that is to only reserve the tables they really need.

"When diners no-show for a booking, it results in a loss of revenue that restaurants can ill afford. In the UK, it is costing businesses millions. Of course, there are times when diners have to change their plans and can’t fulfil a reservation, but when that happens our advice is to always give the restaurant as much notice as possible so they can offer the table to another customer.  

"It is also important that booking platforms play their part by not facilitating unfair behaviours such as spread booking. Here at TheFork, we do not allow customers to make more than one booking during the same time period on our site. The message from us is simple, if you do not plan to attend your restaurant booking, cancel. We can all do our bit to help get this important industry back on its feet.”

UK’s no-show hotspots, according to TheFork: 

1.       London
2.       Glasgow
3.       Manchester
4.       Plymouth
5.       Birmingham
6.       Norwich
7.       Newcastle
8.       Belfast
9.       Bristol
10.   Cardiff