Restaurant to charge upfront due to 'dine and dash'

Customers will be asked to pay upfront after a spate of dine and dash incidents

The owners of a Chinese restaurant are to ask customers to pay for meals upfront after a spate of so-called "dine and dash" incidents.

Staff at the Oriental Garden, in Northampton, say they have had three non-payments in the last few days alone.

In one case, a diner was caught on CCTV putting her own hair in a meal before complaining - then leaving without paying a £77 bill.

"It's got to the point where it's really draining because there's a confrontation as well," one staff member told the BBC.

Dine and dash occurs when customers wrack up significant food and drink bills and leave without paying a penny.

In February, Craig Sharp, 52, from Harwich, Essex, was jailed for 12 months after leaving £8,000 of unpaid restaurant and accommodation bills between April and November 2023.

Staff at the Oriental Garden in Sheep Street, Northampton, have seen a spate of dine and dash incidents in recent days

The staff member at the Oriental Garden said the diner had been captured on the restaurant's security camera placing a hair on her food.

"The couple ordered their main courses and you could see that they were happy with their meal, they ate until they were very full and a couple of minutes later, they called one of our staff members over just to say that there was hair in the food," he said.

He said it was not an isolated incident.

"In the past week, it's happened three times now and it's got to the point where it's really draining because there's a confrontation as well and you don't know what the result is going to be," he added.

There had now been a change of policy at the eaterie, with customers being asked to pay upfront.

"If we don't recognise any new faces, we may ask you to pay for your food when you order," he said.

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