A Trump admin Labor Department rule going into effect soon lets restaurant owners take tip cash from servers and share it with back-of-house staff like dishwashers. Why would the federal government tell small businesses to do what they can already do on their own? And why would restaurant owners lobby the government for the rule?
Background Resource:
Restaurants Can Require Servers to Share Tips Under New U.S. Rule
[Wall Street Journal, December 22, 2020]
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26 replies on “New Trump Admin Rule Lets Boss Take Tip$ from Servers to Share with Dishwashers”
Here in the southwestern portion of what is quickly approaching the people’s republic of VA, one of our local restaurateur’s, who has been in business for a couple of decades, had to pay a hefty state fine. His crime, you ask? He had been, for years, having the wait staff pool some portion of their tips for the back of the house. This was in violation of either state law, or state dept of labor guidelines. I wonder if the reason this got lobbied at the federal level is the state level lobbying didn’t work.
It makes no sense to me why there exists such a guideline, as each restaurant owner should do what they feel appropriate.
He was also one of the first to thumb his nose at the patron limitations.
I am now using Scott’s instruction to class. Selling yourself is a great life skill. Thanks! Do you want your dessert to go?
Scott hit a nerve. I am probably considered front staff. I am a hospital worker. I have direct patient care. The institution I work at was once the best in the town when the sisters ran it and 30 years after the sisters left I cannot say that. The management is always hiring outside companies to try to develop systems to improve our image in the community. The company has grown to more than 500 hospitals. I do not think any of them are exceptional. The sisters knew who made our institution great and we were proud to work for them and they hired the best and made us better. I still try to give the best care I can but there is a feeling when you are in a place that values it workers and their pride and happiness is apparent every where you look. We have lost that at the institution where I work. One of the lines I have heard from middle management. A tech is a tech. If you do not like it here leave and we will replace you. The cause of this is the GOVERNMENT getting into health care. The sisters did it so much better.
Great segment guys. Recognizing the ‘back workers’ as well as the ‘up front’ workers. I have three kids who have worked as servers and it isn’t always easy. There are customers who treat the servers as servants. Fortunately most of us are not cheapskates.
Getting back on topic what do you expect from a government that spreads its ‘tips’ around the globe willy nilly. I hope you get my meaning.
Putting Bill’s, Scott’s and Steve’s accurate and pertinent comments aside, they miss the central point. The federal Dept. of Labor is doing this because they can with no backlash.
The federal boa Constrictor squeezes another inch of breath out of us… Soon we’ll be dead, killed by laws and rules we all agree they have no business making.
Tony Soprano to Paulie Walnuts: Bring up my bolt cutters; I am going to be a moile
The top global capitalists who run the world and are behind The New Covid Order want to commoditize every human process and transaction through the destruction of our cultural values. They don’t have morals or care about fairness (e.g. harder, more skilled jobs should get more). Instead, they want to push everyone down, cheapen/normalize the entire cost structure by equalizing the current pay structure (including tips) so that “they” do not have to kick in any more. Instead, if the masses have to share from among the current pot with no increases from the Globalists, and in fact decreases through all of their schemes, they win. Now, we know that this will have dire consequences in the notion of striving. When there is no incentive to strive harder for to do and be something better is taken away, it brings everyone down. I used to be a successful waiter, I did not tip my dishwashers…they worked far fewer hours, did not have to deal with very difficult clients non stop, or take on many hats where wait staff had to “open up, keeping thee floors clean, keeping all the counters, tables clean and reset, keep all the supplies stocked at the front of the house (Beer, Napkins, Straws, Bread Baskets…on and on), AND if the cooks, dishwashers, or anyone got backed up, rolled up their sleeves and helped them cook and wash. No, no regrets on sharing my tips. If the Dishwashers wanted to up their game by being charming, kind, anticipating how to stack the tables, manage the flow of the tickets and food pick up and deliver, then they could take that on for higher pay….they had the opportunity and not one dishwasher ever wanted to take on all that extra work.
This is also an additional “in” to audit the cash and collect taxes on the Tips.
When I worked as a short-order cook, the place I was at did that on their own accord. I’ve known several other places that do that as well, without Big Brother telling them they needed to. Keep the government out of it.
Exactly. I used to waitress and we always had a pool going at the end of the night for the dishwashers and bussers.
