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Turning wine into water

A hard-working reader from Dublin 6 was dismayed by the discrimination she experienced at the hands of a large Dublin department store recently because she had decided against a glass of wine while having lunch. Fed up with having a rushed and distinctly unhealthy sandwich at her desk every day, this office-bound reader decided to treat herself to an hour off and arranged to meet a friend for lunch in one of the restaurants in Clerys.

She had the special - a comparatively healthy salad - which was perfectly pleasant and cost her, she says, a perfectly reasonable 10.50. It was made to seem even better value when she learned that a quarter bottle of wine was included in the price.

Figuring that a boozy lunch might not be the best recipe for a productive afternoon's work, she declined the offer of the wine and asked if she could swap the little bottle of plonk for an equally small bottle of mineral water.

She was told that such a swap would be against restaurant policy and it was wine or nothing. She expressed her surprise and disappointment to staff in the restaurant that it was not possible to exchange a bottle of mineral water for the presumably more expensive wine. As soon as she returned to her desk, sober and thirsty, she fired off an angry e-mail to PriceWatch.

"I can't complain about the food, which was good, or the price of it, which was fair enough, but I really think staff should be allowed to show a little flexibility if someone doesn't fancy

the glass of wine with their meal. Surely it wouldn't cost the restaurant anything extra?"

To be fair to Clerys, it is not uncommon for restaurants to adopt a policy such as this. When we contacted the store, we were told that the Tea Rooms restaurant in the store often runs lunchtime promotions offering a complimentary glass of wine.

"It was an oversight not to offer a complimentary bottle of water as an alternative option to the wine." Effective from last Friday "all such complimentary wine promotions will also include an alternative bottled water option," Clerys promised.

Milking the latte

Recently we carried an item about the prices being charged by Cafe Kylemore in St James's Hospital in Dublin. A doctor based in the hospital had complained to us about the prices in the cafe, saying in particular that €3 for a latte seemed particularly excessive. A Kylemore's spokeswoman defended the cafe's pricing and said that offering value to their customers has always been a "core value for Kylemore".

Another reader then got in touch expressing his bemusement at the management's response. "On what planet is €3 for a latte value for money?" he asked "Kylemore prices are high across the board. I was more appalled by her expression of 'disappointment that a customer had complained', as if the doctor's observations on Kylemore's exorbitant prices was some sort of one-off aberration."

Our reader, who also works in the hospital, said prices in the cafe were a frequently topic of conversation among staff. "The fact that Kylemore has a captive market of patients and visitors, many with little disposable income, makes the high prices harder to accept," this reader says. Furthermore, the reader wonders whether businesses can charge high prices because "Irish people do not make enough official complaints, probably through a sense that it won't make any difference anyway."

Blog on here

Food miles

I think suppliers and consumers are focusing in the wrong place with the relatively abstract idea of "food miles" and "carbon footprint". I think we need to re-examine the basic environmental slogan "reduce, reuse, recycle", and start with the reduce. If the current debate was moved away from such abstract concepts and back to concepts that are immediately relevant to all consumers, it would show how the consumer's pocket is being hit at the register and again with the additional costs we pay for the management of the extra waste. - Marie Murphy

An Post

I live in a new development on the northside of Dublin. I'm convinced that I'm only getting my post about three days out of five each week. It seems to me that An Post are holding mail for a couple of days to make it "worth their while" to make the trip to make deliveries at my development. - Ronan

Estate agent price hikes

Well if the results of the general election are anything to go by, the price hike will make no difference whatsoever. It appears we queue up to be ripped off and are oblivious to the naysayers who try to point it out to us. I look forward to seeing more Sherry Fitzgerald "For Sale" signs in my neighbourhood soon . . . why not? The whole country appears to have a price tag. - That Girl

Kylemore Coffee

Kylemore's statement dealing with "the core value" of the company and "value for customer" and "guiding principles", while refusing to deal with the media on price, is a cop out. I wouldn't let them away with that. The issue is price, you exposed them! I always have an issue with those prepared statements on watchdog programmes. - Brian Greene

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