Tips on credit cards - do staff get them?

daymobrew

My wife mentioned an article she read (sorry, no other details) that said many restaurants don't pass tips onto staff, especially when the tips are added to the credit card bill.
Any one know if this is true? How widespread? A myth?

Blub2k4

This is mostly true, there are rumours about a staff kitty that no one ever sees mostly.
This happened me once when I was serving Roger Whittaker in the UK, his manager signed off on the bill and added +£20 on the bottom ( effectively the same as a cc payment as it went on the total room bill, I said arse, that's 20 quid gone. Not being happy with this situation I went back to him and said "Sir it appears that you have made an error, what's this"? (pointing at +20 entry)
He said "it's a tip" at which point Roger Whittaker said "so you wont get that", turned to manager and said "Give him cash".
Was a nice one.
was 20 quid at the end of the day.

liamo

I eat out quite frequently and never add a tip to the bill. Since I first heard reports - a number of years go - that these may not reach the staff I have always tipped with cash.

Additionally, if a specific member of staff looks after my table for the evening, I am reluctant to leave a tip on the table in case an unscrupulous member of staff (other than our server) pockets the tip while cleaning the table. I will generally give it directly to the server.

Anyone working in this industry care to comment? How does the tipping generally work in Ireland? Are the tips all divided up equally (or according to some agreed scheme)? Or does each member of staff keep his/her own tips? What happens when one member of staff picks up a tip from a table that s/he wasn't serving?

Regards,

Liam

slave1

I always pay by cc, tip in cash to server

garthv

I worked in a bar in town for about a year and a half and the day staff there had a system by where all the tips where chucked into a jar and divided evenly by the end of the shift
When it came to cc tips for bar staff we put our name on the top of the receipt and were given the tip at the end of the night

Blisterman

I was just given the tip out of the bill. If you ask for cash back, and add a tip to the bill, though, the tip won't go through, so don't do that.

dudara

The staff don't receive the tip in a lot of restaurants. Always leave cash if you want the staff to get it. When you think about it, it's extra work for the restaurant to total the tips on credit card slips, take the money from the till and return it to staff. Much easier to pocket it.