While the dining rooms of the restaurants are now open, subject to respecting the rules issued by public health, it is now possible to see the delinquent behavior of certain restaurateurs!
A viral video, posted online Thursday evening, but withdrawn since, showed a dining room bursting at the seams with customers ... without any mask. In addition, the required distance between the tables was no longer respected. The restaurant was therefore open as if nothing had happened.
Other information circulates to the effect that in other places, other public health instructions are not respected. For example, servers do not wear their masks. In most cases, the tables are too close to each other.
However, compliance with public health health guidelines is essential to contain the pandemic and prevent the second wave of arrival as quickly as in the United States.
Make the customer pay
Since public health and the CNESST require waiters and waiters to wear a mask or visor, restaurateurs have been obliged to provide this equipment to their employees. The same rules apply in cooking, where distancing is much more difficult to respect. This is new spending for these entrepreneurs.
Some of them have therefore decided to pass on the invoice to customers with "COVID fees", a surplus determined per person. This disguised “tax” caused many customers to react.
Note that the restaurant owner can invoice these costs but must mention them as soon as the consumer arrives in the dining room. Restaurateurs must therefore play on transparency and announce it from the start, otherwise the customer is not obliged to pay.
Very often, these costs are temporary and cannot be found on take-out or delivery orders.