"We’re putting our deposit back up to £50, maybe more"
After reducing his restaurant’s reservation deposit from £50 to £5, Oxeye’s chef founder Sven-Hanson Britt, has announced a reversal of the decision after a rise in no-shows and cancellations.
Describing the recent reservation process as "dark and negative", the decision comes after a six-month trial, launched by the chef, looking at whether a higher deposit rate could be impacting Oxeye’s guest numbers.
Discussing the results in a thread on Twitter, Sven said: "Our industry has changed so much, and I think this might be helpful to one person, two people, people trying to make a decision about their style of hospitality."
We’ve done an interesting exercise over the last 6 months @OxeyeRestaurant with regards to reservations, deposits, no-shows, pre-payments etc and now’s time to share our findings about where hospitality is in the U.K. right now (in our particularly niche corner)
— Sven-Hanson Britt (@Svenhansonbritt) April 17, 2023
Thread incoming pic.twitter.com/xT7wB7Stuo
He outlined how the Oxeye used Tock reservations management system and that how during a three-month trial period, which charged guests a £50 deposit, the restaurant had zero no-shows or late cancellations, outside of real emergencies where guests rebooked for another day.
"I cannot emphasise how rare this is. It was solely down to the £50 deposit," Sven explained.
Fearing that a high deposit might be putting off potential customers, Sven reduced the deposit to £5 for three months, which lead to a rise in early and late cancellations with the restaurant reporting its first no-show within a week of introducing the new policy.
Oxeye states within its booking terms and conditions that the restaurant will charge the cost of the menu to the booking card in the case of no-shows; however it is not without problems.
"The security of being able to charge the card on file isn't really worth the paper it's written on. Cancelled cards, AMEX being AMEX and disgruntled emails all lead to the whole reservation process turning rather dark and negative," he said.
Explaining his findings in more detail Sven said: "So where we could previously control all reservations expertly, create menus with no waste, tailor experiences to guests beautifully and know what to expect on each day, the change in the deposit amount dramatically affected that without having any other real benefits.
He added: "The only benefit I thought we might get would be to have larger numbers of reservations, and a waiting list, but the numbers were the same as before when we charged £50 so that just didn't happen."
The chef has now put the restaurant's deposit back to £50 and said he would "highly recommend" that any new restaurant also charged a deposit.
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