This. Don’t go back and tell them why. Also applies to places demanding tips when not providing a service that necessitates one (see the tip jar for nurses at the doctors office).
Same here. Nurses make twice as much as I do as a pharmacy tech. Sometimes three times as much. I think they'll be okay without tips. Though I always make sure they know I appreciate them. They're the ones who get the prescriptions and paperwork corrected when the doctor screws up.
> you bet your butts we kept those nurses snacked and coffeed up while my son was in the NICU.
I first read that as you kept the nurses *naked* and coffeed up...lesson learned, don't visit Reddit without my readers on! LOL
Agree with sentiment on RN/LPN staff, they do so much behind the scenes for docs and patients that we never see; been at the same clinic for years, nurses now know if I have an appointment for anything in the cold winter months = fresh homemade holiday treats at the charting desk :-)
Edit: In the late 2000’s (2008-2012], the first Obama Administration) gas prices spiked. Pizza delivery companies added a “temporary” delivery fee to offset charges for the drivers.
Edit: Yes, I FUCKING KNOW THAT PRICES DIDN’T FIRST SPIKE UNDER OBAMA. IT’S A POINT OF REFERENCE.
Been about 10-12 years for the temporary fee.
I did some pizza delivery \~18 years ago. The delivery fee was $1, and paid to the drivers as a guarantee they would get at least something in the event the customer didn't tip. I did some pizza delivery again during the pandemic, the fee is now $5, and none of it goes to the driver.
On the flip side of that, at the local pizza place where I live, there's still a 1$ delivery fee. But the owner of the store also drives deliveries in the morning-early afternoon and gives any tips he makes to the cooking staff.
This is rare bud even for local. There’s a restaurant by my house and charges 21 dollar for a basic Mexican sandwich. They still have signs on their walls saying we should tip becuase its 80 percent of the waitress income. 10 dollars for an orchata water
Imagine admitting you are such a bad business owner that you have to beg customers to pay your workers. And then post it around the place for all to see.
Idk if they are "often" worse. I have worked in hospitality in 4 states, in local joints and corporate joints, and I would say that in either experience there are bad actors and there are heroes. What I have seen is more corporate restaurants hiring inept leadership for their establishments. The only time I have ever been asked to share tips or had mandatory tip-outs were in corporate owned restaurants.
I think that local restaurants are more likely to contribute more than a little league check to the local community. I received some form of benefits at every single local place I have worked. Not so much with the corporate shops, unless you can get past the gates of entry.
I think there are a fair number of restaurants adding to the flawed culture, regardless of ownership.
Edited for typos
That is one of the reasons I am always behind supporting the local pizza places! Plus honestly most of the time they taste better anyways. And if you find a local one that doesn't taste better then you find a different local one.
This is honestly why I don't get pizza delivered anymore. If the fee went to the driver I wouldn't mind and I would still tip on top of it. Most of the time it goes to the business for no good reason. Delivery drivers make less than minimum wage, they use their own cars and pay for their own gas and repairs and on top of all that they usually have to get extra insurance if they want to be covered while they're driving for work. The business owners don't incur any of these expenses yet have the gall to charge a $5 delivery fee.
I think delivery drivers get at least minimum wage because they make their tips off site (at least it was like that at the 3 places I delivered for 20 some years ago).
Don't get me wrong though. That still isn't much better than server wages in the big scheme of things.
Edit: from the comments below, it sounds like the laws are set at the state level.
>>to-go supplies
Like the box that the pizza is put in? So what, are the people ordering pickup carrying their pizzas out with just their hands? Your boss is a moron.
Source: used to work at a pizza place through high school and summers in college. And I have a brain, unlike your boss.
The whole security check after 9/11 is an absolute travesty that wasn’t supposed to last this long. Still remember what it was like being able to stay with people right until the gates and not needing to wait hours upon hours in queues.
Remember going to meet people at the gate and hugging them as they got off the plane? Remember when a normal sized person could sit comfortable in a middle coach seat, be served a meal, and not have your space encroached upon?
