The one where the waitress added in her own tip
Over the weekend, my boyfriend took me to Whistler for my birthday. We went zip lining and had lunch at a pub in Whistler Village beforehand. Well, because we were in a rush to pay for the meal, Nic was distracted and forgot to add in a tip on the receipt. Not only that, but he forgot to write in the total after tip either. So basically he left those two lines on the receipt blank. He didn’t realize what he had done until it was too late, and we didn’t have time to turn around. But we figured we’d head over there after zip lining and write in a tip amount.
After tax, and without tip, the bill came to $34.70.
When we went back to the pub about 3 hours later, Nic spoke to the waitress who said there was no way to call up an invoice that was already closed. Fair enough. He said he would run out and grab some cash to tip her instead, but she said not to worry about it. Nic had a weird feeling about the whole conversation, and when we went back outside, he checked his account balance on my iPhone. His suspicions were right, because we saw that he was charged $39.70 for lunch.
Meaning, she wrote in a $5 tip for herself!
Okay, granted, we left without giving her a tip (and obviously she didn’t know we were going to come back to tip her), but still. She has some nerve!
1) While tipping is generally common practice, it is not mandatory – maybe we thought her service was lousy (it wasn’t).
2) Is that even legal for a waitress to write in her own tip on somebody’s receipt!? I’m pretty sure that’s called STEALING.
And I’d say the name of the pub, but apparently the last time I complained about a waitress at a restaurant on this blog, the manager fired her (read the comments). And while I’m outraged and pissed off, I don’t want anyone to lose their job over $5. Even though it is extremely lame to steal from customers.
79 Responses to “The one where the waitress added in her own tip”
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If she did that to you how many others has she done that to. She could have quite the little racquet going here. Is it worth reporting if it is $50 bucks a day….you bet.
I’m sure that’s illegal, right?
Amanda L Grossman´s latest post —> Frugal Confessions – Frugal Living
Yes, it definitely is. It has to be, it’s stealing!
[...] fantastic enough to deserve the $5 that was left. I am shocked. A similar thing happened to Krystal from Give Me Back My Five Bucks. I thought it was a rarity. I was [...]
[...] on the etiquette surrounding tipping, and the service industry in general. The first, was “The one where the waitress added in her own tip,” where there was a lot of debate, but the general conclusion was that she was definitely [...]
I’m not sure how I came across this so after the fact, but since your question about its legality doesn’t seem to have been properly answered in the comments, I figured I’d pipe in.
Yes, it is DEFINITELY illegal and it’s totally credit card fraud. A waitress is required by law to submit whatever is printed on the “total” line of a credit card receipt, regardless of any other factors. Even if the “total” line gives her no tip—or is a mistake! (If there’s no tip, then the “total” is the printed total on the receipt, as would have been the case for you guys.)
For instance, If it was a $30 bill, and you left her a $5 tip, but wrote $33 in the total line, because your math is horrible for some reason, then she would HAVE to take the $33 total, even though you’d clearly intended her to have a $5 tip. One time when I was waitressing, a customer accidentally left me a $150 tip (I’m a good waitress, but not that good! Should have been more like $50) and I ended up running out of the store after him, so he could change it. If I hadn’t caught him, I would have had to, by law, process the large tip. And I would have felt horrible!
Melissa´s latest post —> Throwing money at a problem. Or, the dead pigeon saga