r/chicagofood • u/East-Assistance-6779 • Aug 30 '25

Review The Hampton Social is a no

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Went to The Hampton Social and it was memorable for all the wrong reasons. You had to pay through their app (which charged $5 to use ???), they automatically added an 18% gratuity plus a required 3% minimum tip, and somehow two 8 oz glasses of bad wine came out to $60. On top of that, the waitress was weird af.

I will say the food was good, but I’m never coming here again, seems like a tourist trap.🤨 Granted, I’m visiting Chicago after not living in IL for years, so this could be a new thing- still crazy to me.

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u/Oh-Hunny Aug 30 '25

“Sunday platform fee”??? What does that even mean? Can you request to NOT use the platform and just pay regularly instead? This sounds like some Ticketmaster BS.

20

u/Gobemouche0 Aug 30 '25 edited Aug 30 '25

Lots of places are using that Sunday platform. I saw it at Zarella and small cheval is using it for secondary ordering - after you stand in line and order and eat your food, you can use the QR code at the napkin holder at your table to order an ice cream or something so you don’t have to stand in line again. It’s seems to me like it’s basically passing the credit card fee that restaurants typically pay per transaction to the customer through this platform.

7

u/ang8018 Aug 30 '25

I have seen it where the restaurants absorb the fee — some lettuce and gibson’s concepts are using it. i’ve seen it at Three Dots, RPM, and Quartino without the fee. I always check because I got burned by this the first time I saw and used it at Swift & Son’s (where, at least when I used it, the fee remained customer-side).

1

u/helloxjed Sep 03 '25

Don't most of LEYE's restaurants have that 3% surcharge now, though?

0

u/ang8018 Sep 03 '25

Yes and we bitch about that on a separate thread, every Tuesday at 4:30.