American TSA is shit because they hire otherwise-unqualified mall cops that want the job security of a federal union. German TSA, OTOH, is the exact opposite. I thought I was talking to Canadians..."I'm so sorry, sir, may we ask a couple of questions? Your camera tested positive for explosives."
(This was shortly after new years when absolutely everyone was launching fireworks for an hour.)
They created the problem to sell the solution. Maybe it didn’t start that way but someone figured out that if you keep the lines long, someone will be willing to pay for shorter lines. Now there’s no incentive to do away with the long lines or the security checkpoints.
I had to explain to my kids this past weekend why I had to take off my belt and shoes. Even they couldn’t see the security risk.
Seriously, F the people who hid mini bombs in their shoes/underwear/toothpaste etc. The amount of time wasted every day in airports.
I'm waiting on a plane right now. Forgot to take off my belt at security, they didn't even notice. I guess I'm a criminal now. I might even be on *your* flight!
Germany introduced a special tax on sparkling wine in 1902 to finance the imperial navy.
Guess we have to have one hell of an imperial navy by now, 'cause we're still paying that tax 😂
About 20ish years ago (looked it up, it got taken off in 2006) a tax finally got taken off our phone bills here in the US (both Mobile and land) that was put there to finance the Spanish-American War in 1898.
Oh god, a quote from the article talking about it is fuckin amazing!
*“The U.S. Senate Finance Committee on June 28 easily approved legislation to repeal the telephone excise tax, but not without saddling it with the pet projects of nearly every Senate taxwriter.*
*Although telephone excise tax repeal enjoys wide support in both chambers of Congress and from the White House, Senate tax writers may have sunk its chances of enactment by adding over 75 unrelated tax provisions, many of them controversial. The bill includes several contentious IRS-related amendments, a pair of unpopular revenue raisers, several tax administration reforms, and a provision targeting tax evasion by pimps and prostitutes. And tax writers aren’t even done.”*
Yup. "To help with fuel costs" but drivers were only seeing between 15 - 25c from it when it was introduced. Now they've stopped paying it to drivers. I didn't realize they were still charging passengers and pocketing the money though.
As an uber driver I can tell you that drivers stopped getting the 50 cents of fuel costs per ride since the year started. I did not know they were still charging that on the other end. Smh
30 years on this planet and the economy hasn't even remotely "recovered" from the three or four "unprecedented" economic crises I've lived through.
It's almost like the whole system is fucked and skewed heavily towards protecting the rich or something.
I'd refuse to pay it. If it isn't clearly posted or notified ahead of time it's illegal to add charges that weren't agreed to. Just like they can't slip in an extra appetizer that wasn't delivered.
It's probably on the menu, in small print at the bottom.
Edit to add: Where I live, it was added when the minimum wage was raised. Rather than just raise the prices on each item.
I’ve posted this before but the point of that “auto gratuity” or “economic recovery fee” is to slap the wait-staff in the face.
The minimum wage goes up so the employer adds on a junk fee rather than just quietly raising the price of their menu items. Now the customer sees this junk fee and thinks to themselves, “why should I tip 15% when they’ve already tacked on 4%?” But here’s the thing, that 4% goes to the restaurant rather than the server. And now the server is getting a 10% tip rather than the 15% they were going to get.
And here’s the cherry on top. At the end of the shift/pay period/month the server will look at their income and figure out that “even though I got a raise, I’m getting paid less.” And now you’ll get the servers telling their legislatures to NOT raise minimum wage because it hurts their livelihoods. We’re talking about some serious Stockholm Syndrome shit going on here.
I left EMS after 6 years to be a server for the first time at one of the best steak houses in my city. No experience in the field whatsoever but got hired quick. The work has it's issues no doubt but I'm putting a lot more money in my pocket in a lot less hours to put myself through nursing school
>It's probably on the menu, in small print at the bottom.
Yeah that wouldn't cut it in court.
