The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism have proposed tighter business conditions for restaurants to serve tourists, which has faced the public opposition.

Illustrative photo. Foreign tourists at a restaurant in Vietnam

The ministry is seeking different agencies, ministries and the public for the proposal before adding it to the Law on Tourism.

According to the ministry, restaurants must have at least 50 seats and allow card payment to be eligible to serve tourists.  

When fulfilling the standards along with other already-regulated criteria, they will be granted with signboards for being recognised.

Lots of tourism companies and experts expressed their disagreement with the regulation. According to the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the number of seats does not reflect quality and service standards.

The regulation would cause problems for many restaurants. For instance, in cases where restaurants want to arrange fewer seats to have had more space for customers, but if they do so, they fail to meet the requirement of seat number.

The chamber of commerce added that requirements for restaurants should be based on quality not scale, and relate to issues such as menu written in foreign languages, ensuring food safety and good hygiene.

Regarding the requirement related to permitting customers to pay by credit cards, the chamber said that many tourists, particularly Vietnamese people, often do not use credit cards for services with small value such as food and drink.

At present, many restaurants in HCM City centre for travellers have less 50 seats. The same situation can be seen in Hanoi’s Old Quarter. It is not easy to find restaurants or café shops with more than 50 seats.

Many restaurants on Bui Vien Street, HCM City, attract many customers who mainly care about the food quality, food safety and the nice space, but not the number of seats.

Tran Thi Bao Thu, communications and marketing director of Fiditour said that the regulation on seat number should be applied to different areas. It is more important for restaurants to pay attention to food safety and say no to overcharge customers.

Meanwhile, Phan Xuan Anh, chairman of Viet Excursions Company, said that it is more necessary for restaurants to have more rest-rooms so that customers do not have to queue up.

He noted that credit card payment was only sued by a small number of customers.

Dtinews