How late is too late??

[brendaziz]

Does anyone know at what point a restaurant would not honor your ADR anymore? Obviously the goal would be to never be late- but things happen. How late is too late?
Thanks!

 

[Cafeen]

The official word is 15 minutes. However, unless the place is 'Ohana of pre-Signature Le Cellier, they'll typically try and find something that works out for you.

(We were late to several of our ADRs in 2009... I overestimated the ability of my traveling companion to get up in the morning and were never turned away, even a 45 min late CRT in there)

 

[Nadjalu]

While I agree that 15mins is the "policy", they don't have to hold your adr if you are 1 min late.
Some restaurants do of course as it is good business to do so.

However we have had very different experience from PP.

Ohana is 1 place NOT to be late to.

DH and I were meeting my friend for dinner there. We checked in 20mins early and of course wouldn't sit us until the whole party arrived.
I called my friend to see how far away she was and found out that there was a traffic hold up due to an accident on property. She didn't know how long she would be.
We informed the hostess and she said that if the whole party wasn't there at adr time they would call us a no show and give our table away.
My DH was a bit upset and asked to speak with the manager. He also informed us that they didn't have to honor a late party. And stood behind the hostess.
My friend arrived with 1min to spare and we checked in only to find out they had canceled us! DH was furious and again spoke with the manager, causing a bit of a scene so the manager stepped away made a phone call and found out that indeed there was an car accident not far from the Poly and went ahead and seated us.
It got worse after that. The waitress was a bit rude, she was very slow, it took 1/2 hour to receive our drinks, the meal itself was over 2&1/2 hours!! Needless to say we think it was to "teach us a lesson".
As Ohana is our favorite and have never had such a time.

Sorry to go on, but moral of the story....if you really want to eat somewhere, don't be late, period.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

We were 30 minutes late at Cape May Buffet once. So we were told we would have to wait. Then we waited forever and the cm said he lost our reservation. By the time we got seated t was so late. Our server was grouchy and probably ready to go home. It was not a good experience.

Once we were also late for LTT lunch. They told us they would not seat us as it was too late for lunch. I couldnt drag the ds away from what they were doing. They did offer to give us the earliest dinner but I knew the ds didnt like that kind of food for dinner and it was more $$ so we said no. I was none too happy with the ds that day.