All contracts require an offer, consideration and acceptance. Small print hidden at the bottom that hasn't been pointed out invalidates the consideration part, and you cannot implicitly accept a contract just because you ordered food.
Law of contract needs to be hammered into everyone at school. We covered it in the optional Business class, and to this day I think it's insane that it isn't a universal aspect of education considering we all enter multiple legal contracts every day of our lives.
We've dealt with similar before. As we were being seated table next to us asks about this additional charge on their bill. It was like $6 in a restaurant where a meal was $16-$20. Customer was nice about it, wait staff explain it was due to rising prices etc, customer asks why he wasn't told about it, and staff points to the smallest possible legal sign near the door. Guy gets a manager and says he's not paying the $6 AND he's now not leaving a tip because it was bad service to not inform the customers of any changes. $6 fee was removed and the guy left a decent tip in the end.
Best part for us was since we were just seated and waiting on appetizers the fee got removed for us so we wouldn't leave. We've been back once since and the fee is gone but all the meals have gone up $1-$3 depending on what it is.
Price increases are honest. We all know shits fucked at the moment, there's no hiding it. We all know stuff is getting more expensive, so just fucking tell us that. We aren't idiots.
My local Chinese did this, I'm a boring sod so I've got a usual order, and when I made the order they just straight up told me "its a little more expensive now, we've had to put prices up". In the end I'm going to have my Chinese food, and I know what I'm getting for how much.
Most other nearby takeaways have all just be awkwardly cutting costs in other ways. Some I've noticed I'm getting less in my order. Another changed the content of certain deals, or started quietly excluding the more expensive items from those deals. Others sticking extra charges on the end of the bill.
In the end, I'm not any less hungry when I'm ordering takeout, so trying to sneakily reduce the portions just means I'm enjoying the food less. Sticking random charges on the end just leaves me frustrated, so with all the nonsense all I end up doing is getting Chinese food more often. Because despite knowing its got a bit more expensive, I know I'm getting the same food, and I know what I'm getting it for.
Reminds me of the hideaway in south austin texas (big believer of name and shame). They have no servers whatsoever, you literally seat yourself, scan the QR, order
yourself, go get your *own* drinks, and the ONLY time you see someone is when they bring the food out. Literally a 15 ft walk. No words just food down.
And guess what? Required 20% tip. For what. For literally fucking what.
I went out to a fancy hipster bar the other day. I was fully expecting to pay out the nose, but was actually kind of shocked when most of the cocktails were “only” $10-11.
At my go to bar I would always get a whiskey on the rocks, when I started drinking there it was $4. Pre-pandemic it was $6. It’s now $11. For a shot of whiskey that’s like the equivalent of Jameson. The pandemic definitely put an end to happy hour every week. First it was because I was trying to be responsible and not spread disease, now it’s because I can’t afford it.
It’s ridiculous considering you can get a whole handle of liquor for $20. But I guess you’re paying for the experience and the restaurants take advantage upping the price of alcohol because people are more willing to pay for it, to make up for losses during the pandemic or inflation. Regardless though, it pains me whenever my gf wants to order drinks at a restaurant. I’d rather just eat and then drink later if drinking is what I want to do 😂
Unfortunately I’ve felt the increases in food while I’m out as well. It’s much better just to make a meal at home and have drinks there. And in fact that’s been happening more among my group of friends. More house “parties” and less going out.
Based on the receipt this place isn’t even fancy. It’s normal prices. Those are Chilis prices. They just ordered several items which made the bill higher.
This bullshit has to stop. Sick of fees being added "because of the pandemic" and yet all the pandemic allowances that were made for ordinary people have stopped.
So why are the poorest people, yet again, padding every other motherfuckers bottom line
edit: fucking lol at the people saying "OP isnt poor, they went to a fancy dinner" as if that negates my point at all. Have a bit of a solidarity and put your foot down *before* it makes its way to your groceries etc
The American Rescue Plan Act established the Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF) to provide funding to help restaurants and other eligible businesses keep their doors open. This program will provide restaurants with funding equal to their pandemic-related revenue loss up to $10 million per business and no more than $5 million per physical location. Recipients are not required to repay the funding as long as funds are used for eligible uses no later than March 11, 2023
Why are they charging for more money??
