I somewhat remember reading a technique involving a damp towel and a hot iron… But can't see how that would work with a lacquer finish.

 

Damp towel and hot iron should work and should not affect the lacquer finish

 

dampen the wood and a heat gun works wonders. but the water won't penerate the lacquer finish, the finish needs to be removed around the dents ,possible you could blend in the finish or just strip the whole top. at least you wouldn't have to sand the whole piece down to level it with the bottom of the dents. i might be wrong and phil might have a good idea, never tried it through a finish. only on raw wood.

 

Depends how deep the dent in the finish is.
You shouldn't have to strip the table, just work on the spots. That's the beauty of lacquer finishes (pre-cat too)

Here is how I would fix it.
First clean any furniture polish off the top. (I use denatured alcohol.)

Sand the area/area's as flat as you can without going through the finish.
Spray a new coat of lacquer over those areas.
Block sand them flat again.
Repeat until the dented area is filled.

Then sand the whole table (I use 220 grit) and give it a final coat.

Sometimes I have used drops to fill the spots but it's harder to get them to go away on the finish coats.

 

I don't believe that's a dent in the wood. The rubber foot reacted with the finish. At least that's what has happened to me in the same situation. I built some pieces for a craft market and we wanted to display fake food on a couple of serving trays that were finished with pre-cat lacquer. The silicone, or whatever the fake food items were made of, reacted with the lacquer and left the same sort of mark.

The pre-cat makes it difficult. Regular NC could be flowed back out. I have not had very good luck doing that with pre-cat, especially not as old as yours is.

Obviously, since the wood is not dented, steam won't help. The process jbay outlined will be your best bet. He knows lacquer better than anybody.

 

+1 ^^^. Paint stripper works real good with pre-cat. Has happened to me several times so, I switched back to poly .

 

From the image I agree with those who think the wood is not damages just the finish.
If it were mine I would try one of two things. Sand around the spot, particularly the edge of the damaged area with fine sandpaper. Then apply a coat of either water based poly or, this may sound strange, medium thick CA glue. Let is cure and sand again lightly with extra fine sandpaper (400 to 600). Do this until you have filled the recess with which ever material you decide to use. Other possibilities are to use lacquer or varnish instead of the two I suggested.
You may have to rub out the final coat to blend in the edge of the new finish.

 

I wouldn't worry about it. Furniture for your own home will see wear that shows that the home is lived in. It is not a museum.