Bring back menus, QR codes are terrible

When they work well, they're really good, but when they work badly, they're _really_ bad.

The other week, I went for dinner at a place that had a online ordering system. My experience was as follows...

Arrive at the table, scan the QR code

No phone signal in the restaurant, so I need to connect to the wifi.

Connect to the wifi, get a captive portal

Need to put my phone number in to connect to the wifi; there is no signal, so I need to go outside, to receieve the confirmation code.

Connected to the wifi, scan the code again, choose my food.

Go to pay, need to register an account

Put my email address in, I already have an account on this food ordering service!?

Do a password reset

Put in my credit card details (why not use apple pay?).

This whole time, we're sat at a table, in theory to meet friends, but we've spent the first 15 minutes all glued to our phones!

Assuming there was another restaurant nearby, I'd have simplified the process to "go outside". If a restaurant is too cheap to print a menu, why should I consider it good enough for me?

With covid, many restaurants removed paper menus to avoid transmission. I hate QR codes so that was a move I was not in favour of.....

That’s indeed why they did it, which is silly because there’s zero evidence that paper restaurant menus are a significant risk of covid transmission. It’s pure hygiene theater.

Nah, they did it because it makes it super easy to change the menu. Physical menus rarely change, online menus can change instantly for free.

It's definitely not free when you consider the infrastructure behind providing online menus.