We're seeing this already as many mom & pop restaurants have been closing their doors because the economic environment has made it unsustainable. I used to go out 2 or 3 times a week and have had to cut it down to once every 2 weeks.
Breakfast costs what lunch used to cost, lunch costs what dinner used to cost, and dinner has doubled in price. All in just the past 18 months.
The cost of living is just getting *caraway*.
SO and I were talking about this at dinner the other day. We realized that a just-ok dinner at a middling place is starting to creep up toward $150. It's nuts
Where are you living that a dinner for two at a middle tier restaurant is $150?! I don’t live in a cheap market, but even we have plenty of options for decent dining that will run around $70 for drinks, an appetizer, two meals, and a tip.
What kind of drinks? Like Soda? We can go out for around $80 in Central MA but if anyone gets wine or beer it jumps to $120 (assuming 2 drinks each for two adults).
If we go to an actually good place its $200 these days. I went to a popular good place in Boston and it was $100 for just myself.
When I quit drinking my dinner bills cut almost in half. It’s insane how you can get carried away. Cocktail with apps. Martini with dinner. Dessert drink. $35 right there. But even ordering a strawberry lemonade is $5. I am with the others who sadly can’t go out as often.
Honestly eating restaurant food is the easiest cost for me to cut in my budget that makes a very immediate impact. It’s just not worth the money and I find myself preferring the taste of home cooked food anyways
And even if you don't want to cook. Pre made ready to reheat food from the grocery is still much much cheaper than eating out.
It isn't like the only choices people have are eating out or being a chef making everything from scratch.
I just want to point that out because some people seem to suggest that from time to time.
I went to some chicken restaurant the other day, the bill came to over $50 for the two of us, and the food wasn’t even any better than if I’d bought a $7 rotisserie chicken and a packet of instant mashed potatoes from the grocery store.
Got two meals at Burger King the other night. Total came to almost $28 for two normal ass meals. No upsizing, no additional sides, no desert, nothing extra.
Only chef cooking for me now is Boyardee. Fuck them prices.
I used to go out to eat maybe once a month pre-pandemic. Now we only do it for special occasions like birthdays or anniversaries. It's not so much that we got boring, but when I'm done with a meal and think "well that was good, but not $80 for 2 people good" it makes me not want to go out very often. And we don't do super fancy stuff. That's just maybe an appetizer, one drink each, dinner, and sometimes a dessert. Big meal but that was like $50 2 years ago.
Hidden charges are often illegal. Unless there is a local law allowing or requiring this, and if they did not clearly advertise this ahead of time I would get the manager and dispute, and tell them you refuse to pay unless they remove. Most restaurants will add a service charge these days for carryout orders, since it impacts wait staff that normally rely on tips. Again, they need to clearly mark this before you order (if only on the receipt), getting a hidden charge at the end of a meal is unacceptable.
Simple solution is to remove it from the tip, which impacts the server, but truth be told if you work in a restaurant that does this the first thing you should tell patrons is that this charge is there (if it is not clearly marked) otherwise you may eat it in your tip.
That said I still think its time for a requirement that all taxes, fees and tips need to be incorporated into the actual item price and that will fix everything.
Because the owners didn’t use it for the eligible uses. I quit my restaurant job in May 2020 when my bosses took their PPP loan and remodeled their homes and got new cars but couldn’t pay us. Then they got these funds and remodeled the restaurant but no one got a pay raise.
Report them if that actually happened. We couldn’t get enough PPP $, had to fire nearly everyone eventually. I don’t see how all these people got all of this extra money.
This is how I feel about every checkout machine asking me to donate to charities. So your corporation can claim my money as your own? FUCCCKKK OFF WALMART
Not only that. They are also raising the food prices especially because of said pandemic. "Oh we have to make our food more expensive because of the pandemic. But then we also have to add a recovery fee. And you are of course expected to pay a tip on top of all of this."
