"Please sign the waiver"
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A visitor from the U.S. got more than they asked for at a Toronto hotel restaurant when they ordered a cheeseburger on Monday night that was served with a waiver on the side.
“I was flabbergasted,” the visitor said in a post to Reddit that has since gone viral on the platform’s Toronto page and garnered more than 500 comments.
The visitor, who asked to be identified by their username Reit007, ordered the burger to be cooked medium and told CTV News Toronto they had already started eating when the server handed them a waiver.
“I already had my first bite but stopped eating and did not sign the waiver. I was shocked to be honest with you,” they said in an interview.
Reit007 said the server explained that because the kitchen at the Hilton Toronto Airport Hotel & Suites always cooks their burgers well-done, they should sign the waiver first.
According to the waiver, the “guest hereby waives and releases any rights, actions or claims against Hilton Toronto Airport Hotel & Suites…for any liabilities and damages, including any food-borne illnesses and death arising out of or in connection with the guest’s use of its own food or consumption of products not provided by Hilton Toronto Airport.”
“I lost my appetite,” Reit007 told CTV News Toronto. “Simply because I felt they did not have confidence in food they are offering.”
While the hotel chain doesn’t typically hand these waivers out, a Hilton spokesperson told CTV News Toronto that the chain adheres to all of Ontario's food safety laws.
“When guests request a cooking temperature for meat that is below the minimum required, our hotel provides a waiver as an additional food safety measure with language consistent with what you might see printed at the bottom of restaurant menus,” a statement read.
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@Mik said in "Please sign the waiver":
FFS
Welcome to
Joe Biden's AmericaJustin Castreaux's Canada."Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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@Mik said in "Please sign the waiver":
FFS
Welcome to
Joe Biden's AmericaJustin Castreaux's Canada.Never heard of a waiver along with a medium cooked burger. Nevertheless, to request a medium cooked burger in this country is, let’s just say, out of the ordinary. It is as stated in the report, considered unsafe.
Unlike steak and roast beef, hamburger meat in this country is almost always served well done whether in restaurants or at people’s homes. Most Canadians would send a hamburger back to the kitchen if there were any pink, let alone red, in the meat. When in the US I have learned to always order my burger well done after a few instances of having to send it back to the grill for cooking.
So yeah, a waiver is a wee bit over the top but on the other hand, the restaurant is being asked to prepare something not in common Linacre to long standing accepted health standards. They do not want to be sued or fined by the municipal health authorities if a visiting foreigner falls ill.
Note that the standard is under provincial jurisdiction not federal and enforcement is delegated to municipal authorities. The complaint therefore should be made to the Ford Conservative government in Ontario. As an aside this practice of cooking hamburger to well done predates the both Trudeau governments and probably originated from the Diefenbaker or even R. B. Bennett eras of government.
It’s like taking your shoes off when a person goes to someone else’s house here. It is what it is in this country. Don’t like it? Order an Hawaiian pizza with extra pineapple or a plate of Poutine.
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I'm not mad keen on pink hamburger. There's a reason the meat has been made into burgers rather than steaks.
Speaking of which, they weren't allowing Brits to donate blood until 2022 due to fears over mad-cow disease, so Canada's not the only place with over-the-top safety rules.
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I'm not mad keen on pink hamburger. There's a reason the meat has been made into burgers rather than steaks.
Speaking of which, they weren't allowing Brits to donate blood until 2022 due to fears over mad-cow disease, so Canada's not the only place with over-the-top safety rules.
Years ago I asked my colleagues in the Ministry of Agriculture, what happens to dairy cattle when they stop producing. The answer was “hamburger, hot dogs, bologna, and various other types of sausage”.
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The waiver is overly broad.
@Horace may not feel safe until the legal team that drafted the waiver is disbarred.
