JOURNAL / INDEX · 206 ENTRIES · PAGE 1 OF 18 LAST ENTRY 2026-09-05
THE JOURNAL PUBLISHED FROM LONDON · 51.5072°N 0.1276°W

Everything we learn, written down

Bookings, menus, online ordering, search. Written by the people building the product, between services.

Last published 5 Sept 2026 — the TableSpark team, London
ARTICLES201
FILMS19
TOPICS9

Featured note

FIG. 01 Building the website
Featured 2026-07-24

What is TableSpark? The best-value restaurant website platform

TableSpark is the best-value, complete restaurant-ready website platform for independent UK restaurants: scan your menu, publish a site you own, and keep the bookings, the guests and the margin.

Read the note ↗

All entries

1–12 of 205 Newest first

September 2026

2026-09 12 entries
FIG. 02 Building the website
Building the website 2026-09-05

Is “free parking” legally binding? What a restaurant's car park page commits it to

Describing parking as “free” is automatically unfair where the guest ends up paying to park — and the cost of getting it wrong lands on the restaurant, not the car park operator.

FIG. 03 Running the site
Running the site 2026-09-05

A delivery platform suspended the account. The UK deleted Articles 15 to 18, not the duty.

The listing is blocked, the notice names no order and no rule, and three services pass before anyone answers. The duty behind that silence buys damages, not the listing back.

FIG. 04 Ordering and payments
Ordering and payments 2026-09-05

The checkout charged a guest twice: the clock everyone reaches for is the wrong one

Charged twice by its own checkout, a restaurant reaches for the fourteen-day refund clock. That clock belongs to cancellation, and the duty that does reach it sets no deadline.

FIG. 05 Guest data and privacy
Guest data and privacy 2026-09-05

Right to rectification: the time limit that keeps running while you ask which record

A guest list holding the same regular three times, one row carrying the allergy note. What the law requires when a guest says the record is wrong — and where it is unsettled.

FIG. 06 Rules and compliance
Rules and compliance 2026-09-05

The Minimum Energy Efficiency Standard Binds the Landlord — the Lease Decides Who Pays

Continuing to let a sub-standard commercial building has been unlawful since April 2023 — the penalty is the landlord's, but the lease can send the cost to the tenant.

FIG. 07 Running the site
Running the site 2026-09-05

The Christmas Party Invoice That Paid In Ninety Days Was Earning 11.75% All Along

Statutory interest on a late invoice is 11.75% today, plus a fixed sum of up to £100 — and the clause said to cancel it is void unless what replaces it is a substantial remedy.

FIG. 08 Rules and compliance
Rules and compliance 2026-09-05

You Never Employed Them, and the PAYE Bill Can Still Be Yours

A new Chapter of ITEPA 2003 can hand a restaurant the PAYE and NIC bill for staff it never employed — but only on three chain shapes, and the ordinary UK agency is not one of them.

FIG. 09 Rules and compliance
Rules and compliance 2026-09-05

Who holds the food-safety duty once a third-party rider has the bag

In England the 8 °C rule may not govern a hot courier delivery at all — but which branch applies turns on an undefined term, and reading it wrong inverts the risk.

FIG. 10 Rules and compliance
Rules and compliance 2026-09-05

Do I need a written fire risk assessment? In England and Wales, since 2023, always

England and Wales scrapped the five-employee test in 2023 — record the whole assessment or risk a penalty. In Scotland and Northern Ireland, any licensed premises is caught.

FIG. 11 Rules and compliance
Rules and compliance 2026-09-05

Fingerprint clocking-in and UK law: the opt-out that has to stay open

A fingerprint clocking-in terminal turns payroll admin into special category data. Consent can make it lawful — but only where refusing costs a member of staff nothing.

FIG. 12 Building the website
Building the website 2026-09-04

The CMA Can Disable or Fine a Restaurant's Website Without a Court Hearing

A regulator can now disable a restaurant's website and impose a penalty without a court case, while the diner's own right sits on a saving with a condition, not a date.

FIG. 13 Ordering and payments
Ordering and payments 2026-09-04

The Posting Duty in a Hygiene Prohibition Notice, and the Silence About the Website

The posting duty on a hygiene notice stops at the door; whether it reaches the ordering page behind it is untested, and getting it wrong risks a second offence.

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