Restaurant law?

Question

when you order a meal in a restaurant have you formed a contract straight away or is it when you pay after you have eaten the meal? thanks..

Answer 1

Once you order and receive your food yes you have in essence "signed a contract" and are obligated to pay the restaurant based upon the prices on the menu.  Otherwise people could walk into restaurants order food and leave whenever they wanted without paying a dime, with the restaurant of course losing revenue on food costs and employee wages and having no recourse.

However, the most successful restaurants are those with large numbers of repeat clientele and most managers will understand this.  Therefore many restaurants have policies to allow customers to return their food and receive another meal if the customer sees it as unfit.  This allows protection for both the restaurant to ensure employee time and food costs are not completely wasted on customers ordering food and leaving the restaurant, while also protecting the customer by ensuring they always receive a meal that they deem adequate.

Answer 2

If your meal looks nasty or doesn't look good you can refuse it and they can take it back and you don't have to pay for it. But once you have eaten it, yea your going to have to pay for it.