Jeremy Clarkson said he is considering banning customers with food intolerances from his Farmer’s Dog pub after alleging some patrons had attempted to extract large sums of money by claiming to have been made ill by food and drink.
Clarkson, who opened the Farmer’s Dog in the hamlet of Asthall, Oxfordshire, last August after buying the pub for about £1 million, told readers that the venue had become a target for what he described as an "epidemic" of food-intolerance fraud. He said one customer had demanded £50,000, alleging she had been given beer instead of cider and that gluten from the beer had made her ill; he added that CCTV showed she had not been drinking beer.
Writing in a column, Clarkson said the claims have become a recurring problem and that even when not fraudulent the demands placed on staff to avoid offending customers with dietary restrictions can be onerous. "I'm seriously thinking of banning people with food intolerances," he wrote, adding that such a move would be "commercial suicide" but that those customers could be "so annoying."
Clarkson also described other incidents at the pub that he said had strained staff. He wrote that a woman who had been drinking tripped on her hair extensions, vomited into her clothing and handed "handfuls" of the mess to staff to clean. On another occasion, he said, customers removed a crowbar from a shed and used it to force open a toilet door after an eight‑year‑old locked herself inside. He also criticised patrons who urinated on the lavatory floor.
In addition to customer problems, Clarkson reported that the Farmer’s Dog had been the target of a cyberattack that resulted in roughly £27,000 being taken from its accounting systems. He said in a separate column that an intruder had "broken into our accounting system and helped themselves to £27,000."
Clarkson referenced similar recent cyber incidents affecting larger firms, saying attacks have also been reported at carmaker Jaguar Land Rover and retailers, which led to disruption of systems and, in JLR's case, temporary shutdowns at some plants. JLR said at the time it had taken systems offline as a precaution and was working to restore applications, and that it had no evidence customer data was stolen.
Since the Farmer’s Dog opened, thousands of people have visited the pub, which has become a local draw given Clarkson's profile as a former Top Gear presenter and creator of the Clarkson’s Farm series. The owner’s comments about banning customers with food intolerances and his descriptions of the incidents have prompted discussion about pub management, customer behaviour and the impact of fraud claims and cyberattacks on small hospitality businesses.
Clarkson’s remarks were published as part of columns discussing the challenges of running a popular rural pub, including staff demands, customer misconduct and the vulnerabilities of small businesses to digital crime. He did not provide further details about any ongoing investigations into the individual fraud claims or the cyber theft beyond his published accounts.