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Comment by jcpst | Hacker News Reader

I am put off by QR code menus. The last thing I want is a need to use my phone if I’m sitting at a table with people.

Went to a restaurant in Sweden last year and they told me that the "new way" to order was through an app. I used to live there, but not anymore, and my Play Store account is not set to Sweden. Turns out, you could only download the app with a Swedish Play Store account.

They were baffled by this and resorted to giving me a physical menu. I also emailed their corporate division and explained the problem and said that the whole procedure of ordering through an app is uncomfortable and makes me not want to come back.

Came back this year on a visit and lo and behold - no mention of any apps. Just physical menus and waiters taking orders. Seems like I wasn't the only one who gave them this feedback ...

I really don't understand why it needs to be an app. Like couldn't you now do it with some horrendous modern website?

Not that I'm fully against apps for restaurant chains and such. Some of them are nice and practical.

A year ago covid was in full swing.

Only in some Western countries and China, definitely not in Sweden.

Hardly surprising that restaurants went this way given corona, it was the same here in Norway. Now that both peoples' perceptions and other restrictions have eased, the standard old physical menu is back on the table.

I think QR menus are great if it's possible to also directly order and pay from the phone. Especially when going out in large groups where you don't want to necessarily split the bill or where the organizer doesn't want to risk having to pay for items that nobody else claims.

The solution and the problem are both my personal hell.

A table full of people fucking around on their phones (and of course the establishment in question needs you to sign up for an account and fill out a profile before you can pay your bill) or the bullshit and mental hoops some people will jump throught to scam their friends out of a few dollars when deciding how to split a bill.

From my personal experience: The places that I've seen so far that use that system (including one place that I regularly attend with a larger group) do not require an account or anything: Scan a QR code, if you don't want to log in just enter your credit card number, and start ordering. If you're not comfortable with that approach there's usually also some way to order without a phone.

Regarding "scam their friends": 99% of the time it's not about "scamming": Cashiers ask people for which items they want to pay and mistakes happen because people sometimes remember things wrong. Once everyone paid there are still some few unaccounted items for the table due to those honest mistakes.

> Regarding "scam their friends"

The person who ordered the caviar, lobster and cocktails ALWAYS suggests just splitting the bill evenly. The person who just got a starter and a glass of water then has to be the "cheap" one and push back (and they probably ordered like that because they didnt want to spend $200 on dinner).

Eventually we just stopped inviting the guy who orders a $500 bottle of wine for "the table" aka themselves then insists on splitting the bill evenly.

If person who orders caviar and lobster and asks to split evenly is your friend, you may have some friendship-culling to do.

Or some bright spark figures out a lovely pdf hack. Then is able to root thousands of phones for a swath of restaurants. As I am willing to bet most restaurant sites are not exactly hardened and a nice soft target for criminals to exploit. Pair that with the number of phones out there that are not up to date...

The cost to take a menu and print it for each table plus some is non-zero. The cost to replace the old online menu with the new menu online is near-zero, besides man hours for the manager/chef to determine the seasonal cuisine.

Cost for paper menus is nominal, and lasts thousands of eaters. Disagree cost to replace old menu is near-zero, most restaurant owners have to hire a dev for edits. On menus you just use a marker

> most restaurant owners have to hire a dev for edits

Source? All i've seen has been CMSes/SaaS platform which definetely shouldn't require a dev to update.

Or the menu is just a PDF made in Illustrator.

The restaurant could lose out on sales from customers who are dissatisfied with a lack of a physical menu, especially many older people who are not as comfortable using technology or don't even have a data plan.

The restaurant could also lose customers who are tourists, who don't necessarily have a data plan while traveling. While it's a bit more convenient for the restaurant, the convenience comes at the cost of the customer.

Also, the UX for many of the menus is often pretty bad (with diners often asking: "how do I place an order?" "did I place an order or not?" "how do I go back?").

If the cost of printing a menu is more than the price of the meal, I don't want to eat there.

Restaurants/Cafes should cater to customers, not to some geeky manager/chef who is on a weird power trip pushing customers to use their phones.

I've walked out of few places because they failed to present a proper hard menu. Seen few people struggling with their phones.

Totally ok with funny thing until there is a choice. Who prefers it - good luck struggling with your phone. I am not one of you.

If the restaurant offers great dishes that cost near-zero, I would find that approach acceptable as a customer. If they want far-from-zero money, I would look elsewhere.

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