While it is fun to denigrate the negative aspects of asking the govt for help, etc., let’s also focus on the outstandingly positive “sales lesson” remarks that Scott provided at the end. Those ideas translate into much more than just the restaurant business, but certainly also to any service business.
And they can probably be adapted to other forms of “public exposures” that any business must have to succeed.
Even local governments could add “extra services” for extra fees – biweekly trash pickup instead of once/week, etc. The opportunities for smart managers and leaders are legion – not just for the Elon Musk’s out there but a whole range of folks.
But savvy customers are used to a useless extra promotion and tend to resist them, so the psychology of how this “extra” is presented has to be thought through carefully so as not to come across as “pushy”, but merely a “helpful suggestion, if perhaps you might be interested”. Amazon’s algorithms sort of do this when they provide emails with alternative purchase options, but too often they miss the mark by presenting product options after the purchase that are essentially equivalent to the product(s) just bought. Outside of food, seldom do we buy things for which we will want duplicates in short order.
Never trust the government when they propose a simple game of “just the tip”
When I saw “reduce wage disparities” in the article, I immediately saw it as a socialist construct.
WARNING! Sarcasm to follow . . .
Call me crazy, but why not? It’s like everybody gets a trophy so no ones feelings get hurt. So no one puts forth any extra effort (why would they?). Why work hard and prove yourself and get raises based on your skills/experience? So outdated thinking.
Everyone should have the same wage because it feels good. Doesn’t matter how labor intensive (or not) the job is. Minimum wage should be $15 an hour so that people who went to college or worked their way up to a good wage can “get the message” that is was all for nothing.
Also, have restaurant owners been pushing this so they don’t have to pay a decent wage to non-waitstaff? Or don’t have to put in any effort to make their employees feel appreciated and useful?
It’s almost like the government wants to create an entire workforce of drones who lack initiative, ideas, hard work, etc. Hmm. Sounds familiar.
Years ago I started going to a Mexican restaurant in the town where I was attending college. The food was good and they had what I thought was a clever way of letting the wait staff know if you needed them… a small flagpole in each table with a red flag. If you wanted your waiter or waitress, you simple raised the flag. The system worked nicely for both the staff and the customers.
Anyway, when it came time to tip, my waitress told me she could not accept the tip. Instead, customers were supposed to place tips in a tip jar at the front of the restaurant and the tips would be distributed equally amongst the entire staff. I said to her, “you’ve provided great service, but without naming names I have been watching another waitress who has not provided anywhere near the service to her customers that you’ve given to us. Are you telling me that, at the end of the night, she receives the same amount of money in tips that you do?” She confirmed this. I then offered to give her the tip “under the table”, and she told me she could not accept it. Not wanting to get her in trouble, I understood. I placed my tip in the tip jar, but I never went back to that restaurant again.
Fitting that it was a RED flag…
The Communist ideology in action. Either the second waitress had determined that she didn’t need to work as hard to receive the same compensation (tips) as the hard-working waitress, or she was lazy from the get-go and complained to the owner about the “Unfairness” of receiving less in tips from the hard worker.
Either way, I’d wager that the hard working waitress didn’t stay long in that job…
Tips used to be 10% so as prices rose then tips rose, but % stayed the same. Of course as more people dipped into the tip pool then of course the % had to rise. So, tip % rose to 12% then 15% and now 18% and now approaching 20% as more person get their share. Pretty soon the stock boys will be getting a piece of the tips. All to get out of paying them minimum wage which is getting pushed to $15/hr and hurting owners. This is a way of cutting real owner costs and transfer it to customers as they can pay less if workers get tips. Truth in tips should become disclosed to customers to make sure you know who you are really tipping and how much.
Good show, guys! Like you, I can’t fathom the reasoning behind lobbying the government for approval of something that is already in effect. Some lawyer must be whispering in these restaurant owner’s ears. Government has way too much say already in our business and personal affairs.
My general practice is to tip 20% if the service is good and possibly not at all if it isn’t. By bad service I mean utter negligence on the part of the server and/or a surly attitude. I don’t make that assessment lightly, but if my dining experience was less than the low bar of just okay, and the serve was part of the problem that affects whether I tip, how much or not at all.
