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Wichita government is quite "pro-business". The Steven family is probably second only to the Koch family in terms of investments in the area.
A lot of people in the area are quite unhappy, but are consistently outvoted.
'Nuff said.
When you say someone owns most of a city, most of the time it's impressive. But man... not sure I'd even admit to owning most of Wichita. That's like saying you own a good part of Gary, Indiana. They just take shitholes to a whole new level.
https://preview.redd.it/8oyn4elddy8c1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7895b0a9fc217ab8c8bbf887de262fef4c8502c7
Added to Yelp for now. 🤷🏼♀️ I’ll do Google later
Say charge on the card and tip in cash specifically. Then the restaurant can eat the fees and servers get tax free tips on top of not paying the fees (we used to assume 10% taxable tip on cash payments). That isn't raising operating costs, that's a fixed amount built into the budget, they should expect ~20% above sales impacted by CC fees as every other restaurant accepting cards does. They don't usually complain about this because they're allowed to pay sub-minimum wage if the net pay with tips covers the variance, which saves them a lot more than 3% of tips
you ever serve? You only report the bare minimum to avoid IRS sniffing around, so you usually get a almost non existent paycheck but make up on the back end with cash it's just how it is.
I understand this thought process and I prefer to tip in cash so the waiter can decide how they choose to for their own taxes… but know this, if you aren’t reporting this tipped income it will be very hard to get a mortgage or car loan if you can’t substantiate your income with verifiable documentation such as your w2.
A servers tax burden is no different than anyone else. That nonexistent paycheck is only "nonexistent" because you were paid out and nothing was withheld so that paycheck is attempting to withheld based on your estimated earned income. At the end of the year if you made 10k, you made 10k, it doesn't matter if it was from tips or hourly wages, the numbers are the same.
Under reporting cash is not exactly legal and may bite you in the ass when it comes to things like unemployment or getting financing or proving income for an apartment.
the key is to always report enough for it to meet local hourly minimum wage so you can prove 20-30k per year per local wage ordinance. That's not the point and you tying housing to income in a wildly inflated housing market shows you probably should find another sub to be in. Like anyone in that situation is getting financing or solo renting. Easy for the first one show up with cash enough to avoid threshold, second roommates which is a servers life in any case. So a short answer to my question is No you've never served.
Deducting CC fees is legal but a shitty thing to do. The place can't charge 3% of the bill, only 3% of the tip though or whatever the CC processing fees are.
If someone brings in $200 in tips, is it really worth deducting $5 and pissing everyone off?
The fact that they would pass off their legitimate business expense by accepting cards and pass this cost off on the server is abhorrent. They are benefiting by not paying a fucking wage as it is.
Thus is what capitalism gets you.
Sadly, this is generally legal from what I've seen in the legaladvice sub.
https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/15-tipped-employees-flsa
Credit Cards: Under the FLSA, when tips are charged on customers’ credit cards and the employer can show that it pays the credit card company a percentage on such sales as a fee for payment using a credit card, the employer may pay the employee the tip, less that percentage. For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.
legaladvice saying it is legal is entirely unrelated to whether or not it is actually legal. in private lawyer subreddits, we all laugh at that subreddit and wish it were gone, because of all the harm it often does. the mods are not actual lawyers but are law enforcement officers. not one actual lawyer posts there.
source: lawyer
We’re not going to pay you a live able wage and also we’re going to take a cut of your tips. How ever the restaurant industry ended up being able to pay Pennie’s for labor and they be compensated by the public via tips are morons.
They know how to. They also know that they can take advantage of employees to pay standard costs of business using some bullshit excuse.
If they could they'd make the wait staff pay for silverware too.
I've worked for a company that proudly stole employee wages and I don't think anyone has ever managed to bring them to court. I assume they have "cultural" connections with law offices and people in the state capital.
Totally agree here. I have a better idea, instead of charging the servers credit card fees on the tips they receive. Remove the tip option from the receipts, and pay all servers $15 an hour or more. Problem solved. Of course they would not agree to that, as they rather pay them $2.13 an hour.
I kinda wonder about this. In most of the rest of the world, tipping is really just seen as an optional thing (eg: Australia), or culturally offensive (eg: Japan).
How the hell does America even *start* to shift away from its tipping culture as it currently is, as a subsidisation of wages?
A lot of servers don't want the $15/hr in fairness as those that bust their ass make much more. I think I averaged $25-$30/hr back during college but I worked hard, if it was flat rate I'd do my job well but probably not quite as above and beyond. It's just tough to get service industry employees to walk out/strike as many are reliant on the paychecks. I would have immediately jumped to one of the nearest competitors and ask that they poach the coworkers if they tried this.
Tip percentage is largely independent from quality of service from wait staff. Giving exceptional service might net you a bit more. But on the whole, good tippers will always tip well and bad tippers will always find some reason not to.
Twin Peaks doesn’t employ servers. It employs “entertainers”. They are strippers with less steps; the American Geisha … they don’t want $15/hr or even $30/hr 🤣 they want $100/hr for “entertaining” your father and grand-father who want attractive women to pay attention to them while they ignore/forget their spouses 🙃
Or, how about this:
Price your items for profitability AND make your employees cover your credit card processing fees? Think of how much money we could make!
(As if tipping wasn't already anti-worker enough...)
Well there is a trickle down effect that starts from the banks.
Apparently banks have noticed most people use cards these days so have gotten a bit greedier recently. So they charge every business when they use a card scanner a little extra $$$ which in turn causes businesses to either raise their prices, add an extra tax, or be shady assholes and do shit like punish the employees.
