Tourism authorities of Ukraine decided to design a list of ‘Tourist friendly’ restaurants to prevent scams against visitors.
Unfriendly to tourists? Welcome to the ‘naughty’ list
If you have been to Ukraine and went to eat out in a restaurant, you might have been surprised by prices. How would locals afford to eat in such places if the prices are about the same as in your home country, but people here earn 10 times less?
Now the secret trick of Ukrainian restaurateurs is revealed: Guests are getting special price lists where figures are 2-3 times higher.
The scams against unsuspecting visitors (Ukrainians from other cities also get ripped off, not only foreigners) got so awful that Odessa authorities decided to publish special lists which will only include places that are friendly towards tourists, KP.ua reported.
The move was discussed during a special conference discussing safety for visitors in Odesa (Odessa), Ukraine. The president of the National tourism organization Ivan Liptuta wrote about the discussions on his Facebook page.
How to find out if the restaurant is “Naughty” or “Nice”?
The lists of “Nice” and “Naughty” places, based on their treatment of the city guests, will be published online and also accessible on train stations, airports, and in the restaurants themselves.
If the place is honest with tourists, they will get a special sign from the organization that could be placed at the entrance, similar to “TripAdvisor recommended” signs, popular in western countries.
The association also recommends restaurants to publish a menu that guests can check at the entrance to the place. The association plans to lobby the requirement to become mandatory via local legislations.
There will be also information leaflets for people who got scammed, how to complain and whom to call.
It’s quite likely that the pairs of “brides” and “translators” working for pay-per-letter pseudo-dating sites take men to such places with double pricing, while earning sizable commissions on food bills.
Did you realize there was such a tourist scam going in Ukrainian restaurants? Do you think you were a victim of such a swindle?
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I’ve been in much of CIS countries for over a year now and have never seen such a scam. Most restaurants have prices in their windows. The scams are overcharging you on the check which you can fix by looking it over. The other is in buying fresh produce. People take advantage of the difficulty of thinking in the local currency value coupled with the difficulty in thinking in metric weights.
One note is Ukraine is definitely the least expensive country to go out to eat in. In fact, it’s the least expensive country in all ways.
In Odessa not restaurants the n1 risk. Clubs are more likely. Mainly when the guy find out the champagne bill just some 5 – 10 K $ what a “nice girl” just convicted him to order. Off course the girl is an employee there with exactly this task. Odessa is a very scam infested city. And Paul Rose also right: there are metric weights in Ukraine and used often, even for ice cream (that was my laugh at the time – we have scoop as unit, not decagramme, so price was very different than expected, saslik also was dkg, not… Read more »
Good business is good business in any language. A tasty meal at a reasonable price makes everyone happy, including the waitress who realizes a nice bonus. When a diner is happy, he returns. Even if the diner is foreign and only eats 10 dinners, isn’t it better to sell ten dinners than one overpriced one? Хороший бизнес – это хороший бизнес на любом языке. Вкусная еда по разумной цене радует всех, включая официантку, которая реализует приятный бонус. Когда посетитель счастлив, он возвращается. Даже если посетитель иностранный и ест только 10 обедов, не лучше ли продать десять обедов, чем один с… Read more »