China

'Slim, healthy skin': Haidilao in hot water in China for keeping files on customers' eating habits and physical appearance


A Shanghai woman has claimed online that a hotpot chain has been secretly keeping private customer information in its database including spending habits and notes on physical appearance. The woman who used the profile name Naliyouzhimiao, claimed on social networking and e-commerce platform Xiaohongshu that Haidilao Hotpot had been tracking her visits to the restaurant.

She was surprised when her post became a popular search on Weibo after many others shared similar experiences with the chain.

According to the pictures posted online, the hotpot restaurant’s database has a labelling system divided into four major categories: visit frequency, top five favourite meals, top five customised demands, such as “likes to eat hand-peeled oranges” and “plain water”, and physical characteristics, which include descriptions like “shoulder-length short hair”, “healthy skin tone” and “slim.”

There is also a customer who is tagged as “like to complain,” according to Affluence Video, a Shanghai-based media company.

According to the woman’s post, the restaurant manager apologised for recording her information and offered her a gift as compensation.

“You and I are ‘naked’ in the face of big data,” a person commented online.

While many people said the monitoring was creepy and invasive, a considerable number of people said they felt it normal as long as the information is not leaked.

“I wish the pork chop restaurant I frequent could give me a label ‘no black pepper!’,” another person commented.

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The customer service of Haidilao said that the labelling system exists because of the company’s established rules and they cannot disclose further information.

Chen Chang, a partner of Shanghai Zheng Ce Law Firm, told the South China Morning Post that the restaurant’s behaviour is not illegal as long as they collect the customer profiles through the service process, as opposed to more private information gained through some other channels, and only describe the customers objectively and neutrally, and keep the customer’s information for internal use only.

According to Caijing.com, a representative of Haidilao said that restaurant managers can add information to the customers’ profiles in the membership system in order to better serve them. The spokesman went on to say that the restaurant has been improving the system since 2020, and that any remarks on customers’ personal information, such as physical appearance and other characteristics, are now prohibited.

Previously, Haidilao has been involved in several controversies.

In 2018, a customer, surnamed Ni, claimed the restaurant had hygiene issues, but this was later revealed to be a malicious report.

In 2017, Haidilao was at the centre of a major scandal after it was revealed that kitchens at two Beijing sites were infested with rats, and dishes and cutlery were being washed with brooms and soiled rags.

This article was first published in South China Morning Post.



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