Should you be required by law to pay a gratuity if you don’t think the restaurant’s service was worth it? The police in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania think so, and they arrested two college students for refusing to pay a $16.35 tip over what they claim was poor service. Update 11/23/09: the charges will be dropped.
“You can’t give us terrible, terrible service and expect a tip,” said Pope, a 22-year-old Moravian College senior who’s a Pottsville native, according to the Lehigh Valley Express-Times.
They had to find their own napkins and cutlery while their waitress caught a smoke, had to ask the bar for soda refills, and had to wait over an hour for salad and wings, they told NBC10.
The pub, which was very busy that night, took the $73, but then called the cops, who treated the matter as a theft.
“College students arrested for not paying tip” [Philly.com] (Thanks to WinShape!)
(Photo: BLW Photography)
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Oh, no – they SHOULD have left a tip: one dime. That way you make your displeasure known, ensure that you just didn’t skip out on leaving a tip and get the point home about shitty service.
Brilliant!
@El_Fez:
NO! Leaving a dime, or penny, or tiny amount of change is the WORST thing you can do. If you unhappy with the service, and really feel as though it warranted no gratuity, you should leave nothing. Period. Leave nothing, but before you leave, inform the manager that you have decided to leave no gratuity because the service was terrible.
That way, you aren’t a jerk, and you have justified your decision.
@orange20854: if you leave nothing they may believe you just forgot. if you leave a couple pennies they know they were shitty and will do better next time.
@orange20854: I have used this int he past and I will use in the future when I believe it is warranted.
Works only with a paper napkin: Write
“TIP”
“In the future if you would like money for your tip please try using better customer service.”
@El_Fez: Leaving a dime or another small amount wouldnt have mattered in a place like this that adds 18% to the bill. Leaves you no choice but to pay it whether the service sux or not. The wife and I NEVER patronize a place with mandatory tipping. Where’s the incentive for good service? We do tip 25%+ when we go out if the service is good.
@brandymb: went to a TGIF in St. Louis with a couple of employees, didn’t notice the sign that said “18% gratuity automatically added to parties of 6 or more or totals of $75 or higher” Of course after several rounds, appetizers, and meals, I get the bill and notice the “auto grat” on it. Now I typically tip 20% for good service, I questioned the server, and she was apologetic about it. I told her that I hoped TGIF’s policy was working to her advantage because she just lost 2% on my tip.
And yes I realize there are people who say I shouldn’t have screwed the waitress for the restaurants policy, but she is also the one benefiting from the policy in cases where people might only tip 15%. If she feels she’s getting screwed by their policy then find another place to work, or talk to management about changing it.
I find it odd that this is considered a criminal rather than a civil matter. I guess the menu/receipt said a tip is automatically added to the bill, but still….
@heismanpat: When you put it that way, it sounds like a hidden fee & not a tip.
it sounds like a hidden fee & not a tip
@statgrad: Exactly. If it’s required then it IS a fee.
@Difdi: MTE
@heismanpat:
Theft of services, and yes, it is a crime. If it was made clear on the menu that the service charge wasn’t optional, then leaving without paying it is no different than leaving without paying a part of the bill at any restaurant.
@NeverLetMeDown: It really depends on how it was mentioned.
“18 percent gratuity added to check of parties of 6 of more”
Is what the story stated.
So the bar was basically saying that they are adding an optional 18% fee on to the check.
[www.merriam-webster.com]
It is defined as “something given voluntarily or beyond obligation usually for some service”
The kids were not ini the wrong here, the bar added something OPTIONAL to the check.
@SonicMan: That is exactly what I was thinking. If you read the statement “an 18 percent gratuity will be added to the check of parties of 6 of more” in plain English, it says that an 18% optional charge for good service will be added to your check if there are at least 6 people in your party. If gratuity means optional by definition, then not paying it isn’t a crime. If it were worded differently, something like “an 18 percent service fee will be added to the check of parties of 6 of more”
Any lawyer worth his salt will successfully argue this point in court. The language isn’t even vague, it’s pretty clear. If the owner’s INTENT or MEANING of the word differs, that is not the client’s problem.
@NeverLetMeDown: Do you pay for services you never received?