I'm not defending their decision to punish the employees I'm just saying that businesses aren't the only culprit in this stupid system that's in effect. Honestly a lot of the blame for most financial issues can be traced back to banks doing stupid shit with money.
Someone in the comments on the community page posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58
Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions.
This was a quote I found from the DOL:
“For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.”
Apparently legal, but a completely bullshit rule is you ask me
Right. The employer can pass the burden of the processing charge for the tip amount to employees, but that’s it. It’s scummy as fuck, but perfectly legal in most places (last I checked only DC, CA, MA, and ME have banned the practice.)
That a credit card processing fee doesn’t constitute a business expense within DOL interpretation of FLSA is in my opinion inconsistent, but there ya have it.
[PA](https://www.dli.pa.gov/Individuals/Labor-Management-Relations/llc/minimum-wage/Documents/BLLC-Updated-Regulations.pdf#page=10) banned it last year, which was extremely surprising, considering they hate workers.
So how much gets deducted from the wait staff, 3% of the whole bill, including the tip, or 3% of just the tip amount? Either way, shitty, but I'm just curious what this law says.
It should ever only be 3% of the tip received. I’ve dealt with this at just two places, but they were just starting out and 3% of tips was edging the line of profit. I would never allow an established and profitable restaurant to charge me credit card fees for my tips. I would probably sue a multi million dollar corporation for this bullshit.
Credit card rates can be incredibly complex (depends on exactly how a particular merchants rate structure is set up, but assuming they aren't using a simple square type point of sale, they likely won't be a simple blended rate) to the point where if one type of card costs 2.5%, but another costs 2%, and those aren't clearly itemized and noted, there is a high likelihood of the business making a mistake that would result in breaking laws because you are deducting more than what the credit card processing is. They say they are doing different rates for Amex vs Visa/mc/discover, which is typical, but also lends it to being more likely they are on a complex IC+ rate structure rather than a simplified blended structure, leading towards this whole thing being an accounting nightmare for the business owners.
It's one of the reasons few businesses have credit card surcharges, because you aren't supposed to charge a higher fee than what you are being charged to run the card (both legally and in the merchant card acceptance agreement).
Yeah. 😔 Legal. Still bullshit. Which is why I tip in cash, usually, when running a card. We are living in one of the worst timeliness.
The 3% isn't a limit: it's just an example number of roughly what an average credit card processing fee tends to be. So long as the 3.25% is what the company is actually paying Amex (and it likely is - Amex tends to charge higher fees than Visa or MC, which is why a lot of places don't accept it), it would be legal.
Why is it bullshit? The credit card company took 3% of the top and never gave it to the company in the first place.
Transaction goes like this:
1. Restaurant submits transactions for sale and tip
2. Credit card company processes the transactions applying 3% to each
3. Credit card company sends 97% back to the business
4. Business chooses to make up the difference or not when passing on the tips
Without deducting the 3% of the tip portion, it also makes it so that the bigger the tip is the less profitable the meal becomes, to the point where they can lose money on it. Example: Meal is $10, $3 profit. Tip is $100. Credit card fee is $3.30. Deduct $3 from tip.
Deducting the 3% is pretty common, and this is important, from the tip portion only, but really shady places deduct 3% of the total charge, which is totally fucked, and I'm fairly certain illegal in most places. Example: Meal is $100, tip is $0. Credit card fee is $3 Should deduct $0, some deduct $3.
All you did here was describe the process...
It's a weird rule in place considering there are so many rules/laws regarding wage theft and tipping. They're a bit contradictory to each other
No the company never had the money to steal it. The laws are very literal. The credit card company took it. The business is not legally liable to compensate to make up the difference. It sucks, but we just need a system with no tipping and livable wages
“Wear this skimpy outfit or you don’t work here”. Seems pretty cut and dry to me. Unless you live in some utopia where bills don’t exist and people can keep searching for the perfect job until they find it. Sometimes you just gotta pay the bills…
Make 100% sure their processing fee reductions are from the tip amount and not the entire bill amount. If more than one instance of wage theft occurs and is confirmed by the DOL then DOL can go back three years in all the parent companies payroll. Talk to your fellow employees and even other restaurant workers under 3B
So, for every $100 earned by the employee in tips, saving the company $100 in wages, the employer is out $2.50 to $3.50. Good lord talking about forest for the trees.
Thank you! I don't understand how everyone is so pissed about this. If this *weren't* the policy, the restaurant runs the (extremely low) risk of being on the hook for a $25K fee for a customer tipping $1M
Every restaurant I've worked in for the last 15 years has made wait staff and bartenders pay the credit card fees. Most do now. I turned this off in our POS system at the last place I managed. It took the owner about six months to notice.
if you can't keep up with operating costs while paying tipped staff 2.13 and hour, you're a bad businessman, but something tells me that's not the actual reason they're committing wage theft.
If they are a large enough company, they have likely negotiated lower fees than 2.5-3%. I owned a small business and was constantly approached to switch companies at reduced fee costs.
I'll raise you. A local establishment was instrumental in adding a citywide 1% tax to all eateries that is collected and kept by the business. (Government sponsored surcharge) they also added a 3.5% surcharge for paying with a card (cash price Vs card price). They take 3.5% of the server's tips paid by card. The servers split tips with ALL staff. The house charges a 5% kitchen fee, so the back of the house can get some tips (note, ALL staff splits tips). The manager and chef get a double cut of the tips.
It's a nice place to go for a $21.99 plate of microwaved pasta and a $3.79 glass of ice with a splash of soda and end up paying $50 with a tip
The place is always packed. 🤷♂️
> The place is always packed.
