Da Bertino — Restaurant in Bologna

Beware scam addition

I wish to share with you this adventure in this very old and famous restaurant of the city of Bologna. It was Friday 28/12/2018 for lunch. We are welcomed after a short wait. We settle in and we order. We will order three dishes and a dessert recommended by our Italian guide: tagliatelle alla blognese, lasagna al forno, cotoletta alla bolognese a zuppa inglese dessert. The server asks us if we want to divide the dishes in two. I do not see the interest so I answer no, it can serve us and we exchange our dishes ourselves. The waiter insists again indicating that it comes back exactly if they divide in two in the kitchen. So we accept as he says it's exactly the same for them. We are served, the dishes are delicious. Comes the moment to pay, we go to the counter at the entrance of the restaurant. The lady shows us a ticket on which it is mark 51,90 € to pay. I hand out 60 €, the lady gives back 2,10 € and tells us OK is goodbye, keeping the ticket and telling us to leave without further explanations.

As we do not speak Italian and other customers are waiting behind us, we go out and think. I have a very good memory of the numbers. The addition of 51.9 € was broken down as follows: _service 2 covered = 2x 2.7 € _a bottle of water = 1x 2,5 € _tagliatelle alla blognese = 1x 9 € _lasagne al forno = 1x 9 € _cotoletta alla bolognese = 1x 12 € -accompaniment tomato and puree = 1x 7,5 € _a dessert zuppa inglese = 1x € 6.5

So we come back to the restaurant as the addition was not clear. The behavior of the lady is quite abject toward the customer who we are. She is very brief and does not take the time to explain. She also dares to write the ticket (in the picture taken) by raising prices. _tagliatelle alla blognese = 1x 9 € = 10 € _lasagne al forno = 1x 9 € = 10 € -accompaniment tomato and puree = 1x 7,5 € = 9 € _a dessert zuppa inglese = 1x € 6.5 = 8 € The server itself is surprised by the price and does not understand how prices can increase as well. She answers that it's like that when you divide the dishes in half. So surprised, he remains silent and translates nothing.

You will see that the lady has all overbill and has arrived to an addition of 56.9 € but wrote 58,9 € bar then cross and wrote below 57,9 € ... so another 1 € invoice for free instead of the 56.9 € as per the receipt...

My comment: The price of the cover is 2.7 € x2 = 5.4 € what is it used for? Because we split in two the prices go up: it is you who insisted that we divide into 2 our dishes as you said it costs us nothing more this surcharge is not written anywhere it would be nice to have translated it instead of hiding this wobbly explanation in all the other restaurants where we went we never had this problem or price raises. the calculations show that the prices are approximate and not in accordance with what is displayed in the menu. in other words, you make the customer pay based on who he is and you scammed us.

To our Chinese friends, French, foreign tourists, the service is an important element in a restaurant. It was not up to its reputation and we were in addition scammed of 6 euros. I strongly advise against this tourist trap.

You can find another comment that does not surprise me on tripadvisor of 928francot the 16/11/2018 with 3 stars / 5 where we see that the...

We have been living, traveling and eating out around different parts of Italy for almost 1 year now, and this is my first time writing review for a restaurant because the experience was really exceptional disappointing. So the stories goes:

We were recommended by a Bologna local to try this restaurant. As it was public holiday (Epiphany), we knew that all good restaurants would be fully booked. We have tried to call Da Bertino numerous times to make a reservation, but the number (as listed on google map and on the restaurants’ website) always went straight to voicemail. As such, we went to the restaurant at 7:30pm, hoping for a slim chance of getting a table before the usual Italian dinner time. When we arrived, we were immediately told by the lady (whom I guess is one of the main family owners of the restaurant as she’s arranging all the reception) to come back in 1 hour and she added “I wait for you”. So we returned at 8:40pm as instructed. Then we were told by the same lady to wait outside and she added “5 minutes”. At that time there were already several groups of people waiting outside the restaurant, but everyone were just randomly standing in groups. Then after a while the lady came out of the restaurant and told everyone to form a line in Italian. Unfortunately we don’t speak much Italian, so I tried to ask the other people waiting what’s happening. They told me everyone needs to wait in line and we were last even if we have came earlier, as everyone had came earlier (some even at 7pm) and were told to come back after 1 hour. By now it was already 9pm and there is a long line in front of us while we were the last ones.

So the story ended with us going to another restaurant with proper reception and service (I won’t mention the name of the other restaurant or else this review would just sound fake). So to be fair we didn’t get a chance to try the food, even though we really wanted to.

I deeply understand how this family run restaurant has long history in this city and has lots of loyal customers, and also how annoying it is to deal with non-Italian speaking tourists who don’t understand the “rules” for the restaurant. We have therefore tried to be as polite and respectful as we could, and followed every instruction. But the communication and logistics turned out just really bad and disappointing. For those reading this google map review you are probably not one of those local long term loyal customers anyway, and I sincerely hope you could have a better dining experience here...

Mediocre food and terrible service. The restaurant was recommend to me by the owner of my hotel because it was supposed to serve traditional, local cuisine. The waiter recommended the Lasagne to me. It arrived within 30 seconds after ordering but it was mediocre at best (I personally did not enjoy it) and I have eaten much better Lasagne in other restaurants in and outside of Bologna for the same price. The bread rolls that were served with the food were already hard and were taken away from me before I even finished my meal. The waiters all seemed to be in a terrible mood and paid no attention to me, not even when they stood right next to me and I turned to them and spoke to them in Italian. However, they seemed to be eager to turn over my table quickly because they cleared my table the second I had put the last bite of food into my mouth - eventhough the restaurant was almost empty. When I ask for the bill, the waiter barely nooded towards me and left. There was no misunderstanding, he spoke English well enough, he just didn't seem to care. 10min later - during which I had tried to get several waiters attention - , I asked a different waiter for the bill. He pointed me towards a registry in a different room next to the exit. How am I supposed to know that you pay at the registry and not the table? At least I didn't pay a fortune (Pasta is 9 / 10 Euros per dish plus 1,50...