@statgrad: I do, it’s called “my income and property taxes”
@heismanpat: i have never seen this on a menu other than the larger than 8 in a party. but if i got a bill with an added gratuity, and was not told about this before i ordered, i would not pay it either. if i went to a place that had that, i would never have ordered, and found somewhere else to eat. you have to work for your tips, this whole generation of entitlement makes me sick. and i am only 30.
i tip 10 to 15% for decent service and %20 – 30% for excellent service. terrible gets pennies, but you have to be really bad for that, like the guy chatting up the clearly under age girls in the booth behind us, for a long time before getting my wife her coffee. he got a penny.
@heismanpat: I’m just trying to understand why only 2 people were arrested out of this party of 6. What happened to the other 4? Did 4 pay the gratuity and these 2 not pay? Did 4 leave and these 2 got stuck with the cops? Also, 18% of $73 is not $16.35. Was this just their share of the total bill? One of the stories circulating on this says that the manager offered to comp some of the meals, which makes me wonder why, if they were willing to comp some of the meals, they made an issue of 16 dollars.
@windycity: I’m getting stuck on the math as well. That’s well over 20% for the tip on $73.
Looks like the establishment has been sent to Yelp hell, with a large number of 1-star reviews popping on there today.
@rpm773: Hahaha there’s a picture of handcuffs on the Yelp page.
Brilliant.
I know a lot of people in the service industry here in Detroit and from their stories (especially tables paying in casino comps) they’d love to be able to call the cops on the “2 dollars for bad service” and “5 dollars for good service” flat tippers/no tippers.
However, I hardly see how this is a crime so long as they paid what was quoted on their bill. If they had left a dime would that have been enough to satisfy the police?
@Enduro: See, that’s the problem. They didn’t pay what was quoted on their bill because the “gratuity” was added onto the bill.
The best solution would have been to get up and go to another establishment once they saw the automatic gratuity listed on the menu. Of course, it’s one thing to just vow to never return to a place that has mandatory tipping (as I do), and it’s an entirely different thing to actually get up before ordering and go elsewhere.
@witeowl: Good luck finding places that don’t automatically add on gratuity for “large” parties in many places.
The distiction between “gratuity” and “service fee” isn’t trivial.
@witeowl: when they saw that, they may have thought there would have been service. There was no service.
It’s like getting an oil change and paying full price to later find out they didn’t change out the filter.
You already signed up for something and didn’t get what was promised. Ok, maybe good service isn’t promised but if they’re adding 18%….it sure as hell is expected.
this is ridiculous. if it’s not optional then it’s not a tip, it’s a service fee. if it’s a service fee then there should have been service. you wouldn’t pay for an empty glass if you ordered a soda.
@Elcheecho: New York has had two cases that I know of, both times the restaurant has had to back down because they used the improper language on the menu and bill.
NYS has basically said that a Gratuity can not be mandatory unless there is a signed contract involved. A service fee can be demanded based on menu disclaimer, but not a gratuity. Mandatory gratuity is a contradiction in terms no matter how you slice it.
In the first case the restaurant settled out-of-court after the person countersued for libel and false arrest with a 10k donation to a charity. In the other a public apology was given.
Tag Win.
“It’s Not Really A Tip, Then, Is It?”
Pretty much sums it up.
And I’d continue with that since it’s not really a tip/gratuity, but more of a ‘service charge’ then couldn’t it be argued that these restaurants are engaging in false-advertising?
What law did they charge them with?
@Telekinesis123: A commenter on Yelp brought up a point – there’s already legal precedent that they did not break any laws:
[www.nytimes.com]
@DoubleEcho: You’re assuming that the law in Lake George, NY is the same as in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
@DoubleEcho: Very interesting, thank you.
gratuity – 1. a gift of money, over and above payment due for service, as to a waiter or bellhop; tip. 2. something given without claim or demand.
As long as there are college students, there will be upset waitresses getting stiffed on a tip.
After all, there is beer to be bought.
@RandomHookup: Yes, plenty of Newcastle.
@Telekinesis123: If it were my call, yes. Unfortunately, the budget-conscious student goes toward PBR and Natty Light. In my day, it was “Beer” and “Light Beer” in a white can with bold black lettering.
@RandomHookup: I was told by a former waitress last night that it’s actually teenagers and old people that usually stiff them on the tip. She said people in their 20′s are usually the best tippers.
@Nicole: Probably a lot of them either have been or know someone who has worked as a waiter.
@RandomHookup:
I’m a college student and I paid a Jimmy John’s delivery guy a $5 tip for no reason at all.
@jarhead906: I hope he at least delivered your subs.
@jarhead906: I’m a college student and I paid a Jimmy John’s delivery guy a $5 tip for a handjob in the back of his Cavalier.