Since I don’t believe in the mask mandates, I’ve had my groceries shopped and delivered by a service like Instacart a number of times. I tip 20% and on top of that a cash tip $5-10 (depending on the size of the order) put inside a small thank you card to give to the delivery person. By the time fees, taxes, delivery charge, tip and the extra cash is added up my $150 food has cost me an extra $50 or $60. Besides being worth the convenience, I also believe that the worker deserves the tip beyond what the service pays. I appreciate what they do, and they are taking some risk in performing the service.
I generally try to tip 20% regardless. You never know if the staff is just having a bad day/week/month. If there’s a problem, I’ll try to address it directly to them or their manager in an encouraging way. That usually results in better attitudes the next time I’m there.
I worked in a restaurant in New York in the late 70s as a teen. They pooled the tips. While I was working there, the management told us that there was a new rule put in place such that they could not pool tips any more. They implied that it was a government rule. Since I was not a waiter, my pay was cut because of this. I found a better paying job shortly after that.
Let me first make clear that I worked in a UK restaurant where the law mandates a decentish minimum wage for workers. Tips were a bonus on top, not a way to make up your wage deficit.
That aside, some customers did tip us, and we worked hard for those tips, giving excellent service to earn them. Those who gave better service got bigger tips than those who couldn’t be bothered to put the effort in.
We were supposed to share the tips and then get an even distribution of the amount at the end of the night, but I’ll make it quite clear right now that when someone gave me a £20 note because of my hard work, it went in my pocket and didn’t see daylight again until I was home.
One of the waiters had to organise the bussers each night which meant being in the kitchen and not getting tips, which is why that was rotated each night to a different person.
As for kitchen staff, the pot-washers never got tips but they did get surplus food from the kitchen. You took the job with the relevant perks.
There is no excuse for picking a man’s pocket from his own hard work, based on some ‘fairness and equality’ nonsense. I work harder than you do and thus earn more tips: now that’s fair.
Don’t the dishwashing and janitors get paid more than wait staff who are paid a meager pay as they have tips considered into what they earn?
Yes, usually the dishwashers, etc. get at least minimum wage. The wait staff have to make up their wage in tips. They usually get $2.30 ‘ish per hour + tips and dishwasher (depending on the state) get $7.25 or more per hour.
If the restaurant has a slow night, money is tight because of lockdowns, or you just get customers who leave very little tip, wait staff may not make up that $5 or more an hour gap.
My mom and sister were wait staff for a while. They had lots of stories about their experiences.
If dishwashers need to be paid more, then the OWNER should pay them directly. Bureaucrats permitting owners to rob wait-staff (who already get lower-than-minimum-wage-compensation) is just more trickle-down fascism…
I can report that there are places where the owners do pay the dishwashers decently and give regular bonuses as well. I have a learning-disabled daughter who washes dishes at a pizza place. They pay her well, they give regular bonuses to all their employees and they also share tips. They treat her with dignity and respect. Blessings on these good folks.
It’s been awhile since I ate at a place you tip at. If good service, they get 20%. Excellent service, more.(depends). If awful service I leave a penny. Leaving nothing may mean I forgot, but leaving a penny says “I didn’t forget, and your service stunk.” Only once did I ever complain to a manager. … Who also did not seem to care. “Well, we were busy”. Multiple people who came in after me got their food even before my order was taken. Wait staff was chit chatting with customers. Had 1/2 hr. to eat, (and they were told this. Not a problem before).” Got it cold with 4 minutes left. Order was wrong. No Apology. No money back. Gave horrible review on Yelp, never went back.
I had a meal once where they messed up my order, then I had to wait like 20 mins. extra to get it fixed, then when I got it the food wasn’t very good at all.
I did complain to the manager. He offered me a free meal card! I was irritated. No $ off my messed up bill.
Now why would I want to get a free meal from a place that can’t get my order right and the food isn’t very good? Crazy. Never went back.
The place I mentioned had good food. It tended to be very busy as it was near many businesses with about 4 fast food nearby, and was one of two non fast food nearby. Black and blue burger was excellent… Except for above. They forgot the blue cheese. Nasty without it, especially cold. Couldn’t even complain in person, I had to get back to work. I called it later, on hold a long time. Twice. Got hung up on the first time. No apology, no attempt to make it right. Told them about doing a bad review. They did not seem to care.