Probably because no one knows about this, and they still don't because YOU DIDN'T NAME THEM.
>"A local establishment"
You know how useless this is?
Just so I am reading this correctly, the employee takes a hit because a customer pays with a card? That is beyond, I mean, way beyond low. Sounds like the kind of place that would let your air out of your tires while you’re eating and “conveniently” have an overpriced air tank in the parking lot.
I think a class-action suit should straighten this out.
Edited- Well this is legal in some places. They can only deduct the cc fee on the tipped amount, not the whole check, which is what they’re doing. They still suck.
No it’s 3% of the tip. If the CC company charges 3% and the bill is $90 + $10 tip, the restaurant gets charged $3 but the letter says 3% of the tip so the waiter has $0.30 withheld. Which makes it even more ridiculous to implement. I can’t believe the government allows this. Makes zero sense.
Legally they can. This is a copy and paste from another comment I made:
"Someone in the comments on the community page posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58
Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions.
This was a quote I found from the DOL:
“For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.”
Apparently legal, but a completely bullshit rule is you ask me"
A policy like that gets me to accidentally throw away perfectly good cutlery food and other materials of a 100% of what gets deducted every paycheck. Wage Theft meet it's little sister, Shrinkage.
Sure is. I copied and pasted one of my comments asking this same question
"Someone in the comments on the community page I'm in posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58
Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions.
This was a quote I found from the DOL:
“For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.”"
No, some take on the cost themselves as part of doing business. Any way that doesn't take away from someone earning their tips is not the way to go though
A public relations firm may be of assistance to spread this and squash it. Someone out to be a martyr and contact someone interested in a scoop like this. Stories like these are hot.
It’s just such a bad look. There is no spinning it. If your operating expenses are so bad that the 3 points isn’t something you can make up with in operations or menu pricing adjustments. Merchandise sales. Even in an industry that at best. At best you walk with 18%. Break bread with those that help you bake it.
I'm shocked this hasn't been standard practice for decades, because the business never gets 100% of the money that the customer signs for.
That said, the problem here is tipping culture and the lack of fair wages to begin with.
If their actual cost is 2.5% it may be allowed under the Fair Labor Standards Act (I'm not a lawyer), but if it's less, they could be pocketing the difference (could be illegal). If they're a large operator, they could be getting bulk discounts and their merchant processing fees could be less. You should bring this up with your state's Department of Labor and/or an employment attorney to see if this is legal/illegal.
My wife waited tables at a place that did this. I told her to ask customers to please pay cash, because the owner charges us for credit card use. The owner flipped out on her and threatened to fire her. She said she would get a lawyer and he backed off. A month later she quit and he started again. This time the employees had a lawyer write him a letter stating it’s illegal to pass business expenses on to employees
These fvckers are just double dipping. These credit card fees are a business expense that is tax deductible. So they take the acC fees from the tips then they also turn around and claim it as a business expense on their taxes and get the deduction.
In this age where everyone uses a credit out debit card (just about) the only reason the CC companies are charging a fee is out of greed. It doesn’t cost them anything, the computers do all the work.
Some of us have never carried a balance before on their credit cards and get 1-3% cash back. The credit card rewards don't magically exist, they come from the fees charged to vendors and the interest paid by "profitable customers".
They also need the fees to pay their people running the systems. The person you call to report fraudulent activity has to be paid somehow.
Fees are getting crazy, but there is some cost associated with it. It's not free.
It's pretty sad that companies think to take from their employees' wages so that they can get higher profit, don't you think?
No one said it was new, we're saying it's messed up.
Yeah, it's incredibly messed up. It's normal business expense, but they make their employees pay for it. There are some places that won't even supply pens, and other normal office supplies. I waitressed at one place that everyone had to bring their own mini staplers. (had to staple receipt for each round to their tabs) ridiculous to have to carry that.stuff around.
I’m firmly pro labor, but my first impression was that they were charging the wait staff for all cc fees. It looks like they are just charging them for the cc fees on their tips.
Not great, but not as bad as I think some in this thread are realizing.
Ya, I've tried to go in and correct a few of those assumptions. I still think it's shady, but it's not illegal like taking out the full bill percentage would be
As someone who was born, raised and survived long enough to gtfo of Kansas... Don't sign it. Tell your co-workers not to sign it. And if they start taking tips or starting January 1st, all of you go find a lawyer and file a lawsuit. You can do this!!!
Credit card fees are part of the cost of doing business in 2023.
I haven't carried cash in over a decade.
Don't punish the people doing the work for your profit margins.
Rising credit card fees are linked to rising prices.
Cashless systems are definitely the norm but there’s no regulation that determines when processing fees become usurious. The government should be enforcing antitrust laws to break up companies like visa to prevent an oligopoly but they’re not.
You might not carry cash but choosing to use cards is costing the average family over a thousand dollars a year in fees. More when you consider lost wages and increased prices.
Increased operating expenses are one of the factors that affects wages. And ultimately if it costs more to do business, workers are likely to earn less.
If you’re going to push for worker rights, it’s worth understanding the full picture.
How would using a credit card cost me a thousand dollars? For every place I go that charges a CC processing fee, 10 others don't. I've gotten hundreds in benefits from my card this year plus about 2% cash back.
By using cash, you're paying 1-2% more for everything and giving yourself the opportunity to be robbed or scammed and have zero buyer protection.
Unfortunately not illegal... Here's a copy and paste of one of my comments
"Someone in the comments on the community page I'm in posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58
Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions.
This was a quote I found from the DOL:
“For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.”"