/fixed
//bored
@RandomHookup: Based on my experience as a recent college grad (well, ’05, I guess I’m getting on in years now), in school we were typically excellent tippers. Because it was often we who were manning those kinds of posts ourselves when we weren’t studying. My buddy delivered pizzas and he said the best tips were from college students, and the worst, were from old folks who lived in rich-looking homes.
They should have left a note on the bill – WILL NOT PAY TIP, TERRIBLE SERVICE. This way the place knows there was bad service. However, if the menu and bill clearly say a tip is automatic on larger groups, they are going to be assumed to have agreed to those terms by eating there, and so will probably be legally on the hook for this.
That’s insane. And the tag is right. If you have to pay it, and most certainly if you can be arrested for not paying it, it’s not a “tip”.
While they might have “agreed” to pay the 18% gratuity by eating there (which I think is asinine personally), didn’t the restaurant agree to provide a reasonable quality of service in return and fail to do so? That makes it even more disgusting that they’re trying to extort a service fee for a service that they failed to provide.
If this were any other kind of product or service, would you write it off as acceptable for them to charge you full price for the service delivered while not providing the service that you paid for? Why the double-standard for waitstaff?
Did the menu say that a “Gratuity would automatically be added for a table of 6″ or something along those lines?
If so then when they sat down and ordered they agreed to that automatically added gratuity. And since it is added to the bill, then when they didn’t pay the gratuity they didn’t pay the entire bill. They essentially ran out on part of the bill.
I don’t agree with automatic gratuities. But when you agree to them, then you must pay them.
If the service was that bad then it was their responsibility to speak with the manager and work it out with him. Not decide not to pay and walk out on part of their bill.
@Boulderite:
Which is why I will never eat at a place that forces that on you. I tip based on quality of service provided. I have even personally tipped the cook before. If you as a restaurant is trying to force me to tip a certain amount, I just won’t do any business with you. Otherwise they can just give you bad service and still get the same amount which in itself is atrocious.
Maybe I am old-fashioned, but a person shouldn’t get more than they deserve. Also, one must prove their worth, not have it set in stone.
Yet another reason why I love living in Japan (when I do). In Japan, excellent customer service is simply what is expected from everyone, customers and employee alike, no matter what the business is.
I have been actually chased down in Tokyo by waiters/waitresses for leaving a tip behind when I left the restaurant.
They gave the tip back. Gratuity is bullshit.
@Atheist Jew: Yeah, but the wages are higher compared to American waitstaff? Can’t really compare Japan to the US.
@hypnotik_jello: I think he was comparing, the two systems. In Japan they pay and expect good service, no tips. Here we have a system that doesn’t work anymore.
@Atheist Jew: When I lived over there, a group of friends and I told a waiter to keep the change from our bill, then basically sprinted out of the restaurant to avoid him giving it back. They probably divvied it up amongst the entire staff- one yen for everybody!
I agree that not having to worry about tipping is much more pleasant, though.
@FaustianSlip: @FaustianSlip: @FaustianSlip: @u1itn0w2day: @u1itn0w2day: I have no issue with this. It is not an expectation but if you have the spare change and want to toss it in you can. It is obviously optional. I don’t see what the issue is.
Even if the place automatically charges gratuity to large parties, the customer can adjust the gratuity amount to whatever amount they want. If it’s a service charge, that may count as theft. I think the police are in the wrong here.
At what point are the police culpable for false arrest… it would seem the case here… Unless there is some notice that ALL bills will have added to it a gratuity, tipping is completely at the patron’s discretion. The cops should have their butts sued to high heaven…
Look at these reviews on Yelp:
[www.yelp.com]
I’m from PA, about an hour from Bethlehem. I heard there was some sort of incident and the *couple* called the cops. FWIW.
I would have been a smartass and asked that they split the check six ways.
This happen to a group I was in once… we basically told the manager he could either get the full amount (including the automatic tip on the bill) and never see any of us in there again, or we were not paying the full tip (horrible service).
I’ve left a 100% tip when the service warranted it. And I’ve left a handful of pennies. If the restaurant leaves it up to me the wait staff will get the tip they’ve earned.
If we’ve got to have this stupid system of giving money to wait staff to reward the service they’ve provided, then we should be allowed to do exactly that.
Isn’t there a lower limit on charges for theft? I thought it had to be at least $20 or something for civil matters…? And I think the police here should be held MORE accountable than the restaurant. Coming to see the situation is one thing, but actual arrest of the patrons…they should be reprimanded for this!
