Garage regrets free meal offer after dissatisfied customer spends £700 in restaurant

Siobhan Yap took her mother to L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon in Covent Garden

L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon in Covent Garden, London (Google maps)

An Audi car dealership that offered an unhappy customer a free meal has labelled the resulting £700 bill “excessive”.

Watford Audi agreed to pay for a meal for two after Siobhan Yap’s Audi A3 was damaged in a collision while sitting on the car dealership’s forecourt.

Ms Yap, 27, from Hertfordshire, took her mother to L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon in Covent Garden, London, where they managed to rack up a bill of £714.61.

The Watford garage called the amount "excessive" although they offered to pay for half the meal, which included four glasses of champagne, two bottles of wine costing £69 each, six cocktails totalling £86 and a sloe gin.

But Ms Yap maintains that the Audi garage should pay the entire amount, claiming: "They put me through a lot of stress and it was a really nice restaurant".

"They should have specified a limit," she told the BBC.

Ms Yap bought her car second-hand for £20,000 but the vehicle was damaged by a delivery truck before she could pick it up.

In recompense the car repair company gave her a courtesy car and offered to pay for a meal for two "for the inconvenience caused" – but drew the line at the £700 meal, offering to pay £357 instead.

"We believe this is a fair and reasonable amount given the circumstances, and we stand by the decision taken," the spokesman told the BBC.