Hubby and I have been away for a few days. We had tea at a pub in the hills out of Melbourne and asked if we could put our drinks on a tab with our meal. Sounds simple.
The bar lady said yes we could and then asked for a credit card. Thinking she would do a swipe and give our card back we handed it over. To our amazement our credit card was placed in a glass next to the till. As we were not prepared to leave our card next to the till in a public bar we asked for it back and paid for our drinks and meals seperately. There would have been half a dozen credit cards sitting in full view beside the till.
Has anyone else come across this way of running a tab?
Yep i have. I went to dinner for my birthday and took five others out as well. Exactly the same sort of thing happened except i left my debit card with the woman taking orders for the food. At the bar i used the table number. I had no choice really seeing i dont carry much cash at anytime. I am more comfortable leaving that type of card in preference to a credit card.
Yes me too. But in my case the card was placed in a folder and I was given a numbered card for the table. Worked OK for me but I should point out it is a local Hotel/Restaurant. Chris
Hi Pam, hope you enjoyed your trip away. They tell you to always keep your credit card in sight when paying for meals while out. An important security tip. There's no way I would be handing a card over to sit in a glass beside the till for every man and his dog to see and maybe take when the bar tender is not looking. I would have thought there is a law against it anyway or there is only a need for a table number surely.
A few years back a close relative of mine had his Gold Visa "skimmed" (I think that's the term for it) at a Chinese restaurant in Sydney. Within a few hours the credit card details had been used run up $20,000 (his limit at the time) in Hong Kong.
Fortunately he became aware of the problem very soon after and the bank reversed the transactions and he cancelled the gold card and replaced it with basic Visa with a low credit limit.
Following his experience I rarely let my cards out of my possession even very briefly, preferring to pay at the cashier rather than having a waiter take the card and return it.
Hi Pam, hope you enjoyed your trip away. They tell you to always keep your credit card in sight when paying for meals while out. An important security tip. There's no way I would be handing a card over to sit in a glass beside the till for every man and his dog to see and maybe take when the bar tender is not looking. I would have thought there is a law against it anyway or there is only a need for a table number surely.
Thanks HW, 5 days at Bairnsdale was not long enough, beautiful place along the coast.