@db4dbms:
There is no lower limit on theft charges in Pennsylvania. I have seen at least one person charged (she pleaded guilty, incidentally) for stealing two tootsie rolls.
I can’t think of ANY sit down restaurants in the DC metro area that don’t automatically add an 18% tip to the bill for large (usually defined as 6 or more) parties. But, I’ve also known plenty of people who asked to have the automatic tip removed when the service was poor, and never heard of anyone having a problem. I’ve done this myself, once. Another time I would have done so, but we’d spoken to someone during the meal, and when the bill came our drinks had been comped, so we figured it came out to about the same thing.
If the restaurant accepted the payment, and the payment was in full including tax other than the tip, it’s insane that the restaurant would then call the cops.
Of special interest: In Georgia (at least), it is illegal to verbally solicit a tip.
Also of special interest: The “X% Gratuity will be added to parties of Y or more” has less to do with your specific waiter than it has to do with the additional work often required by waitstaff and cleaning crews to clean up after a larger group of people. Small groups of diners tend to clean up after themselves, for the most part, but larger groups frequently *destroy* their table and the surrounding area.
If it is mandatory, it’s a fee, and not a gratuity. A tip is something extra I give to show my appreciation of the quality of service (and NOT the food!).
I NEVER tip bad waiters or waitresses, with the hope that they will quit and be replaced by somneone who is good and actually cares about QoS.
If this make me sound harsh, I am not: I an an understanding, agreeable customer. If there are delays in the kitchen, and I am told – that’s OK. I have worked in and owned restaurants, I know that these things happen. I don’t ask for much, but it is depressing hopw often I don’t even get that.
As for payscale: A good waiter or waitress will make a good amount of tip and a decent living out of this hard work. What mandatory tipping means is that the lousy slackers now have no incentive whatsoever to be good.
Eventually – clients do not come back. THe restaurant starts making less money, then closes. And the GOOD staff lose their jobs along the bad ones.
This reminds me of the airlines tacking on extra fees for busy travel times, and they’re being investigated by the government now, because they don’t collect taxes on those fees.
If a restaurant makes tipping mandatory, then it’s part of the cost of the meal, and they should also have to charge taxes on it. I think that might make more people take notice…
I usually just pay the “mandatory gratuity”, and not a penny more. If a restaurant can’t trust me to leave a tip based on the service they provide, then I will respond by paying exactly what they think their service is worth. Obviously I won’t eat in a place that has a 50% gratuity…but who would?
For those commenters who seem to imply the tip is compensation for a poor wage, why not campaign for that to be stated clearly on the menu: “A 10% mandatory poor salary compensation fee will be added; for tables of six or over, this will be 20%”
It would inject a degree of honesty into the situation for the wait-staff, the diners (i.e. the public at large) and especially the restaurant owners.
Tip… Definition: give a tip or gratuity to in return for a service, beyond the compensation agreed on; “Remember to tip the waiter”; “fee the steward”
Mandatory Tip… Definition: A tax levied on customers/clients to subsidize or pay in full the wages of employees. Alternately, a scam by scumbag employers to scoop more cash out of the pockets of their clients in the guise of rewarding “good service”. Alternately, A tax levied on customers/clients to subsidize or pay in full the wages of employees who no longer have any incentive to actually provide decent service to the client.
Making a “tip” mandatory ensures that service is optional.
First and foremost, if you can’t afford to tip then you can’t afford to eat out.
Secondly, by requiring a tip there is no incentive for the server to offer good service. Waiting tables well is hard work. But if you have guaranteed money coming from one table it is only human nature to slack a little. I’m sure there will be arguments against this but only comment/reply if you have actually waited tables.
I am sure Lehigh Pub in Bethlehem is going to love being in internet hell.
This will never stand up in court. I can’t believe that the police actually followed thru with it.
“Pope and Wagner, members of a party of eight during happy hour, refused to pay a $16.35 service charge on top of their $73.87 tab because of what they say was shoddy service as well as a surcharge that was nearly 5 percent higher than the 18 percent listed on the menu.”
Who committed “theft” here?
snipped from
[www.lehighvalleylive.com]
There also seems to be some confusion as to if there was food comped in response to complaints.
I wonder if they comped something in a way that it wasn’t deducted from the gratuity. If they were so busy they couldn’t get a salad and some wings out in under an hour, I’m willing to bet the students looked at it and said f this and refused to pay it rather than wait for them to get their “stuff” together and fix it.