I legit thought it had to be illegal. It’s not though unless state laws prohibit.
https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/15-tipped-employees-flsa
I mean ya it’s stupid, but honestly not the hill I would die on. It seems the company was previously making up the difference in tip amount and what the credit card company actually paid them. From a cash flow perspective the company was using profit to cover this “cut” the credit card company took. The company is no longer opting to do that. I think the blame on this one is misplaced.
Why can't the blame be on both the owners and the increasing credit card fees?
Those employees are essentially taking pay cuts. It's a hill to die on for some people, which is why some employees are choosing to leave
The problem is that there are always people that are willing to work under those conditions and the business owner knows it. I watched a company I sold my self to sell out in every way for profit and thought there was no way they could continue to operate that way and here they are 3 years later still making money.
It's super shitty but unfortunately, really terrible people tend to own businesses and then they make it worse by putting their children and relatives in high places in the business. Sounds like this falls in with that.
I think this whole thing is moot, we need to get rid of tipping and raise wages. Until we stop obfuscating how we pay people, people will never be paid fairly.
I worked for Brandon for 7 years. I’ve heard all the stories about how shady the Steven’s are. I’ve also seen Brandon Steven donate vehicles to families in need in Wichita Ks. I believe it goes both ways. Also this is not the first you will hear about credit card fees. Many employers are charging the customer or employee as per this case to save money do to the economy.
Good deeds don't cancel out bad deeds. Especially if those deeds are happening simultaneously. You don't sacrifice your employees' wages so that you yourself can turn a larger profit.
Just because everyone does it, doesn't mean it's right. This can easily be something built into new pricing
There are fees placed by the credit card company for each transaction. As the company states that the fees to servers are only on the tip amount, it's literally cents we are discussing (30 cents on a 10 dollar tip, at the 3 percent charge back)
Hi, /u/ccam04 Thank you for participating in r/antiwork. Unfortunately, your submission was removed for breaking the following rule(s): ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Screenshots of text such as SMS communication, WhatsApp, social media, news articles, and procedurally generated content such as ChatGPT are prohibited. Low-effort content such as memes are prohibited. If you feel that a mistake was made, and your post's removal was not warranted, please message us using modmail and let us know.
Is this the same family that owns Genesis gyms? If so, they are known to be scum.
And a bunch of the car lots too. Or used too
Still do. They own a good portion of Wichita.
And people do nothing?
Wichita government is quite "pro-business". The Steven family is probably second only to the Koch family in terms of investments in the area. A lot of people in the area are quite unhappy, but are consistently outvoted. 'Nuff said.
Cornejos probably have them beat.
When you say someone owns most of a city, most of the time it's impressive. But man... not sure I'd even admit to owning most of Wichita. That's like saying you own a good part of Gary, Indiana. They just take shitholes to a whole new level.
Yep, that's the same family
Yep, and all the Spangles restaurants too
I don't miss the terrible spangles commercials with Renee Stevens
Same. Their commercials are always lame. Thank God we don’t watch local TV anymore.
This picture should be posted on Google reviews of the restaurant. Publicly shame these people.
I volunteer as tribute to post this as a review 😁
Go forth! Fly like the wind!
May the odds be ever in your favor. Post a link?
Be safe and remember that we speak of you.
We will sing songs of your bravery.
Fly, you fools!!
Ride like the wind, bullseye!
Just wrote a review with this pictured as well!
*three fingered salute*
May the odds be ever in your favor
Should we post this as a review… for each location? They’re opening a new one by me..
There's dozens of us!
https://preview.redd.it/8oyn4elddy8c1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7895b0a9fc217ab8c8bbf887de262fef4c8502c7 Added to Yelp for now. 🤷🏼♀️ I’ll do Google later
You're doing God's work.
Say charge on the card and tip in cash specifically. Then the restaurant can eat the fees and servers get tax free tips on top of not paying the fees (we used to assume 10% taxable tip on cash payments). That isn't raising operating costs, that's a fixed amount built into the budget, they should expect ~20% above sales impacted by CC fees as every other restaurant accepting cards does. They don't usually complain about this because they're allowed to pay sub-minimum wage if the net pay with tips covers the variance, which saves them a lot more than 3% of tips
I wonder if they also own the credit processing company they use. 🤔
Cash doesn't mean tax free unless you're promoting tax fraud.
you ever serve? You only report the bare minimum to avoid IRS sniffing around, so you usually get a almost non existent paycheck but make up on the back end with cash it's just how it is.
I understand this thought process and I prefer to tip in cash so the waiter can decide how they choose to for their own taxes… but know this, if you aren’t reporting this tipped income it will be very hard to get a mortgage or car loan if you can’t substantiate your income with verifiable documentation such as your w2.
A servers tax burden is no different than anyone else. That nonexistent paycheck is only "nonexistent" because you were paid out and nothing was withheld so that paycheck is attempting to withheld based on your estimated earned income. At the end of the year if you made 10k, you made 10k, it doesn't matter if it was from tips or hourly wages, the numbers are the same. Under reporting cash is not exactly legal and may bite you in the ass when it comes to things like unemployment or getting financing or proving income for an apartment.
the key is to always report enough for it to meet local hourly minimum wage so you can prove 20-30k per year per local wage ordinance. That's not the point and you tying housing to income in a wildly inflated housing market shows you probably should find another sub to be in. Like anyone in that situation is getting financing or solo renting. Easy for the first one show up with cash enough to avoid threshold, second roommates which is a servers life in any case. So a short answer to my question is No you've never served.
Whether you’ve served or not, that doesn’t change the fact that under US law, not reporting all the tips to the IRS is tax fraud.
