Welcome to City-Data.com Forum!
U.S. CitiesCity-Data Forum Index
Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Travel
 [Register]
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
View detailed profile (Advanced) or search
site with Google Custom Search

Search Forums  (Advanced)
Reply Start New Thread
 
Old 08-19-2014, 11:08 AM
 
26,585 posts, read 61,935,379 times
Reputation: 13161

Advertisements

Quote:
Originally Posted by barneyg View Post
Well that's actually 13 euros per gelato. Anyway, that place is a scam:

Sala Interna Bar or Bar il Caffe, Rome - Restaurant Reviews - TripAdvisor

51 reviews on TripAdvisor including 48 1-star reviews. Of course I wouldn't have checked TA if I had only wanted gelato.
Pretty much everything around the Trevi Fountain is a scam.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message

 
Old 08-25-2014, 07:13 AM
 
Location: Poshawa, Ontario
2,982 posts, read 4,089,035 times
Reputation: 5622
Quote:
Originally Posted by barneyg View Post
51 reviews on TripAdvisor including 48 1-star reviews. Of course I wouldn't have checked TA if I had only wanted gelato.
If I was thinking of travelling somewhere and fid out that I'd have to check TA at every stop on my trip so I don't get ripped off by greedy locals, I would simply choose another destination. Stories like this one are one of the main reasons I wrote off Egypt as a possible travel destination. Seeing the pyramids doesn't seem worth being harassed by locals looking for baksheesh every time you turn around.

The worst experience I have ever had with this kind of thing was being charged $6 CUC for a bottle of cerveza while having lunch in a local restaurant in Varadero, Cuba. Like the tourists in the OP, I assumed the cerveza would cost somewhere closer to the going rate of $1-2 CUC. However, $6 for a bottle of beer is a long way from $50 for ice cream. Tourist trap or not, that is a scam no matter which way you want to slice it, and something I have never seen the likes of despite travelling all over Canada, the United States, Cuba and Ireland (the glaring exception being the cab drivers in Las Vegas. What a bunch of ignorant, lowlife shysters!).
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 08-25-2014, 08:08 AM
 
Location: Gatineau, QC, Canada
3,379 posts, read 5,520,563 times
Reputation: 4438
Quote:
Originally Posted by barneyg View Post
Well that's actually 13 euros per gelato. Anyway, that place is a scam:

Sala Interna Bar or Bar il Caffe, Rome - Restaurant Reviews - TripAdvisor

51 reviews on TripAdvisor including 48 1-star reviews. Of course I wouldn't have checked TA if I had only wanted gelato.
Those reviews are pretty wild. The feedback is still frequent enough that it must not matter much for business. I guess since they're close to the Trevi fountain people are probably just passing by without being aware. I hope they get pranked hard.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 08-25-2014, 11:59 AM
 
Location: Sputnik Planitia
7,826 posts, read 11,753,388 times
Reputation: 9045
I have noticed very frequently Americans will just order stuff without even looking at prices. They will just go to a bar and say "give me a beer" etc. How do you know that beer is not $40? In an airport sometimes I will ask the bartender how much the beer costs because there are severe markups and I need to know the price before I decide whether I will drink or pass on it. But the bartender and others around me always look at me funny when I ask how much it costs... like I somehow don't have the money for it, LMAO!

Call me paranoid but I don't want to order a pint of lager at an airport and get a bill for $20 for it...because I think that is daylight robbery and some places have no shame in charging that much!

No, they don't check the price because somehow in American culture it signifies being cheap to check the price... then later they have issues.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 08-25-2014, 01:36 PM
 
26,585 posts, read 61,935,379 times
Reputation: 13161
Quote:
Originally Posted by k374 View Post
I have noticed very frequently Americans will just order stuff without even looking at prices. They will just go to a bar and say "give me a beer" etc. How do you know that beer is not $40? In an airport sometimes I will ask the bartender how much the beer costs because there are severe markups and I need to know the price before I decide whether I will drink or pass on it. But the bartender and others around me always look at me funny when I ask how much it costs... like I somehow don't have the money for it, LMAO!

Call me paranoid but I don't want to order a pint of lager at an airport and get a bill for $20 for it...because I think that is daylight robbery and some places have no shame in charging that much!

No, they don't check the price because somehow in American culture it signifies being cheap to check the price... then later they have issues.
Please don't paint all Americans into the same corner. I assure you that we are not all ignorant. Most places have the prices squarely on the menu or a board on the wall both in the US and abroad.

By the way, I have seldom run into an airport with markups any higher than the average local restaurant.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 08-26-2014, 11:21 AM
 
Location: Middletown, CT
627 posts, read 1,055,297 times
Reputation: 190
There's plenty of blame to go around here. Yes, you ideally would check the prices before you buy anything. No, you don't deserve to be ripped off if you don't.

These places that prey on tourists just give the place a bad name. I'm always surprised when the locals don't get more mad about it, but just seem accepting that it's what happens to tourists.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.

Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.


Reply
Please update this thread with any new information or opinions. This open thread is still read by thousands of people, so we encourage all additional points of view.

Quick Reply
Message:

Over $104,000 in prizes was already given out to active posters on our forum and additional giveaways are planned!

Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Travel

All times are GMT -6. The time now is 01:28 AM.

© 2005-2024, Advameg, Inc. · Please obey Forum Rules · Terms of Use and Privacy Policy · Bug Bounty

City-Data.com - Contact Us - Archive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 - Top