Bad experiences at the Oktoberfest 2006

I got this story off an American who owns a travel agency and accompanies various groups to Munich: Her party of 10 people were at the Käfer tent on the first Saturday from noon until app. 3pm, and she was pleased to have a British waiter.
He ended up trying to upsell the whole time. He said he would explain the menu and then decided to make it easy and ordered the large appetizer plate for them which was o.k. That really filled the party up and no one wanted anything else to eat. One suggested a salad and one suggested dessert.
The waiter said that they had to order some main courses. When asked if they could just order side dishes he told them to order the duck, but for four people. This put their bill to €480, €180 over their pre-paid vouchers.
The waiter said that the party had to hit the €60 per person limit, which is not true, at lunch the limit is €30; the €60 limit is for supper. He also claimed that all the side dishes cost app. €30, which is also not true, they are app. €16. The agency owner contradicted him on both points, he answered, “I don’t know what to tell you.�
After the party left, the agency owner checked her credit card reciept, and lo and behold, the waiter had charged €280 to the credit card instead of the proper amount of €180 according to the bill of €480. She had told him not to charge gratuity, saying the tip would be in cash.
She went to the Käfer offices in the city, reported the incident and immediately received the €100 in cash. Käfer took the whole incident very seriously and promised to take the waiter to task.
He seems to have thought that he had a group of stupid American tourists who have no idea of how the Wiesn functions and would never have found out about the overcharge until they were back home and wouldn't know how to retrieve the €100 he had appropriated.

What a tosser, they need to go back and make sure he has been fired

Good story. Petty swindlers get on my nerves.

So, name the Brit waiter. I will bet he is on here.

Because, of course, a German waiter would not do the same thing. Or Indian. I mean we have never had stories on Toytown about waiters trying to charge for more than was actually drunk/eaten at random TT events. No no no no no

The contract was with Käfer, therefore, Käfer is named.

Based on personal experience at Käfer last weekend, I would be more likely to say that it is standard procedure there.

I think this belongs here, too.

The experience JJ is referring to is our group of 20 people being charged for 190 litres or something. It is not humanly possible for 20 people to drink 10 litres each from 7-11 pm!!

I should edit this to say that this evening was the most fun I'd had at Oktoberfest!!

The experience Wahoo is referring to happend with my reservation. There were 25 of us on two tables, and when the bill was presented the two waiters had us down for 168 maß of beer!

On the night, because it was too difficult, and approaching 1am, we were able to get the waiter to deduct €300 immediately.

The next morning, after a good nights sleep and in the cold light of day, we could see that still meant we had been charged for 128 maß, still above what 24 (1 person drinking wine) would have had. Based on previous experience, it averages about 4 per person, from 7:15 until 12:30. Thankfully we have previous years receipts. We went down to Käfer's this last weekend on Saturday, spoke to the office and the waiter from that night, and were given an additional refund of €290, which made up for all of the mysterious beers.

This was the 9th year we have had a reservation at Käfer's, and the only time something like this has happened. We all had a great time as always, and I will happily make another booking there next year, keeping an eagle eye on the waiters and who they are serving. With one "bad" experience out of 9, I'm unwilling to smear them too much.

At the Arc do at the fest last thursday, the Augustiner took an age to remove people from one of our tables. Also one of the waitresses refused to serve anyone their halb hendl until the whole table wanted it together. Lazy Bitch!! Same woman also took without being asked to a €2 tip along with a beer voucher for a maß. They are all at it, and it gets worse every year. I am happy to tip, as that is how they make their money, but it gets right up my nose when they take the piss.

One of the middle aged bavarians (this guy looked like heidi's fucking grandad!!) who in the end had to be removed by security from the table next to us, tried to get past a security guard to have a swing at Hazza. The last I saw he was being ejected head first at full speed through a side door by two burly bouncers. Class!!

same experience at the Winzerer Fähndl first Monday of Oktoberfest. Problem was, I was with 3 non-German speakers & they didn't get the tip thing or they didn't want to give so much and asked for some change back. The guy, Hans was his name, was "frech". At one point it got a bit hairy cause one of my pals was trying to pay the tip of the guy next to him and it got very confusing. I can imagine, without any guidance that my friend would have gotten ripped off easily, even though 2 were definitely street smart.

At the Hofbrau on Sat, the waitress asked for an Euro tip for each beer... their bier vouchers have no tip built in like I am used to at the Armbrüstschützen.

I was giving €1 with each token to cover my tip. My mate handed her a token and a fiver, and she handed him back €3. He took her up on it though and got more money back.

That is what they want, but the standard or minumum tip, at least in the Augustiner and the Schottenhammel, is around €0,65. Normally increasing the price of a mass to €8.