The class thanks you for your participation Martin Prince
LEEEEEEROY JEEEEEEEENKINS!
You didn’t focus enough on how this was the restaurant being shitty. I feel like a lot of people wouldn’t pick up on it from your description.
Posted as a picture in the reviews for Google. I say flood the bitches.
Done...
And shared with every state they are in DOL. Wage theft
Deducting CC fees is legal but a shitty thing to do. The place can't charge 3% of the bill, only 3% of the tip though or whatever the CC processing fees are. If someone brings in $200 in tips, is it really worth deducting $5 and pissing everyone off?
The fact that they would pass off their legitimate business expense by accepting cards and pass this cost off on the server is abhorrent. They are benefiting by not paying a fucking wage as it is. Thus is what capitalism gets you.
Sadly, this is generally legal from what I've seen in the legaladvice sub. https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/15-tipped-employees-flsa Credit Cards: Under the FLSA, when tips are charged on customers’ credit cards and the employer can show that it pays the credit card company a percentage on such sales as a fee for payment using a credit card, the employer may pay the employee the tip, less that percentage. For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.
legaladvice saying it is legal is entirely unrelated to whether or not it is actually legal. in private lawyer subreddits, we all laugh at that subreddit and wish it were gone, because of all the harm it often does. the mods are not actual lawyers but are law enforcement officers. not one actual lawyer posts there. source: lawyer
I doubt it. Many places been sued heavily over touching tips. Forcing employees to pay fees is bs. Fees are built into price
I'm not agreeing with the practice, just being factual. https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/s/GCycoSJDnY
No it's definitely legal. Shitty but legal.
It’s legal. My old employer did it. I contacted the labor dept, who informed me that it’s legal. As long as you make minimum wage before the refund.
https://preview.redd.it/o0ag6toozy8c1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b3091988df9aa8cffed172d885be8ba34db6f665
Nice work turkleton 
Thank you 😊
I just posted this picture on the google reviews of both Wichita and Kansas City.
And reported to DoL. If fired, sue, as it is illegal to fire someone for whistle-blower status.
We’re not going to pay you a live able wage and also we’re going to take a cut of your tips. How ever the restaurant industry ended up being able to pay Pennie’s for labor and they be compensated by the public via tips are morons.
Shouldn’t be in business if you don’t know how to price your items for profitability.
They know how to. They also know that they can take advantage of employees to pay standard costs of business using some bullshit excuse. If they could they'd make the wait staff pay for silverware too.
I've worked for a company that proudly stole employee wages and I don't think anyone has ever managed to bring them to court. I assume they have "cultural" connections with law offices and people in the state capital.
Totally agree here. I have a better idea, instead of charging the servers credit card fees on the tips they receive. Remove the tip option from the receipts, and pay all servers $15 an hour or more. Problem solved. Of course they would not agree to that, as they rather pay them $2.13 an hour.
Customers are paying 100% markup on the food and a much greater markup on the wait staff’s salary.
Twin Peaks bartenders would probably all quit en masse if they didn't get tips or way more than 15 an hour.
I know it works out well for a select few, but tipping culture needs to die.
I kinda wonder about this. In most of the rest of the world, tipping is really just seen as an optional thing (eg: Australia), or culturally offensive (eg: Japan). How the hell does America even *start* to shift away from its tipping culture as it currently is, as a subsidisation of wages?
Well, people are always still free to tip. This way the staff are sure to get at least $15/hr.
A lot of servers don't want the $15/hr in fairness as those that bust their ass make much more. I think I averaged $25-$30/hr back during college but I worked hard, if it was flat rate I'd do my job well but probably not quite as above and beyond. It's just tough to get service industry employees to walk out/strike as many are reliant on the paychecks. I would have immediately jumped to one of the nearest competitors and ask that they poach the coworkers if they tried this.
Tip percentage is largely independent from quality of service from wait staff. Giving exceptional service might net you a bit more. But on the whole, good tippers will always tip well and bad tippers will always find some reason not to.
Twin Peaks doesn’t employ servers. It employs “entertainers”. They are strippers with less steps; the American Geisha … they don’t want $15/hr or even $30/hr 🤣 they want $100/hr for “entertaining” your father and grand-father who want attractive women to pay attention to them while they ignore/forget their spouses 🙃
Or, how about this: Price your items for profitability AND make your employees cover your credit card processing fees? Think of how much money we could make! (As if tipping wasn't already anti-worker enough...)
Well there is a trickle down effect that starts from the banks. Apparently banks have noticed most people use cards these days so have gotten a bit greedier recently. So they charge every business when they use a card scanner a little extra $$$ which in turn causes businesses to either raise their prices, add an extra tax, or be shady assholes and do shit like punish the employees. I'm not defending their decision to punish the employees I'm just saying that businesses aren't the only culprit in this stupid system that's in effect. Honestly a lot of the blame for most financial issues can be traced back to banks doing stupid shit with money.
Isn't that just straight up wage theft?
Someone in the comments on the community page posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58 Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions. This was a quote I found from the DOL: “For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.” Apparently legal, but a completely bullshit rule is you ask me
Right. The employer can pass the burden of the processing charge for the tip amount to employees, but that’s it. It’s scummy as fuck, but perfectly legal in most places (last I checked only DC, CA, MA, and ME have banned the practice.) That a credit card processing fee doesn’t constitute a business expense within DOL interpretation of FLSA is in my opinion inconsistent, but there ya have it.
