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I was in a restaurant in Rome and after I got the bill I saw that beside the regular 8€ for spaghetti I ordered there was an additional position that said:

una persona 1.5€

When I asked the waiter about it he explained me that this is for the bread (indeed the menu listed it for 1.5€, but I did not order it), for the table (which sounded less convincing) and everything (that really raised my concerns). If it was for a starter, the bill should list a starter and not something that cryptic in my opinion.

Maybe I am not an expert but I have been in a few restaurants before and have always paid only for what I have ordered from the menu. After my complaints he tried to persuade me that this is a common practice which was again not convincing. The day before I had been in another restaurant and have paid only for what I have ordered.

So it is a legal practice or a pure rip-off and how to deal with it? If it is a legal practice I would like to know it in advance whether I am going to be charged additionally. Does leaving the started untouched changes anything? Or ordering a drink?

The same thing happened to me in Milan a few days later. I was charged 2€ but got no starter.

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    From anecdotal experience, it's common in Southern Europe. I've been treated similarly in Spain and Portugal. If you are used to Western Europe mentality, this is somewhat hard to swallow the first few times.. but then again, I returned recently from a trip to USA and was never ever charged what the menu said. There were always service or I don't know what taxes applied (apart from the expected tip).
    – mindcorrosive
    Oct 5, 2012 at 6:35
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    It is common practice in Southern and South-Eastern Europe. So if you don't want to pay for that just don't touch the bread. In a lot of cases this will suffice.
    – RoflcoptrException
    Oct 5, 2012 at 7:53
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    Once I went to US and didn't like to know that everyone expects a tip just because he/she did exactly what I expected to be done: drive a cab, bring my food at the restaurant etc...
    – woliveirajr
    Oct 5, 2012 at 12:17
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    @woliveirajr: The reason for this (at least in food service) is that in the U.S. it is legal for restaurants to pay their servers much less than minimum wage, with the expectation that the "majority" of their wage will come from tips. Our current minimum wage is $7.25USD/hour for "non-tipped" employees, and $2.13USD/hour for "tipped" employees.
    – Justin ᚅᚔᚈᚄᚒᚔ
    Oct 5, 2012 at 14:35
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    @Justinᚅᚔᚈᚄᚒᚔ :) yep, and I agree with that (giving tip). I just wanted to point out that there are so many countries where you are charged for things that aren't exactly "included in the price that you pay"..
    – woliveirajr
    Oct 5, 2012 at 15:19

5 Answers 5

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It's common practice in Italy. It's called "coperto" (cover charge). Even though it's sometimes phrased as "pane e coperto" (bread and cover charge) but even if you don't touch the bread you are still required to pay for it. It is usually stated somewhere on the menu, although in some cases not very prominently.

So this does not only happen to tourists. To be fair, traditionally in Italy tips are not expected unless the customer is particularly happy with the service. Most of the time only small change is left as tip (as opposed to the 15/20% expected tips in some other countries).

My feeling is that, over time, cover charges are slowly starting to disappear, especially in informal restaurants (pizzerie, etc.).

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    I looked at this in another restaurant (pizza) and indeed the price was on the first page in the menu. However I was not charged. How to explain it? Is there any rule behind it?
    – crenate
    Oct 6, 2012 at 11:46
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    @mithy maybe they simply forgot to add it but it is quite unusual. There is not a particular rule: if it is reported in the menu you have to pay it. I would say that 90% of the italian restaurant have the "coperto" voice and those which haven't it have similar voice like "10% service"
    – shard
    Oct 6, 2012 at 17:33
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It is common practice in Italy to charge for the dish on top of the dinner.

It is common practice in Portugal to charge for water, bread, olives on top of the dinner.

It is common practice in the USA to charge for service and taxes on top of the dinner.

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    yeah, US business listing prices pre-tax is total rip-off, which is illegal in Europe.
    – vartec
    Oct 5, 2012 at 12:43
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    It's just what you are used to. USians think not getting a free refill of your coffee is a rip-off.
    – DJClayworth
    Oct 5, 2012 at 13:01
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    @dbkk: it is a ripoff, that's why it's illegal in Europe. The fact that in US you accept that kind of ripoff, doesn't make it right.
    – vartec
    Oct 8, 2012 at 8:18
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    @BrendanMcK: In Europe you have for example on-line stores. According to EU rules, they have charge tax according to the taxes in client's country. And they do. They detect where you from and display the final price, you're actually going to pay. Because displaying anything but the final price is a rip-off.
    – vartec
    Oct 22, 2012 at 9:19
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    @BrendanMcK: "This makes it impossible to have advertisements list the actual sale price" - over how many cities is a single printed menu usually circulated? Seriously, I don't think it's truly "impossible", although I concede marketing customs are somewhat different in the U.S. For instance, in Europe, ads on TV usually do not indicate any prices (because each store will charge something else for a given product, anyway), and printed ads delivered to your mailbox are printed (or at least altered) individually for each city. In any case, a restaurant menu is usually used only within that ...
    – O. R. Mapper
    Nov 10, 2017 at 9:50
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In your individual case, this could of course have been a ripoff.

However, historically, it has been quite common practice, particularly but not only, in south western Europe (Italy, Spain, Portugal), to charge a small fee for sitting down at a restaurant. In essence, you could argue this is to cover, say, the bread and butter you receive but did not ask for, but it's simply a cover charge. It's more likely this is a leftover from a time when tipping was less common while sitting down at a restaurant means not being able to 'sell' the same seat to another person for the time the seat is occupied. There's a brief but adequate explanation available near the bottom of this Wikipedia page.

Similarly, still, many southern European cafes will charge you a supplement for your drinks and food when you choose to sit down, as opposed to standing at the bar.

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You did get ripped off in Rome, Not sure in Milan.

The practice of adding a fee for every person at the table on top of any food ordered is old, but a regional law of Latium (Lazio), which includes the city of Rome, forbade it in 2006. Unfortunately violations are widespread, particularly downtown.

I'm not sure whether the Milan area has a similar regulation and what it does say.

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Well yes, probably, but it can be defended as a cultural thing.

I've seen places in Poland charge a per person cost for "sauces" too, something like $2.50 a head (regardless of whether or not you've actually used any of course!). In that case my waiter's defence sounds similar to the your's.. "It's standard and it's listed in the menu". He was right too, it was in the menu... down the bottom on page 12. But I guess that's warning enough.

Any business where most of their customers are tourists will be tempted to use tactics like this. Once you figure it out it's too late and you were probably never going to be a repeat customer anyway so they lose very little. (That's my theory at least.)

Caveat emptor!

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  • -1 This has nothing to do with tourism really, it's the traditional and, in my view, quite reasonable way to charge for service and other fixed costs which otherwise need to be “hidden” in the menu prices or even not explicitly mentioned at all (case of service in the US).
    – Relaxed
    Sep 25, 2013 at 5:56
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    @Annoyed I'm not saying it isn't normal, traditional OR reasonable but, you must admit, not every restaurant does this, even in Italy. I'm simply suggesting restaurants that have a lot of tourists amongst their customers might have more incentive (due to less repeat business) and more opportunity to take advantage of cultural ignorance.
    – Molomby
    Feb 4, 2014 at 23:41
  • Well I don't know about every single restaurant in Italy but I was under the impression it was really widespread and not limited to touristic areas. If it really is, I don't think it's fair to say they are “taking advantage” of anybody or using any specific “tactics” as they are really just following local norms.
    – Relaxed
    Feb 5, 2014 at 7:34

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