Yet another reason for me to hate http://www.news.com.au – as if I need yet ANOTHER one! I woke this morning and checked the news, like I often do. News.com had a story that interested me, relating to a group of diners from Seagrass at Melbourne’s Southbank who left without paying their bill.

As much as I HATE sending readers to dodgy websites, here’s the link to the story. In a nutshell, “five young diners” attended the restaurant (4 males, 1 female), where “Over dinner, they worked their way expertly through the menu, ordered and drank fine wines and, after ordering dessert, slipped out “for a smoke”. They kept going.”

This article was posted today (6 January 2013). But it was written and initially published on 27 November 2008. So they’ve recycled a FOUR YEAR OLD STORY. I wanted to leave a comment on the News.com website to express my views on their awesome reporting, but of course they’re not accepting comments for this story. Hmmm, I wonder why?

But that’s not the worst of it. The story tells how these 5 diners seemed to live it up at Seagrass, enjoying what sounds like a banquet fit for a rock star. Yet the unpaid bill was “about $520”. I’m not sure when you last went out for a good meal with a group of friends, but I would challenge ANYONE to meet the description of these diners’ meal and come away with a bill for only $520.

Let’s do some REALLY quick maths – no brains required. The article says “fine wines”, so let’s assume that the author isn’t talking about Grange Hermitage, and that they bought wine at $120 a bottle. That’s pretty cheap from a restaurant. One bottle generally yields 5 glasses, so assuming these guys who were apparently living it up, didn’t just have 1 glass during their meal, so that means $240 on wine.

I tried to look up Seagrass’s menu to see what their mains are worth, but guess what? Seagrass has CLOSED. So great work from News.com, talking about a restaurant that doesn’t even exist anymore. So I’m going to assume their prices are “mid way”. Entrees probably around $20, mains averaging around $37 and desserts at $17. That’s $74 per person (remember, they “worked their way expertly through the menu, ordered and drank fine wines and, after ordering dessert….”

So….$74 per person, times 5 people, equals $370. Add in the two bottles of wine at $240 and we’re already at $610. Again here, we’re assuming there were no pre-dinner drinks or cocktails, that they only drank two glasses of wine each and that the prices at Seagrass aren’t anything to raise an eyebrow at (even back in 2008).

If I went out for a dinner matching the article’s description with four of my friends, I would probably budget AT LEAST $200 per person, so that I knew everyone could have GOOD wine (as described) and not be restricted to what they could order off the menu.

Just another example of the shit news we get in Australia, and how there’s nobody out there keeping tabs on this crap.