The fact the amount charged was more than the “posted mandatory” will destroy their case.
Gratuities are voluntary by definition
[en.wikipedia.org]
The local DA not be happy when he gets this one. It will never make it to court.
Karma has been balanced. If this has been on the local news then they’ve lost much more business than the lousy tip came to. I’m sure the case will either be dropped or they judge will fine them the 18% and leave it at that.
I think there’s way more to this story than the 3 paragraph blurb the newspaper article provided.
I would have complained to the manager before I left the ‘mandatory’ tip off…we don’t know if they did that or not.
Either way I won’t be eating there, and me thinks the bad publicity they’re getting will shut them down.
What is called for here is a mass boycott / sit in attack where people order food, then leave, or sit there refusing to pay anything at all, or refusing to order.
On separate notes:
1. I am thrilled to see this place has been SLAMMED on yelp.com with hundreds of bad reviews since the story came out .
2. The victims need to hire the ACLU to sue this place for everything they are worth. Their freedom of speech was violated – because that is what a tip is – your feedback, and you have a RIGHT not to leave one. Restaurants cannot legally require them.
In college, a group of five of my friends and I went to a local Greek restaurant. None of us were unruly or rude or asked for anything special, and the automatic gratuity was only on parties of eight or more. During the entire night we received horrible service. No drinks refilled, wrong orders given, rude waiters, and when we asked for our check, they brought out one overcharging us by about $40 first. Once they fixed that, they refused to split the check for us (they had done it before), so one person had to pay for it all.
As we were all college students, we were not very well off, and this meant that the person paying did not have a lot of money to leave for a tip. They left what they could, and we didn’t really care that it wasn’t a lot because of the amazingly poor service (I usually tip at least 20%, for the record). We were then chased out of the restaurant by the owner and told never to come back.
Good times!
At my restaurant and others I know, the grat. will be taken off the ticket if the customer complains about it. At mine it is added for parties of eight or more. I did work with someone who didn’t try as hard on big tops like those.
What I don’t understand is why the cops arrested both Pope and Wagner, but not the other four people in their party. Not that I think they should have been arrested. I just don’t understand the logic in arresting the person that paid the bill excluding the tip along with their significant other.
I’ll tip great if my service is great, but when they try and slip this fee on my bill i will give them what they ask for, which will be less then what i would left on the table.
This is actually old news. There’s the famous case (wish I could find it) of the group of lawyers sued by a restaurant for not paying a “mandatory” gratuity. By its very word, the word gratuity means gratuitious, or at discretion of patron, there are definitions all over the place about the word and its meaning:
“Something given voluntarily or beyond obligation, usually in response to or in anticipation of service.”
Then there’s the website that cites the (as of yet, then) unpublished decision in CA:
[forum.freeadvice.com]
Just because a restaurant puts in their menu doesn’t make it enforceable. Matter of fact in NY, if you protest the gratuity being added, they take it off. More people are inclined to leave more, just the slimier places think that by adding it, that some customers won’t realize that a tip was already automatically added and they add MORE so instead of the “mandatory” 18% now the restaurant is getting somewhere in the neighborhood of 35%.
@amberlink: I thnk you’re looking for this one – a Yelp commenter posted it.
[www.nytimes.com]
It used to be that not tipping meant the lousy waitstaff takes home a little less cash. But now, not tipping gets you arrested and gets nationwide bad publicity for the restaurant in question. Interesting how the internet has changed things.
Tips should never be required. The kids have got a case, I think.
When will people learn that a businesses’ policy is not the law?
When the Lehigh Pub in Bethlehem goes out of business, they’ll know how stupid they were. If I were the owner, the manager or whoever called police would be fired.
I think tipping for service should be optional. But if you go to a place that clearly states on the menu that an automatic amount is added to the bill for parties of some many then you are basically agreeing to the charge. If you order an item off the menu that is clearly priced a certain amount and you do not like it you don’t usually have the option of paying less than the listed price…bottom line is we should avoid places that charge this automatic service fee….
Hmmm. That’s outrageous.
leave without paying next time. just get up and walk out.
It looks to me as though the management took advantage of “college students”. If it were someone my age, maybe they would have been more open-minded and would have known better than to call the cops. In fact, I would have encouraged them to call the cops because this is BS. There has to be more to this story because you cannot get arrested for not tipping. That is just plain ridiculous.
I guess this means that if you get lousy service, not only should you not leave a tip but that you should also walk out on the bill entirely. I would have left within the first hour when the food didn’t show up.