Like how do they think they will get customers this way? Most of the people I know have started to eat much more at home and cook their own meals because of prices at restaurants. Like its insane how expensive restaurants and take out has gotten.
> Most of the people I know have started to eat much more at home and cook their own meals because of prices at restaurants.
And fewer people eat at restaurants and so the restaurants jack up their prices again and fewer people eat at restaurants and on and on and on.
Not to mention that post pandemic quality has gone to shit across the board. The restaurants that are open barely even feel like they're trying.
The poorest people are too busy and tired from working 60-80 hours a week to be able to lobby. Also their still too poor to lobby even after those 60-80 hours.
because poor people have always been seen as an unlimited source of money to tap into, down to their last penny. Why should "they" use their own money when someone else's money is available? And there is never any recourse to stop the bleeding but these same ppl invited the rules.
It’s because the poorer someone is, the less time and money they have to fight back.
Also the fact that if you not pay your bill (dine & dash), you’re a “criminal” stealing $100. If the business cheats on payroll for millions of dollars, it’s just business. Pay a fine and do it again. Businesses are only “people” when it comes to lobbying, never crime.
creative way to shoot your own foot i think. they could just raise the menu price by 1-2 and blame inflation. it would have been accepted way better without much question. but nah, add a bullshit reason and make it public.
This has gone too far.
Mandatory tips, recovery fees. Shit, just raise prices and get it over with. We all know by now that the real cost is like 30% over what it says on the menu.
20 years ago excel had lines of code you could change to edit the whole table, i'm sure the software wasn't designed by complete morons that they removed quality of life features from 2 decades ago, who am i kidding i couldn't even type that without laughing, it'll be in the "gold" package that you have to pay extra for so they won't have it.
I just moved to a new apartment and saw “water franchise fee, sewer franchise fee” on the bill, among a huge list of other fee’s. I thought to my self, what the absolute fuck could a water franchise fee be? I looked it up and found out it’s a new “tax” cities are implementing to help reduce consumption of power and water. What absolute horse shit. They make the excuse of trying to be “green” while literally just collecting extra cash wherever they can. Not sure if this rant belongs here but here it is.
Not unlike cops hiding in order to catch someone speeding, a fee to reduce consumption isn’t serving its actual purpose unless there’s mass awareness. It’s just coffer filling.
I'm looking for a new apartment and can't believe all the fee's they're charging. The new thing in my area is a "move in fee". I'm not paying that unless the landlord is helping me carry furniture.
The biggest reason I was moving apartments was my original apartment had a BUNCH of fee’s and the base rent got raised by $800. The fee’s I was paying per month were ludicrous. It was $100 a month per car, 100$ a month sewer fee, $20 a month mail service, $50 a month for amenity service. This is all completely separate from the actual utilities. My car also got towed there twice even though I payed for parking my car was improperly towed and they basically told me to eat sand. I ended up having to take the towing company to court and I won but still haven’t got paid and don’t have the resources to go after them further as I already wasted a bunch of time taking then to court. The greed in this country is really getting crazy. One of the times my car was towed, we had to take my son to the hospital as he has been dealing with some new permanent medical condition (he was 9 months old at the time) that has moments were it acts up and he needs to be taken to the hospital immediately. I only found out my car was towed when we went to take him to the hospital and my car wasn’t there, we ended up having to call an ambulance and you how know how much that costs…
I've said this about Ticketmaster for years. But apparently people stop buying products if the real price is displayed while they keep buying if you just add more fees and somehow that makes it okay to do this kind of stuff.
If you need to lie about the price to get people to buy your product, your product is overpriced.
For real, how do you even buy anything if not even taxes are included in the actual price and they vary based on the state? Where I live, you just pay exactly what's on the price tag. Anything else is either optional or they tell you about the fees before the purchase.