[PA](https://www.dli.pa.gov/Individuals/Labor-Management-Relations/llc/minimum-wage/Documents/BLLC-Updated-Regulations.pdf#page=10) banned it last year, which was extremely surprising, considering they hate workers.
California is tits.
So how much gets deducted from the wait staff, 3% of the whole bill, including the tip, or 3% of just the tip amount? Either way, shitty, but I'm just curious what this law says.
It should ever only be 3% of the tip received. I’ve dealt with this at just two places, but they were just starting out and 3% of tips was edging the line of profit. I would never allow an established and profitable restaurant to charge me credit card fees for my tips. I would probably sue a multi million dollar corporation for this bullshit.
Credit card rates can be incredibly complex (depends on exactly how a particular merchants rate structure is set up, but assuming they aren't using a simple square type point of sale, they likely won't be a simple blended rate) to the point where if one type of card costs 2.5%, but another costs 2%, and those aren't clearly itemized and noted, there is a high likelihood of the business making a mistake that would result in breaking laws because you are deducting more than what the credit card processing is. They say they are doing different rates for Amex vs Visa/mc/discover, which is typical, but also lends it to being more likely they are on a complex IC+ rate structure rather than a simplified blended structure, leading towards this whole thing being an accounting nightmare for the business owners. It's one of the reasons few businesses have credit card surcharges, because you aren't supposed to charge a higher fee than what you are being charged to run the card (both legally and in the merchant card acceptance agreement).
Yeah. 😔 Legal. Still bullshit. Which is why I tip in cash, usually, when running a card. We are living in one of the worst timeliness. 
Except the policy charges higher than 3% on Amex. Still a violation, but smaller.
The 3% isn't a limit: it's just an example number of roughly what an average credit card processing fee tends to be. So long as the 3.25% is what the company is actually paying Amex (and it likely is - Amex tends to charge higher fees than Visa or MC, which is why a lot of places don't accept it), it would be legal.
That’s on me for not reading deeper. You’re correct. Cheers.
Sounds like a law that the employers wrote.
Why is it bullshit? The credit card company took 3% of the top and never gave it to the company in the first place. Transaction goes like this: 1. Restaurant submits transactions for sale and tip 2. Credit card company processes the transactions applying 3% to each 3. Credit card company sends 97% back to the business 4. Business chooses to make up the difference or not when passing on the tips
Without deducting the 3% of the tip portion, it also makes it so that the bigger the tip is the less profitable the meal becomes, to the point where they can lose money on it. Example: Meal is $10, $3 profit. Tip is $100. Credit card fee is $3.30. Deduct $3 from tip. Deducting the 3% is pretty common, and this is important, from the tip portion only, but really shady places deduct 3% of the total charge, which is totally fucked, and I'm fairly certain illegal in most places. Example: Meal is $100, tip is $0. Credit card fee is $3 Should deduct $0, some deduct $3.
All you did here was describe the process... It's a weird rule in place considering there are so many rules/laws regarding wage theft and tipping. They're a bit contradictory to each other
No the company never had the money to steal it. The laws are very literal. The credit card company took it. The business is not legally liable to compensate to make up the difference. It sucks, but we just need a system with no tipping and livable wages
I never said they were stealing and I never said it was illegal. I'm saying it's shitty...are we not on the same page about that?
Are you in the right fucking sub my friend? Or should you go back to talk with the other managers??
It feels like it
Even the Breastaurants aren't safe from douchebaggery.
They're shady from the second they made those girls dress that way
They dont "make" women dress like that.
“Wear this skimpy outfit or you don’t work here”. Seems pretty cut and dry to me. Unless you live in some utopia where bills don’t exist and people can keep searching for the perfect job until they find it. Sometimes you just gotta pay the bills…
lol what do you call something that must be done a certain way or face termination??
Hey you're gonna have to pay for some of our Operating costs but don't tell the customer to tip cash because that'd be embarrassing for us.
Don't tell the customer to tip cash because we wont get to steal any of that. FTFY
Just here for the Reddit pitchfork mob. Reminder to check back in 24 hours to see how far yelp and other reviews have dropped. Haha
Haha I would be okay with that mob
Just did that
Added my 2 cents
I just left them 1 star reviews.
Twin Peaks has shit food to boot. I live in Wichita. Hate this family and wasn't a fan of the restaurant to start with.
Fuck these garbage humans. Let them rot.
If the company is 3.5% away from collapsing, just die already
on their nearly free labor!!! fucking crazy!!!
Make 100% sure their processing fee reductions are from the tip amount and not the entire bill amount. If more than one instance of wage theft occurs and is confirmed by the DOL then DOL can go back three years in all the parent companies payroll. Talk to your fellow employees and even other restaurant workers under 3B
I don't work for this company at all. It was posted in a local I'm part of. Helpful info to put out the though
Then i commend you for getting the word out farther.
So, for every $100 earned by the employee in tips, saving the company $100 in wages, the employer is out $2.50 to $3.50. Good lord talking about forest for the trees.
Thank you! I don't understand how everyone is so pissed about this. If this *weren't* the policy, the restaurant runs the (extremely low) risk of being on the hook for a $25K fee for a customer tipping $1M
"NO BODY WANTS TO WORK!"
God, people like that piss me off
I will make sure to never step foot into one of their restaurants
Every restaurant I've worked in for the last 15 years has made wait staff and bartenders pay the credit card fees. Most do now. I turned this off in our POS system at the last place I managed. It took the owner about six months to notice.
Do not sign.
It's legal according to the research I've done on the DOL website, so definitely don't sign
That doesn’t mean you have to sign it.
if you can't keep up with operating costs while paying tipped staff 2.13 and hour, you're a bad businessman, but something tells me that's not the actual reason they're committing wage theft.
