Eating buffet in Hanoi and getting 10kg of seafood: A guest in the group spoke up!

Seafood buffet diners speak out

The incident involved a group of 7 people who came to eat at a buffet and then arbitrarily put 10 kg of seafood in their bags to take home, attracting public attention. The incident occurred at the Buffet Chef Dzung establishment on Nguyen Chi Thanh Street at noon on January 25.

According to the report, the staff saw the group of guests continuously taking seafood and food to the table, but when cleaning up, they did not see any shrimp or crab shells, so they became suspicious and asked the security department to check the surveillance camera.

Ăn buffet ở Hà Nội lấy 10kg hải sản: Vị khách trong đoàn lên tiếng! - 1 — Seafood dishes served at the restaurant (Photo: Provided by the restaurant).

They then checked the customer's bag and found 10kg of various seafood and other food inside. It is known that this is a meal priced at 409,000 VND/person in buffet form, with crab, shrimp, crab, snails in grilled and hot pot form.

Sharing with Dan Tri reporter, Ms. T., owner of a coffee shop in Quoc Oai, said that she was the one who booked the table and brought the group of guests to eat. Initially, the group planned to eat goat meat but then decided to change the dish to seafood.

"I booked a table for noon on January 25. There were 7 people in the group, including my husband and I, 2 of my husband's friends, and 3 cafe employees. This time I wanted to invite everyone to a New Year's Eve dinner," said Ms. T.

Even though she couldn't eat seafood, Ms. T. still sat down at the table to eat with everyone else. The others who had finished eating left first, leaving only Ms. T., Ms. A., and another person to eat hot pot. Before the meal was over, a restaurant employee invited the guests out to talk.

Ms. T. said that when the staff came to the table to invite everyone out, she herself did not understand what was happening. Later, they saw the images recorded by the camera and realized that Ms. A. had put the seafood in the bag.

Because she was the one who invited the group to eat, Ms. T. took responsibility and said she would pay the fine on behalf of Ms. A. because this person was in very difficult circumstances and was her employee.

"Ms. A. was born in 1973 and has been working at the restaurant for 5 years. Her family is poor, her parents died early and she divorced her husband. Ms. A. did not have the opportunity to study since she was a child so she is illiterate. This is her first time eating at a buffet so she does not know the restaurant's rules," said Ms. T.

Ms. T. admitted that she was also negligent when she did not remind the staff in advance about the rule when going to a buffet: only eat at the restaurant, do not bring food home.

Ms. T. thinks that her employees think simply, thinking that eating buffet is like going to a party. In the countryside, when going to a party, people usually just eat vegetable soup and then pack the food in bags to share and take home.

Ăn buffet ở Hà Nội lấy 10kg hải sản: Vị khách trong đoàn lên tiếng! - 2 — Restaurant staff checked and discovered that the customer brought home 10kg of seafood (Photo cut from clip).

This woman was very upset with the way the restaurant handled the situation when it imposed different fines. She said that the restaurant initially fined the customer 1 million VND, then increased it to 2 million VND and then 3.5 million VND. After that, the two sides could not reach an agreement so they invited the local police to assist.

In addition, Ms. T. was "miserable" because the restaurant posted her picture on its personal page, causing many acquaintances to recognize her and continuously call to ask about her.

"I was not the one who stole and I paid the restaurant in full, but they posted the pictures without permission. Ms. A. took the food and I paid all the fines for her. I took them out to eat, so I have to take full responsibility. Since this incident happened, Ms. A. has been crying and apologizing for affecting me so much," said Ms. T.

Speaking to Dan Tri reporter, a representative of Lang Ha ward police confirmed that the incident happened in the ward and said that "if the customer takes unprocessed seafood, it is considered theft. This case will be handled according to restaurant regulations as agreed upon by both parties."

What did the restaurant say when it fined a customer 6.1 million VND?

Sharing with Dan Tri reporter, the restaurant representative also explained why the fine for customers was 6.1 million VND for 10kg of seafood.

"If the customer had agreed to pay the fine from the beginning, the amount would have been only 1 million VND. Because when it was first discovered, the seafood that was taken (10kg) could still have been used by the staff to avoid waste. However, because the customer did not agree, we were forced to invite the police to assist. The entire amount of goods was sealed for settlement.

The incident did not end until 6 p.m. the same day, so all the processed food was spoiled and could not be used. Therefore, the restaurant offered compensation corresponding to the import price," the restaurant representative explained.

This person also said that he had removed the video with the customer's image on the restaurant's fanpage.

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