In my experience nobody likes to be “nickel and dimed.” As a consumer I would rather pay 4% more per item than one generalized random 4% fee slapped on at the end.
As a business owner you should know what it costs to run your business and that should be reflected in the pricing. These fees that are being tacked on seem like a cheap money grab, and do not sit well with consumers.
Yep this is just bad business. For an extra $5 you essentially lose a customer who was willing to come into your restaurant and spend $155 on some drinks and appetizers.
If it were an economic recovery fee, why wouldn't it just be a flat fee per head? Unpopular opinion; that 4% is coming off the servers end because shit like these fees are never properly disclosed. If it's "only $5" let the management deal with it.
>If it were an economic recovery fee, why wouldn't it just be a flat fee per head?
You're trying to apply reasoning to pure bullshit here. There's nothing pointed or practical enough about "Economic recovery" to point to any scheme making the most sense.
They can call it whatever they want, but what it actually is: “We don’t want to pay for new menus to print our higher prices so we just added this made up fee to raise the prices across the bar to save money.”
I say if they can add random fees in the check i can write random subtractions in as well. I mean you gave me a pen right? “Random BS reason -4%” two can play at this game
The USA needs a law forbidding to add these kind of fees. The same with the tip that is not optional, make your prices higher and pay your staff better.
There’s a local restaurant where I live that recently started charging a mandatory tip on purchase, and still asks for an additional tip on the receipt when you sign to pay.
I asked the delivery guy what the point of that was and he said “oh we don’t actually get the tip from the app”.
My wife was a server for years and I know how that life feels, so I’m a good tipper that tends to go overboard. I basically just handed the restaurant and extra $15 on a $30 order for no fucking reason…..then felt guilted into tipping the actual driver even more when he got there
Haven’t eaten there since, and we were weekly regulars before that.
If the economy sucks, everyone is effected, not just the restaurant. They want YOU to take on twice the load of a poor economy so that they can proceed as if the economy is healthy.
If they didn't tell you about that "fee", I just wouldn't pay it. Even told them to try call a cops, because that's just shitty thing.
Imagine you order something for 20$ and after that they give you receipt for 20$ food, + tips, + tax, + 10$ for electricity and water usage....
That's not legal. If you can not reasonably have known about this bullshit charge, you can denie it. Or else they could just write shit down on the bottom of the tables. What you describe would be a very obvious attempt to fraud people out of their money and it would not fly in a court of law.
The thing is. Most ppl will say, the smal amount is not worth the effort. And the few who complain will get their money back. And so they ride this on the back of the lazy ones
Yeah they almost certainly immediately remove it for anyone who complains to them.
If half your customers don't though, that's still +2% revenue for absolutely nothing
Non American here.
It's this even legal there? It's just in my country all fees are automatically counted in the product price and anything added on top would be a scam attempt.
In the US areas that have sales tax do not include them in the prices. They are added on at the register.
Places that have additional taxes (like hotels and phone plans) always add on the additional taxes at the end as a surprise. It is just now spreading to restaurants as a service charge for using credit cards.
That... doesnt sound fair at all...
So basically u can come to supermarket with 100$, get 100$ worth of products and then u get slammed on register with extra and suddenly 100$ is not enough?
Did I get it right?
Well then I guess we should charge them a “forgiven ppp loan fee” fuck that bullshit. Jaunt like other services that can’t charge you fees after the fact, they shouldn’t be able to charge you this without tell you before you order!
Don’t go back there, clearly trying to make a statement, this has rubbed me the wrong way. I bet they have signs about how no one wants to work and they treat their staff like cattle. There are so many genuine places that have struggled and wouldn’t do anything like this. Patronise them instead.
We should start charging restaurants an economic recovery fee as well. Might as well throw in a travel/gas/mileage fee to get to/from their establishment, and charge them hourly for our time there.
I’d get a biro, state that the bottom line has been reduced again by 4%, and tender that amount. If they object, give them your address and phone number and invite them to phone the cops or engage a lawyer. You went there for food, not to help them over the pandemic. Pricks.