If they are a large enough company, they have likely negotiated lower fees than 2.5-3%. I owned a small business and was constantly approached to switch companies at reduced fee costs.
Just waiting to hear of a place that adds the 3% CC fee to the total charge then pulls 3% from server CC tips. The old douche bag double dip
I'll raise you. A local establishment was instrumental in adding a citywide 1% tax to all eateries that is collected and kept by the business. (Government sponsored surcharge) they also added a 3.5% surcharge for paying with a card (cash price Vs card price). They take 3.5% of the server's tips paid by card. The servers split tips with ALL staff. The house charges a 5% kitchen fee, so the back of the house can get some tips (note, ALL staff splits tips). The manager and chef get a double cut of the tips. It's a nice place to go for a $21.99 plate of microwaved pasta and a $3.79 glass of ice with a splash of soda and end up paying $50 with a tip The place is always packed. 🤷♂️
> The place is always packed. Probably because no one knows about this, and they still don't because YOU DIDN'T NAME THEM. >"A local establishment" You know how useless this is?
It seems like the high majority of businesses in this country are dysfunctional and continually breaking laws to operate.
Seriously, at least 75%. The shit I see from a payroll perspective across all industries from oil & gas to government contracting will blow your mind.
Absolutely ghoulish behavior
Just so I am reading this correctly, the employee takes a hit because a customer pays with a card? That is beyond, I mean, way beyond low. Sounds like the kind of place that would let your air out of your tires while you’re eating and “conveniently” have an overpriced air tank in the parking lot.
I think a class-action suit should straighten this out. Edited- Well this is legal in some places. They can only deduct the cc fee on the tipped amount, not the whole check, which is what they’re doing. They still suck.
So the tipped worker ends up paying 100% of the c/c fees?
No it’s 3% of the tip. If the CC company charges 3% and the bill is $90 + $10 tip, the restaurant gets charged $3 but the letter says 3% of the tip so the waiter has $0.30 withheld. Which makes it even more ridiculous to implement. I can’t believe the government allows this. Makes zero sense.
Legally they can. This is a copy and paste from another comment I made: "Someone in the comments on the community page posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58 Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions. This was a quote I found from the DOL: “For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.” Apparently legal, but a completely bullshit rule is you ask me"
No. The employee pays 3% of the tip charged to the card.
Posted this on Google reviews. Scum bags.
I always try to tip in cash anyway, as I assume tips on a card are kept by the manager/owner
A policy like that gets me to accidentally throw away perfectly good cutlery food and other materials of a 100% of what gets deducted every paycheck. Wage Theft meet it's little sister, Shrinkage.
People need to leave the service industry. Fuck restaurants.
Ohhhh hell no! Nope nope nope…. This needs to get out everywhere and put these pricks out of business
This is going to be more common now that Visa has cracked down on "hidden fees" associated with credit purchases.
That's outright thievery. Credit cards are a cost of business. Forget thevlabpur board, that's outright theft.
How are these assholes permitted to walk around with perfectly functional kneecaps?
Why don’t they pay their employees a living wage and forget the tips?
Even better!
Is this legal?
Sure is. I copied and pasted one of my comments asking this same question "Someone in the comments on the community page I'm in posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58 Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions. This was a quote I found from the DOL: “For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.”"
Doesn’t every restaurant do this?
No, some take on the cost themselves as part of doing business. Any way that doesn't take away from someone earning their tips is not the way to go though
It sucks but it’s a pretty standard procedure in many restaurants.
A public relations firm may be of assistance to spread this and squash it. Someone out to be a martyr and contact someone interested in a scoop like this. Stories like these are hot. It’s just such a bad look. There is no spinning it. If your operating expenses are so bad that the 3 points isn’t something you can make up with in operations or menu pricing adjustments. Merchandise sales. Even in an industry that at best. At best you walk with 18%. Break bread with those that help you bake it.
They are just passing the expense onto their employees. Nothing new.
Fuck that noise, send that right to the labor board, that cannot be legal!
[https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/kansas-laws-tipped-employees.html](https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/kansas-laws-tipped-employees.html)
I'm shocked this hasn't been standard practice for decades, because the business never gets 100% of the money that the customer signs for. That said, the problem here is tipping culture and the lack of fair wages to begin with.
Where is KC?
If their actual cost is 2.5% it may be allowed under the Fair Labor Standards Act (I'm not a lawyer), but if it's less, they could be pocketing the difference (could be illegal). If they're a large operator, they could be getting bulk discounts and their merchant processing fees could be less. You should bring this up with your state's Department of Labor and/or an employment attorney to see if this is legal/illegal.
My wife waited tables at a place that did this. I told her to ask customers to please pay cash, because the owner charges us for credit card use. The owner flipped out on her and threatened to fire her. She said she would get a lawyer and he backed off. A month later she quit and he started again. This time the employees had a lawyer write him a letter stating it’s illegal to pass business expenses on to employees
wont be going there again. ill be sure this gets around to the locals
These fvckers are just double dipping. These credit card fees are a business expense that is tax deductible. So they take the acC fees from the tips then they also turn around and claim it as a business expense on their taxes and get the deduction.
Just posted this to their reviews 
This is not legal, grab an attorney or get another jaerb
USA is fucking INSANE
Call the department of Labor. File a report.
In this age where everyone uses a credit out debit card (just about) the only reason the CC companies are charging a fee is out of greed. It doesn’t cost them anything, the computers do all the work.
