Gail's

My six- and three-year-old daughters wanted to go to Gail's. Me, my wife and her sister had just been to see the Christmas concert at Colville Primary which is close by.

We had a couple of drinks and two gingerbread men, paid for when we ordered. Then the girls wanted some orange juice (£2.80 each, tiny!) and my wife paid for them. She noticed that she’d been charged for the gingerbread men again, an extra £2.20.

She pointed this out to the staff, in what seemed to me to be a surprisingly long, though civil, conversation. They said they’d need to check it on the computer. Ten minutes later the kids wanted to leave. I went to the counter to find out what was going on with our refund.

‘I can’t give you a refund until I’ve printed out the receipt from the computer,’ the manageress said. I said ‘Please could you just give us the £2.20 – my daughters want to leave, and you don’t have a loo here.’ Yes in this pricey joint, they have no toilet – we were pointed to the public loo outside.

I repeated my request for a prompt refund. The manageress, still fiddling with the computer, said she couldn’t do that until she had a printout.

By now, I’d had enough. What did they think? That this was an elaborate scam by us to do them out of £2.20 when we’d spent 15 quid for some drinks and biscuits?

I raised my voice to give the other customers a chance to hear what was going on. ‘So you’re refusing to give me my £2.20 that you mistakenly overcharged me?’ I had everyone’s attention at this point.

Eventually, one of the waitresses said that she found me threatening as a man (I think she meant I was a man, not her). She started giving me the money out of the tips cup. She was 1p short, so she pulled out a card, opened the till and took out the 1p. So much for not being able to refund me until a computer printout appeared.

Horrible place, I won’t be back. Though I suspect I have a lifetime ban. Never mind, I can give them a smile every morning as I pass by to dro