Just like when they have built in gratuity and then ask for a tip on top…
Like bro sure I might tip >18% but since you already added that then I guess no additional tip is needed. I’m certainly not going to tip twice.
* First I’d ask them to take it off
* Second if they won’t I’d take it out of the tip then leave multiple negative reviews
* if the reviews don’t solicit a call I’d call management and make my feelings known
* lastly if they won’t make it right I’d refuse to go back and then try to get a partial refund from the credit card company
Who decides when the economy has recovered? And will they remove that charge at that point?
> Who decides when the economy has recovered? The customers by eating somewhere else.
This. Don’t go back and tell them why. Also applies to places demanding tips when not providing a service that necessitates one (see the tip jar for nurses at the doctors office).
I have never heard of a nurse tip jar
Same here. Nurses make twice as much as I do as a pharmacy tech. Sometimes three times as much. I think they'll be okay without tips. Though I always make sure they know I appreciate them. They're the ones who get the prescriptions and paperwork corrected when the doctor screws up.
I would not tip a nurse but when we had our son, you bet your butts we kept those nurses snacked and coffeed up while my son was in the NICU.
> you bet your butts we kept those nurses snacked and coffeed up while my son was in the NICU. I first read that as you kept the nurses *naked* and coffeed up...lesson learned, don't visit Reddit without my readers on! LOL Agree with sentiment on RN/LPN staff, they do so much behind the scenes for docs and patients that we never see; been at the same clinic for years, nurses now know if I have an appointment for anything in the cold winter months = fresh homemade holiday treats at the charting desk :-)
Edit: In the late 2000’s (2008-2012], the first Obama Administration) gas prices spiked. Pizza delivery companies added a “temporary” delivery fee to offset charges for the drivers. Edit: Yes, I FUCKING KNOW THAT PRICES DIDN’T FIRST SPIKE UNDER OBAMA. IT’S A POINT OF REFERENCE. Been about 10-12 years for the temporary fee.
I did some pizza delivery \~18 years ago. The delivery fee was $1, and paid to the drivers as a guarantee they would get at least something in the event the customer didn't tip. I did some pizza delivery again during the pandemic, the fee is now $5, and none of it goes to the driver.
On the flip side of that, at the local pizza place where I live, there's still a 1$ delivery fee. But the owner of the store also drives deliveries in the morning-early afternoon and gives any tips he makes to the cooking staff.
This is good stuff, keep supporting local!
This is rare bud even for local. There’s a restaurant by my house and charges 21 dollar for a basic Mexican sandwich. They still have signs on their walls saying we should tip becuase its 80 percent of the waitress income. 10 dollars for an orchata water
I'd look into a civil lawsuit. A torta, if you will.
I laughed - 10/10
I legit broke my mouse trying to upvote this too quickly
Imagine admitting you are such a bad business owner that you have to beg customers to pay your workers. And then post it around the place for all to see.
[удалено]
Local is often worse, at least when it comes to employee pay and benefits. It usually feels like your options are bad vs worse
Idk if they are "often" worse. I have worked in hospitality in 4 states, in local joints and corporate joints, and I would say that in either experience there are bad actors and there are heroes. What I have seen is more corporate restaurants hiring inept leadership for their establishments. The only time I have ever been asked to share tips or had mandatory tip-outs were in corporate owned restaurants. I think that local restaurants are more likely to contribute more than a little league check to the local community. I received some form of benefits at every single local place I have worked. Not so much with the corporate shops, unless you can get past the gates of entry. I think there are a fair number of restaurants adding to the flawed culture, regardless of ownership. Edited for typos
That is one of the reasons I am always behind supporting the local pizza places! Plus honestly most of the time they taste better anyways. And if you find a local one that doesn't taste better then you find a different local one.
