Saudi Gazette The Kingdom is famous for being home to fine dining in elegant restaurants. With an interesting and appetizing mix of almost all international cuisines, food lovers have a plethora of options to satisfy their palates with delicious dishes of various countries. Although, in recent years it has been noticed that the prices of services charges have risen drastically. Paying a good amount for a delectable dish is worth every penny, but extreme and increasing service charges is erroneous. Consumers have complained of service charges that could reach as high as SR50 for a lavish meal. However, a new policy by the Ministry of Commerce, confirmed and released last week, will come as a relief to foodies. The ministry has requested all restaurants and coffee shops to eliminate the service charges completely. To ensure that this new policy will be enforced and not treated as ink on paper by restaurant managers, the ministry has provided a toll free number (8001271616) to receive reports from customers of any restaurant or coffee shop that continue to demand service charges. To expedite your assistance, make sure you have on hand the following information before you make the call: the name of the restaurant/coffee shop, its exact location, your full name and iqama/identification card number. The telephone call will be monitored to improve the service provided by the operators. All restaurants can be reported except for those which fall under the responsibility of Commission of Tourism. Restaurants violating the policy will be possibly fined by the ministry. One father who likes to take his family out for lunch every Friday told the Saudi Gazette, “Canceling the service charge by the Ministry of Commerce is a good step because most world class restaurants demand unreasonably high service charges. The service charge never made sense to me because the customer pays for the food and at the end of the meal he/she always tips the waiter anyway, so why the service charge?” So, the next time you are dining out, carefully check your receipt to make sure that you have not been automatically billed for a service charge. __