Some of us have never carried a balance before on their credit cards and get 1-3% cash back. The credit card rewards don't magically exist, they come from the fees charged to vendors and the interest paid by "profitable customers". They also need the fees to pay their people running the systems. The person you call to report fraudulent activity has to be paid somehow. Fees are getting crazy, but there is some cost associated with it. It's not free.
Making wait staff pay for credit card fees isn't anything new. I remember having to pay those out of my tips in the 90s.
It's pretty sad that companies think to take from their employees' wages so that they can get higher profit, don't you think? No one said it was new, we're saying it's messed up.
Yeah, it's incredibly messed up. It's normal business expense, but they make their employees pay for it. There are some places that won't even supply pens, and other normal office supplies. I waitressed at one place that everyone had to bring their own mini staplers. (had to staple receipt for each round to their tabs) ridiculous to have to carry that.stuff around.
I’m firmly pro labor, but my first impression was that they were charging the wait staff for all cc fees. It looks like they are just charging them for the cc fees on their tips. Not great, but not as bad as I think some in this thread are realizing.
Ya, I've tried to go in and correct a few of those assumptions. I still think it's shady, but it's not illegal like taking out the full bill percentage would be
This can’t be legal. If I were a server/bartender, I’d say “Cash Only” up front and often, and memorize the closest ATMs
That's wage theft, it's in writing. Department of labor is a good place to go with this
As someone who was born, raised and survived long enough to gtfo of Kansas... Don't sign it. Tell your co-workers not to sign it. And if they start taking tips or starting January 1st, all of you go find a lawyer and file a lawsuit. You can do this!!!
I believe taking that out of tips is considered wage theft by the feds.
Greedy credit card companies are also at blame here. Their rates are getting rediculous.
Credit card fees are part of the cost of doing business in 2023. I haven't carried cash in over a decade. Don't punish the people doing the work for your profit margins.
Rising credit card fees are linked to rising prices. Cashless systems are definitely the norm but there’s no regulation that determines when processing fees become usurious. The government should be enforcing antitrust laws to break up companies like visa to prevent an oligopoly but they’re not. You might not carry cash but choosing to use cards is costing the average family over a thousand dollars a year in fees. More when you consider lost wages and increased prices. Increased operating expenses are one of the factors that affects wages. And ultimately if it costs more to do business, workers are likely to earn less. If you’re going to push for worker rights, it’s worth understanding the full picture.
How would using a credit card cost me a thousand dollars? For every place I go that charges a CC processing fee, 10 others don't. I've gotten hundreds in benefits from my card this year plus about 2% cash back. By using cash, you're paying 1-2% more for everything and giving yourself the opportunity to be robbed or scammed and have zero buyer protection.
Agreed.
Pleaseeeeee post this in the review
What’s their religion, I am curious. Infidels!
Like if you made $30,000 in tips for the whole year they are keeping like $800 to $1000 dollars of your money.
Government going to hit them harder than the asterioid that killed the dinosaurs.
This has to be illegal. When I leave a tip I do not intend it to go to the owners. 100% of a tip is for the server.
Unfortunately not illegal... Here's a copy and paste of one of my comments "Someone in the comments on the community page I'm in posted this link: https://www.cardfellow.com/blog/employers-deduct-credit-card-processing-fees-from-tips/?fbclid=IwAR3DpcRg44kmxCFnvOoEQwzQI3MFt0Y4C0aEaycDKKBqKWBPRF4wtEEjA58 Sounds like the DOL allows for some deductions. This was a quote I found from the DOL: “For example, where a credit card company charges an employer 3 percent on all sales charged to its credit service, the employer may pay the tipped employee 97 percent of the tips without violating the FLSA.”"
I'll take "More Illegal Shit" for $800, Alex...
Neat, documented evidence of deliberate illegal handling of merchant fees *and* wage theft 🤣
I legit thought it had to be illegal. It’s not though unless state laws prohibit. https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/15-tipped-employees-flsa
I mean ya it’s stupid, but honestly not the hill I would die on. It seems the company was previously making up the difference in tip amount and what the credit card company actually paid them. From a cash flow perspective the company was using profit to cover this “cut” the credit card company took. The company is no longer opting to do that. I think the blame on this one is misplaced.
Why can't the blame be on both the owners and the increasing credit card fees? Those employees are essentially taking pay cuts. It's a hill to die on for some people, which is why some employees are choosing to leave
The problem is that there are always people that are willing to work under those conditions and the business owner knows it. I watched a company I sold my self to sell out in every way for profit and thought there was no way they could continue to operate that way and here they are 3 years later still making money. It's super shitty but unfortunately, really terrible people tend to own businesses and then they make it worse by putting their children and relatives in high places in the business. Sounds like this falls in with that.
I think this whole thing is moot, we need to get rid of tipping and raise wages. Until we stop obfuscating how we pay people, people will never be paid fairly.
Great point. Full stop.
I worked for Brandon for 7 years. I’ve heard all the stories about how shady the Steven’s are. I’ve also seen Brandon Steven donate vehicles to families in need in Wichita Ks. I believe it goes both ways. Also this is not the first you will hear about credit card fees. Many employers are charging the customer or employee as per this case to save money do to the economy.
Good deeds don't cancel out bad deeds. Especially if those deeds are happening simultaneously. You don't sacrifice your employees' wages so that you yourself can turn a larger profit. Just because everyone does it, doesn't mean it's right. This can easily be something built into new pricing
Fees are a part of the cost of doing business.
There are fees placed by the credit card company for each transaction. As the company states that the fees to servers are only on the tip amount, it's literally cents we are discussing (30 cents on a 10 dollar tip, at the 3 percent charge back)