Tipping is a heavily debated topic
While in many countries tipping isn’t customary due to servers getting higher wages from the restaurant, in America tipping is necessary to ensure restaurant servers are paid fairly.
Additionally, some people think that diners should not have to tip servers, while other people argue that people should tip even more than what they already do.
But at one diner, this tipping conundrum took on a different light when one mother realized that her favorite diner was adding automatic gratuities to her daughter’s bill.
Charged extra for being a teen
The Desch family has been going to their local diner for years.
In Wayne, New Jersey, one of their favorite things to do is go to the diner. Melissa and her daughter Bella like to go to the diner and have some good food and see familiar faces.
In all their years of going to this diner, Melissa’s bill has always included a note at the bottom that says “gratuities are appreciated!”
That’s pretty standard at restaurants, but something else has started happening.
Different bill for different folks
Recently, 11-year old Bella went to the diner with her friends and noticed something different.
Bella and some friends went to the Wayne Hills Diner to get milkshakes and have kid fun. At the end of their night, Bella sent a photo of her receipt to her mother.
Coincidentally, Melissa had been at the diner earlier that day and noticed that something was different with Bella’s receipt than with hers.
There was a gratuity added on at the bottom of her total. The same was true of all of her friends’ bills as well.
Mom wanted answers
Melissa felt that this was unjust and wanted to get to the bottom of this immediately. What on earth was going on at her family’s favorite diner?
Taking advantage
For Melissa, the lack of choice and the fact that this tax was only being given to people in a certain age group rubbed her the wrong way.
Bella tips using cash
She did this for her all her meals, which means that when she wasn’t paying attention she actually ended up tipping twice for her meal. First the automatic “gratuity”, then in cash.
The diner’s attorney made an excuse that wasn’t really satisfactory to Melissa.
Mom Melissa wanted answers
The attorney for the Wayne Hills Diner said that this added gratuity is because huge groups of teenagers show up for an hour or two, order very little food, and often don’t tip.
This gratuity for young people is the restaurant’s way of trying to make the situation fairer for their servers, who get paid in tips and need that money to survive.
This restaurant has been hitting a lot of teenagers with a tax, and the Desch family is fed up.
Fair for servers, but not for teens.
Although the restaurant does state on the menu “management reserves the right to add 18% gratuity”, Melissa is still angry about the situation.
She feels that if they are going to add gratuities, they should do it for every bill. She says she won’t be returning to the diner because she believes they are unjustly targeting teens.
What do you think of all this?
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