If they do not close, restaurateurs are imposed ever stricter health rules -
Michel Spingler
The Paris police prefect, Didier Lallement, announced the new sanitary measures to be implemented in restaurants from Tuesday.
In addition to the hydroalcoholic gel on all tables, the mask should be kept as much as possible and the physical distance is one meter.
Restaurant owners will need to collect contact information for all customers and display their establishment's capacity outside.
Restaurant owners are worried and ask themselves many questions after announcements deemed "unclear" and "always more restrictive".
New grimace soup for restaurateurs.
After weeks of famine during confinement, the restaurants which had been able to reopen under restrictive sanitary conditions will again have a strict protocol applied in the maximum alert zones.
This was announced on Monday by the Paris police prefect Didier Lallement at a press conference held alongside Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris.
Hydroalcoholic gel on all tables, mandatory masks at all times (except when eating meals), distance of one meter, six guests maximum per table (instead of ten), notebook to collect customer details, restaurant capacity posted outside and an “accelerated” closure procedure… These new restrictions, applied in Paris as well as in Marseille or Aix-en-Provence, are coming like a sledgehammer for restaurant owners.
Too vague measurements?
“If you can explain to me in detail, I'm interested, because it's not clear their story.
Like the vast majority of restaurateurs questioned, Bruno, owner of Les Tontons, rue Raymond Losserand, in the 14th arrondissement of Paris, still had many questions on Monday, a few minutes after the press conference.
Faced with regulars, he dissects the ads and looks for a way to apply them to his business.
“Here, it's a restaurant, but I open in the morning for people to have their coffee, the same in the afternoon for those who want to hang out after the meal.
Can I continue tomorrow?
Point by point, he highlights all the subtleties that have not been addressed.
Like his establishment, many restaurants are also drinking establishments and do not know what to do with these new rules.
Madame Gandy, owner of the Le Bouquet bar-restaurant, a few dozen meters away, is in the same state: “I do catering, but my drinking figure is undoubtedly more important than cooking.
Does that mean I can open?
»Turnover, Kbis number, licenses, she does not know which criteria to take into account.
“I cook so I'll be open.
But I don't open at night.
Will I still be able to serve coffee?
"
Other questions haunt people's minds.
Laven, owner of two restaurants, Les Artistes, in the 14th arrondissement of Paris, and L'inspiration, in the 15th, is already puzzling how he will organize himself: “I receive deliveries at 8 am in the morning.
My employees are there to receive.
But if they can't serve before noon, what do I do?
Do I pay them for nothing before the service or send them home when they live far away?
And it's the same in the afternoon.
"
Six + four = ten
Sanitary measures seem to pose fewer problems, but opinions are divided.
Frost on the tables?
Not complicated to manage, even if "it is less inviting", comments a client.
Distancing?
It was already applied, despite the heavy loss of cutlery it entails.
On the passage of six to ten people per table, it ticks a little more.
Questioned on this subject, Hubert Jan, president of the catering branch of the Union of Trades and Hospitality Industries (Umih), fears a loss of attractiveness for "family meals and business meals".
Laven has found a solution.
In order not to lose the reservations recorded, he will divide the tables: “A table of six and a table of four with a distance of one meter between the two.
"For the systematic recording of customer details, Hubert Jan is not alarmed:" It is already a common practice in the community to avoid "no-shows".
However, he advocates for the registration of only one referee per reservation.
And in addition, make the police
But the obligation to display the capacity of the restaurant outside, to facilitate controls and the accelerated closing procedure, leaves restaurant owners much more skeptical.
Madame Gandy believes that she cannot constantly count the number of people in her restaurant: "Are we going to have to set up a security guard to count?"
Imagine that there is only one extra person in the restaurant at the time of the control… Am I getting shut down?
You need a little flexibility anyway… ”
A few streets away, in the Ti case Creole restaurant, the owner, Mr. Kilan, already sighs: "We are already making the police for masks, frost, distancing ... We have 60 place settings, one or two extra people. who enter the restaurant, it quickly happened without us realizing it.
"And Hubert Jan, from Umih, to recall that the closures of establishment have already been numerous in recent weeks.
A collapse
If the restaurateurs questioned assure that they will do everything to respect the sanitary rules, they do not forget to recall how they are penalizing.
“We will do everything for our safety and that of our customers, that is not debatable.
But we have already lost at least 50% of our customers, ”says Michelle, an employee of the Bo Bun counter, rue Raymond Losserand.
Madame Gandy draws up the same terrible observation: "Things were not going strong already, but with the Covid figures which have been coming out for some time, our attendance has collapsed for a week.
The restorers all ask for state aid in return for their efforts.
Laven sums it up: “We don't get any help for any of that.
Even the insurance companies are failing us.
Mine asks me to modify my contract to remove the Covid clause, otherwise it will terminate it.
Our income is collapsing but the fixed charges, we always pay them.
"
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