About to head back to your favourite restaurant now that sit down dining is allowed? Great!
As a restaurant owner, please consider the following:
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Restaurants have been closed for 3 months now; some have maybe managed to generate some turnover through takeaways and deliveries. Many have not. Restaurant owners are currently very, VERY stressed.

It is highly likely that during lockdown, because overheads of restaurants don't magically disappear when the doors shut, a lot of staff were let go. This could result in the restaurant being under-staffed. Therefore you might wait a bit longer. DON'T BE A DICK.

It is also highly likely that the menu will be smaller, or items will be out of stock. Food industry suppliers mostly work off 30 day accounts; with no turnover for 3 months, most accounts are overdue; accounts get frozen; you can't buy stock unless it is cash on delivery.

Does the restaurant even HAVE the cash to do CoD? Who knows!? Margins are insanely tight in food & beverage, and I don't know of a single restaurant/hotel that got the promised government relief or an insurance payout (sidenote: insurers are single-handedly killing tourism).

Please also remember that no restaurant is allowed to serve alcohol for onsite consumption. Trust me, if we could we would because liquor sales make up a BIG part of restaurant turnover. Government has banned us from selling you alcohol. Please still come to eat. PLEASE. PLEASE!

There are now a billion new COVID19 regulations being enforced. You will get your temp taken on entry, you will need to fill in a "track and trace" form, you'll have to sit with social distancing rules (which takes up space so you might wait for a table; not our fault); you will

need to sanitize your hands; there might be sanitizing spray at your table (PLEASE don't steal these; we're already basically bankcrupt; don't be a dick); if you have a temp and you're not let in, then just go, dont make a scene, we're dying inside already.

No we don't want you to have to do all this, because it detracts from your dining out experience; we're about making sure you enjoy your time, but now there are some hoops both restaurant and customer need to jump through. DON'T BE A DICK ABOUT IT.

In order to open there is a big outlay for C19 regulatory items: spit screens, visors/masks for staff, deep cleaning of entire floorspace to nuke any potential COVID19 (charged per square meter), litres of sanitizer... there's a lot to pay for already strapped businesses.

So yes, go out, be careful, be considerate, be patient, dont expect your restaurant of choice to be exactly the same. We will NEVER be exactly the same again. But above all: please, PLEASE don't be a dick to us; we're (highly stressed) people like you.

And no, our restaurant remains closed because our area is spiking in infections right now.