establishment claims that they have no connection with the woman and indicates that she arrived with the man, and as such the man is responsible for all of the items on the bill. Once inside, drinks are usually non-alcoholic (as the venues usually do not have a license) or watered down and overpriced with no prices listed on the menu. Unrequested companions may also arrive at the table. This scam is in a legal "gray area" if extortion is not explicitly involved, since there is no law against charging high prices and the customer is primarily responsible for determining the prices of services to be rendered before accepting them. In the United Kingdom A number of clip joints (or "near beer bars") still operate in London's Soho area, alongside legitimate strip bars. Since 2007, the London Local Authorities Act reclassified clip joints as sex establishments, meaning that they required relevant licences, closing a loophole where these businesses did not need a licence to operate because they did not serve food or alcohol or provide entertainment. In 2009, two people were jailed for 36 and 14 months respectively after threatening an undercover police officer in a Soho clip joint. In Japan "Bottakuri" or rip-off clubs have been a small but persistent problem in Japan, especially Tokyo's Kabukicho district. The complaints had surged tenfold in 2015 and police have begun crack-downs. In a mid-2015 sweep by the Tokyo Metropolitan Police, six hostess clubs were found to have charged as much as 2.6 Million yen (~US$26000) for one evening's visit by nine male customers. There have been some reports of bottakuri operating in Akihabara under the guise of maid cafés rather than hostess bars. Bottle service clubs The Manhattan bottle service club Arena was sued in 2007 for their version of the clip joint scam. In December 2007, a patron knowingly purchased a $350 bottle of vodka, but was not told of a three-bottle minimum. At the end of the night, he was presented with a $1050 tab that included two unordered bottles. When he refused to pay, the Arena bouncers beat him up. The patron agreed to get money from an ATM, but after the bouncers escorted him two blocks to a machine, his debit card was declined. The bouncers then dragged him back to the bar, where he was held until police arrived. He was arrested for theft of services but