Japanese price sneakyness, gah
 

The sneaky extra surprise charges in Japan annoy me so much.
Last night with some friends we went to some restaurant which we've been to before, whilst we're waiting for our food what should appear but some random small tubs of fishy stuff...we expect the worst and sure enough when the bill appears they cost 400 yen a piece.
Afterwards we decide to go exploring and find a small pub somewhere. We do this and sit down and all seems good until the woman starts bringing us snacks....what? We never asked for this?....there's some mad 1200 yen fee just for being in the place- a normal little pub, not a live music venue or a club or any of that.
This is madness. Why is this so? In particular why is it done via the medium of crappy bits of food you never asked for instead of just an entry fee? Is there some Japanese law against such charges and they get around it by giving the food? Why are these little pubs always so full despite the gouging- is there some sort of yearly membership people buy?

I don't think this is norm, I've never paid for anything I didn't order.

Well, except at this cozy, little claustrophobic dark grill restaurant above Yodobashi Akiba. Table fee was 1000¥. I didn't complain, the plate of four fist-size kara-age was only 500¥, and the rest were as cheap, so the total came to about average.

Where are you going that this happens? Feel free to ask before you sit down if there is a "charge". The second place sounds like a snack bar. The fact you have a woman running a "small pub" should have been a hint.

It's not madness, just business. Learn which places "charge" and which don't. Don't be too shy to ask.

It wasn;t a snack bar no (or at least not a standard one). Just a normal little pub. I don't see how having a female staff member should have been a hint. Women commonly work in innocent non-sleazy bars (e.g. my usual, some people I know back home, etc...) and this woman though not quite a mama san certainly wasn't hostess material and was dressed quite normally.
I've heard stories of other people encountering similar stuff in apparently innocent random pubs.

And it is mad, its very unusual and makes no sense, I don't get how they get business.
Yep, in hindsight should have asked but it just didn't strike that we would have to, it was just a little pub, nothing special to suggest there would be an entry fee.

This is pretty common in Tokyo, actually. A lot of places seem to do it, even large chains. What you are usually doing (not always) is paying the service fee. The people running around in the Izakayas don't get paid much, and as most Japanese don't tip you pay the 'seating fee' instead. It also means they can offer the food at lower, more competitive prices. And with low paying table hoggers, instead of the awkwardness of having to ask a customer to finish up and go, it means the business has at least made enough off of them to call it quits and let them stay as long as they like. They give you food because, well, I guess it softens the deal; makes it less direct. "please pay for service, we'll provide you good service and a little something free in return." If you like, the random dish is the kitchens way of showing it's service, just like the waitresses' attentiveness or smile does.

As MMM said, if you don't like the custom, ask before you sit down. If you don't want to pay it, don't go to those places.

Sounds like a standard snack bar to me.

It's not very unusual in Japan. In fact it's completely commonplace ( at least it was up in Hokkaido) and is certainly not sneakyness. Your being unaware of this completely normal practice doesn't make it sneaky! ;)

Take what Columbine and what Masaegu say seriously. In regards to snack bars, all snack bars have women working at them (well, there are probably exceptions, but as a rule that is part of the definition.) Just because a bar is "non-sleazy" does not mean it is not a snack. In other words not all (or even most) snack bars are sleazy, in my experience. I think among foreigners they have a reputation as being a waste of money because the culture of paying for more than just the drinks you purchase doesn't exist really in Western culture. The thinking goes "paying for things I don't drink, ergo waste of money, ergo rip-off, ergo sleazy." This is slippery slope that isn't really the case.

Not all the women who work at these places look like "hostesses". I have been to snack bars with the workers in jeans and t-shirts.

The question isn't "how do they make money?" because they obviously do. The question is "why don't I understand this business model?".

Is there a general average this "patronage fee" is? Could I expect it to be from 1000-1500 yen or can in go higher than that?

The average お通し（おとおし） should be around 300-400 yen for most places. By that, I am referring to regular Mom & Dad's type or big chain type izakaya where you get a tiny non-meat dish for that price. So it is actually very modest and reasonable.

At higher-end palces, it can be 1,000 -2,000, but it is called a table charge and you will not get that tiny dish in return. I have personally never been to a place where I was charged for both table and お通し, though.

For those barely legal back-street bars where ugly girls with pancake make-up sit next to you and ask if she may have a drink, and keeps ordering drinks that are actually tea, the table charge can be higher. But what really costs you much more than the table charge at these places are those many glasses of "tea" your hostesses order, making Japan a rare country where some women make a living by drinking lots of iced tea at night.