Keen to start a fight with strangers on the internet? Head to your nearest neighbourhood Facebook group, vent about restaurants not serving water, and wait until someone tags a restaurateur or restaurant manager.

It’s a topic that has Capetonians very riled up, which is saying something, and if you’ve eaten out over the past while you’ve probably had first-hand experience.

Now foodie Dax Villanueva has had his say over on Food24, and we’ll start with the legalities he highlights:

…legally speaking, restaurants that have a liquor license are obliged to provide patrons with free tap water. This is according to the liquor act norms and standards (the relevant section is 4.7).

In fact, any patrons that are refused tap water for any reason can lodge a complaint with the Western Cape Liquor Authority and an inspector will pay a visit to the restaurant to check that they are meeting their obligations in terms of the liquor act.

Basically, if you don’t serve liquor you’re all good, but if you’re serving booze then you have to provide free tap water.

On the flip side, restaurant owners and managers argue that this leads to an unnecessary wastage of water:

If a typical glass of water is 250 ml, it takes just four glasses make a litre. If 1000 people over the course of a day ask for a glass of water, the restaurant will be using 250 Litres of water a day just providing free tap water…

Restaurateurs have commented that many patrons ask for a glass of water then have one sip and leave the rest. Considering the increased cost of tap water and restrictions on usage, is it fair to expect restaurants to provide hundreds of glasses of tap water a day to patrons who might or might not drink it?

Some restaurants have already stopped providing tap water to their patrons, but cynical diners have accused them of using the drought as an excuse to force guests to pay for over-priced bottled water.

Boom, there it is.

Restaurateurs can put whatever spin on it they like, but customers are still going to feel like they’re being hit up for extra money.

There are some restaurants that have taken to selling bottled water at cost price, which many believe is meeting in the middle, and then there are those who allow customers to bring in their own water.

If you’re not playing ball on either of those, the backlash on social media can be intense.

Here’s one example, from a certain Cape Town restaurant review group I won’t name, that popped up this week.

Customer asks for glass of water, gets denied.

Customer takes out own water, all hell breaks loose:

You’ll find hundreds of these posts, and this restaurant is by no means alone in being dragged on Facebook.

It’s a complicated one, and you can bet that as the screws tighten the social media rants will only intensify.

Oh well – as all Dad Joke aficionados are keen to point out, you can save water by drinking wine.

[source:food24]