Have today, and will give it at least one more read-through. Excellent and thorough.

Re: restaurants and tipping. Both Don & I have been in the business. We tend to “overtip”(unless of course, service is wretched). We enjoy doing this as we know how hard service professionals work, and how difficult in general the bar/restaurant business is.
OK. No need to go. Again, excellent thorough information.
Take care. Thanks again. Charlotte

The discount doesn’t apply to all items on the menu and it it isn’t available to all people. With reasonable statistics, a restaurant can determine , within a reasonable amount of time, what percentage of eligible people it has that come into the restaurant.

I know many people go to restaurants and only eat dessert or have beers and talk. Neither of these two cases get discounts. An active bar will cover the cost of most discounts in many restaurants.

Many families go to restaurants and only one member in the party is eligible for the discount. The discount does not apply to the entire bill, only to that one person’s items and then only to certain items.

So the net effect of net effect to prices of a restaurant can only be determined after the restaurant has determined the traffic it receives and what percentage of that traffic is eligible for discounts. It also has to be smart enough to give the discount on the items that receive it and not across the board.

If the law says that a discount will be given in certain situations and a business decides not to give it, the conflicts will arise and eventually the loser will be the business.

I personally think that a business adding tips to a bill is dumb. Most tourists from the US will tip more than the 10% that is allowed to be added so it will then lose the difference. I believe a tip is to provide an indication to the provider as to how the service was. Good service deserves a good tip. In Panama that would be 10%. Bad service does not deserve a 10% tip. Less than 10% should tell the provider that its service is substandard.

Bad service and bad food will stop clients from returning much faster than adjusting eligible food items to cover the legal discount.

I do believe it is unfair of the Panama government to require the discount to be given without giving the business relief on the taxes it pays by the same amount. This must mean that the government assumes the business will cook the books and cheat.

However, as long as the law is the law, then I think there is risk for any business that breaks it. One way or another it will affect business.

if i add 10% normally in all bills then i will have less people, but if i apply 25% discount i will have same result. They open, they close.
be or not to be….

David “Shakespeare” Renegado

I don’t know. Just can’t seem to get that image out of my mind. Anybody good at drawing??

I think everyone’s already getting great deals on so many things. Discount on long bus rides is great, and other such items that are more expensive. Makes me feel like I’m cheating, or having one of those neat dreams where I’m in a store and everything’s practically for free. Don’t feel I need to get a deal on every little nitty thing. And I’m not even in the ballpark of the McMansion crowd in Boquete.
I agree with the “rule of 10″.

Also, re: Boquete restaurants, with all the rich gringos, ya’d think everybody’d be making more money at the restaurants, because of increased clientele…all be it perhaps gringos screaming “I want my jubilado!”

Maybe it’s time for a visit from famous British (or actually think he’s Scottish) Chef Gordon Ramsey, of “Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares” TV fame. Get him to whip the restaurant owners into shape. We could all suggest a particular restaurant in Boquete for him to “help”. We could all watch it on TV! Or on streaming video.

The restaurant business is brutal everywhere. They open. They close. They flunk out. They mess up. Or sometimes they do it all really well. Come on Gordon. Make a visit to Boquete! I know you can fix this.
OK. Guess I’ve had enough fun with this one.
Thanks. Charlotte

Great write-up, Don, and right on as well. I am also in emphatic agreement with you and Mike Horrell about Boquete restaurants. i would simply extend that to Boquete in general myself, with a few (but very few) exceptions.

And to emphasize that we’re guests in this country: for those who have the pensionado visa, take a really good look at what type of visa you REALLY have. I know what mine says, as I stare at it: “turista pensionado”. Yep, a permanent tourist, not even permanent residency.

We’ve both written about the witless folks who come here who haven’t put as much thought into the move as they would in buying a TV set. They’re hopeless. I agree with whoever said that the Ugly Americans would be TP back in the US–just more restrained because Americans are a litigious sort, and they might get slapped with a lawsuit. We encountered a number in Boquete and one in David, making himself heard loudly at Ray, complaining about the service. there was good reason why there was no one at that counter at that moment, but I assume he couldn’t read the small sign in Spanish that explained. Boquete has been so bad in that regard, that we avoid it; not only are there Ugly Americans, but there are very large numbers of the Witless and Clueless. We sneak in about once a month, renew our supply of essential coffee, and sneak out again before anyone stops us to give us unasked for advice or makes some comment that shows us they have no idea that they’re actually in a foreign country.

I hope these people figure it out soon that they don’t belong here and get out. I know two in our area who are leaving here to be unhappy in Argentina. Nothing can be done for these people, and it’s a waste of time and effort to try. Figure out how many days, statistically speaking, that you have left in life and then ask yourself how many of those you want to waste dealing with people like that.

Of course I know that all boquetenos are not like that, probably not even the majority. It’s just their decibel level and behavior make it seem that way. Why, some of my best friends used to be boquetenos–of course, they’ve since moved closer to Panama City because they couldn’t stand it any more.

Oh well–our gates are locked.

To my astonishment, I’ve suddenly got old and need to take several meds every day and I can safely say that the medical discount is well appreciated. As are the air travel and hotel discounts.

We rarely bother with the restaurant discount except at truly upscale places because we are feeling increasing uncomfortable about asking for it. Our rule of thumb has become the Rule of 10; if the main course is $10 or more, then we’ll ask, otherwise we let it slide.

I agree about the Boquete restaurants sucumbing more to poor service and medicore food that the raging hordes of expats demanding discounts. We’ll be back in Boquete next week and I fully expect to eat a number of poorly prepared, poorly served and definitely overpriced meals while I’m there.

Why? Because in the three years we’ve been coming to Boquete we’ve never failed to find that most of the restaurants are determined to drive themselves out of business. And most eventually succeed at doing so.

One of the best meals I had in Boquete was in what had been a woman’s living room that she had made over into a tiny restaurant. Trout with rice and some sort of veggie I no longer remember. Simple, prepared well, served with a smile.. I’ll be going back to see her again this trip.

That’s why we enjoy your right-ups about the David restaurants so much. It’s nice to have some idea of what to expect and where to give a try.