Some might know that restaurants in Italy often charge you (per person) for being their guests. This charge/fee is called coperto.
I was wondering if you could tag the coperto in OSM for more transparency, because not all restaurants ask for it and the amount varies, especially in very touristy areas of the country.
Here are my ideas:
- new tag: coperto=X EUR
- amplify “fee”: fee=yes + conditional=yes @ coperto
- ampfliy “charge”: charge:coperto=X EUR
The latter is my favourite.
charge= is predominately the total amount. So charge:*= is mostly the total for different modes, not parts of the total yet.
Recording the detailed prices is debated, even if stable. When it’s not a universal and permanent percentage, having a =yes is preferable before attempting to record the exact amount.
Coperto is a national-specific concept, or at least the term for the pricing per customer. There are other service fee, eg I read you have “servizio”.
surcharge= was thought before, and adding different ones together can be discussed further Proposal:Surcharges and Discounts - OpenStreetMap Wiki
Please note that those are the same thing but said in different ways, “servizio” and “coperto” while having different meanings are used in the same way, in a restaurant you won’t find both servizio and coperto.
…and it’s not exactly Italy-specific. The French term is couvert, also adopted in many other European countries. Apart from bare service, it may include nominal costs of napkins, cutlery and bread; in Portugal, it includes the cost of appetizers you get served by default (but may refuse).
I said the nominal concept and term are nation-specific, not that such fees don’t exist in other countries. Exactly you mentioned it’s “couvert” in France. In Asia, there are “tea”, or appetizer fees. It’s explaining why coperto shouldn’t be used.
Another question is further touched on: Mandatory vs Opt-out fees/items
In Greece it’s called κουβέρ (couver) and not many restaurants have it, usually it’s found at the expensive ones. I don’t know though if it’s a constant value or changes depending on how much you ordered.
Maybe it would be better to have it under fee:* key, which could include later other services that are being paid. Something like fee:couvert=* (yes or no as values to denote if you pay for it) or whichever term it is chosen.
Couvert is French, I think it should be cover since that is the standard English term (cover charge): while “cover charge”[1] naturally covers the concept of couvert, the French term isn’t standard in English-speaking countries like the US or UK.
Furthermore, there should be also a charge:cover=* (or whichever term) for the amount
Could be specified in fee:cover=*, its values could be mandatory/no/optional
Sum of money that you must pay in some restaurants and nightclubs in addition to the money that you pay there for food and drink ↩︎
I agree with that, if it’s a constant amount regardless of the order.
I didn’t know the English term till now. And I don’t see on the wiki any other words for it, so I guess fee:cover=* makes sense.
In the US, this is called a “cover” charge.
Likewise in Canada. It’s very rare for restaurants to charge a cover, but it’s common at nightclubs, and not unusual at pubs or bars where there is a live band playing in the evening or there’s a pay-per-view event on TV (e.g. a big boxing or MMA fight).
However, the amount of the cover charge varies wildly where it is charged. In most cases a pub or bar wouldn’t charge except for the live bands or PPV events described above. The amount of cover may be $5, $10, $20 or more, depending on the fame/notoriety of the band/PPV event. Nightclubs would typically waive a cover charge entirely if it’s not busy, but conversely charge more if it’s busy, or waive cover charges for women but not for men, or charge more for men than for women. I don’t think there’s much point in trying to document this.
However, if it’s commonplace for ristoranti in Italia to charge a flat coperto fee no matter how busy the restaurant is… sure, something like charge:cover=yes or with an exact amount of euros seems reasonable. 
We didn’t tag this until now, because the coperto amount is usually so small that it is not relevant, it is a pricing detail, typically around 2 eur / pp, so it is much more relevant if your pasta dish costs 7 euros or 20, the coperto alone doesn’t provide useful information when choosing a place.
Isn’t it the service fee/charge? Here restaurants charge it on larger parties instead of the tip.
A service charge for a large group is different than a cover charge. A service charge is applied after the meal, usually as a percentage of the cost. (In Canada usually this is ~18%.) A cover charge is applied at the entrance to the venue: you’re not even getting in the door unless you pay the cover charge upfront (usually in cash).
What if I’m a cheapskate and out of principle don’t want to go somewhere where a coperto is levied, regardless of the amount? 
Jokes aside, you’re right. The cost of coperto usually indicates the overall price range of a restaurant. Cheaper restaurants typically charge 1–2 euros, while high-end places can go up to 5 euros.
I think this is also useful information for data consumers, so setting these two tags to ‘in use’ could be nice
Well, be ready for McDonalds and fast foods only 
I’m a cheap date. 
I’ve moved this to “tagging help and support” because that’s literally what it is about…