Pay first, eat later. That's the new trend emerging at fancy American restaurants.

Per Se, New York's second most expensive restaurant after Masa, will likely go “pre-paid” next year, meaning guests will pay for their entire meal at the time of booking. It is joining other establishments in New York and Chicago that are doing the same.

Per Se charges $310 for the standard tasting menu, service-included. 

"This is a huge shift in the burden of dining out, from the restaurant, and placing that burden on the diner," said in this interview Ryan Sutton, restaurant critic for the website Eater.com.

Sutton explained the reason for the change is that restaurants are trying to cut down on "profit killing no-shows." He said a restaurant in Chicago called Next that started adopting "pre-paid" reservations was able to reduce that rate to 2 percent. One of the owners of Next is Nick Kokonas, who is also the founder of the new ticketing service that handles the reservations called Tock.

Several high-scale restaurants already adopt credit card guarantees to take reservations, and when the customer doesn't show up, he or she is charged a certain fee. At Per Se, that is $175 per person. But Sutton said people often contest those changes with credit card companies.

But is Per Se worth the salty "pre-paid" dinner fee? Not really, said Sutton. "It's not worth it at its current price level," he said. Sutton explained Per Se charges extra for items like foie gras, or white truffles, whereas other restaurants don't. "I find that troubling from a diner's economic, financial stand point. I think that is unfortunate."