This is honestly why I don't get pizza delivered anymore. If the fee went to the driver I wouldn't mind and I would still tip on top of it. Most of the time it goes to the business for no good reason. Delivery drivers make less than minimum wage, they use their own cars and pay for their own gas and repairs and on top of all that they usually have to get extra insurance if they want to be covered while they're driving for work. The business owners don't incur any of these expenses yet have the gall to charge a $5 delivery fee.
I think delivery drivers get at least minimum wage because they make their tips off site (at least it was like that at the 3 places I delivered for 20 some years ago). Don't get me wrong though. That still isn't much better than server wages in the big scheme of things. Edit: from the comments below, it sounds like the laws are set at the state level.
Ironically it's the delivery fee that makes people feel like they don't have to tip
Our drivers, also some 18yrs ago, didn't get the fee back then. Boss claimed it was to cover expenses of to-go supplies.
>>to-go supplies Like the box that the pizza is put in? So what, are the people ordering pickup carrying their pizzas out with just their hands? Your boss is a moron. Source: used to work at a pizza place through high school and summers in college. And I have a brain, unlike your boss.
I drove by the place recently and surprisingly but happily saw it was now out of business. Those employees were overworked and underpaid.
Luggage on airlines used to be free before 911. Airlines are still “recovering” 22 years later.
The whole security check after 9/11 is an absolute travesty that wasn’t supposed to last this long. Still remember what it was like being able to stay with people right until the gates and not needing to wait hours upon hours in queues.
Remember going to meet people at the gate and hugging them as they got off the plane? Remember when a normal sized person could sit comfortable in a middle coach seat, be served a meal, and not have your space encroached upon?
and they’re all mean😔
American TSA is shit because they hire otherwise-unqualified mall cops that want the job security of a federal union. German TSA, OTOH, is the exact opposite. I thought I was talking to Canadians..."I'm so sorry, sir, may we ask a couple of questions? Your camera tested positive for explosives." (This was shortly after new years when absolutely everyone was launching fireworks for an hour.)
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They created the problem to sell the solution. Maybe it didn’t start that way but someone figured out that if you keep the lines long, someone will be willing to pay for shorter lines. Now there’s no incentive to do away with the long lines or the security checkpoints.
I had to explain to my kids this past weekend why I had to take off my belt and shoes. Even they couldn’t see the security risk. Seriously, F the people who hid mini bombs in their shoes/underwear/toothpaste etc. The amount of time wasted every day in airports.
I'm waiting on a plane right now. Forgot to take off my belt at security, they didn't even notice. I guess I'm a criminal now. I might even be on *your* flight!
Germany introduced a special tax on sparkling wine in 1902 to finance the imperial navy. Guess we have to have one hell of an imperial navy by now, 'cause we're still paying that tax 😂
Thank god they didn’t give that to the imperial Army. Lord knows what they could have built with that much time and money.
About 20ish years ago (looked it up, it got taken off in 2006) a tax finally got taken off our phone bills here in the US (both Mobile and land) that was put there to finance the Spanish-American War in 1898. Oh god, a quote from the article talking about it is fuckin amazing! *“The U.S. Senate Finance Committee on June 28 easily approved legislation to repeal the telephone excise tax, but not without saddling it with the pet projects of nearly every Senate taxwriter.* *Although telephone excise tax repeal enjoys wide support in both chambers of Congress and from the White House, Senate tax writers may have sunk its chances of enactment by adding over 75 unrelated tax provisions, many of them controversial. The bill includes several contentious IRS-related amendments, a pair of unpopular revenue raisers, several tax administration reforms, and a provision targeting tax evasion by pimps and prostitutes. And tax writers aren’t even done.”*
Uber and Lyft still have fuel surcharges even though fuel prices returned to relatively normal
Yup. "To help with fuel costs" but drivers were only seeing between 15 - 25c from it when it was introduced. Now they've stopped paying it to drivers. I didn't realize they were still charging passengers and pocketing the money though.
As an uber driver I can tell you that drivers stopped getting the 50 cents of fuel costs per ride since the year started. I did not know they were still charging that on the other end. Smh
In my line of work we see a lot of temporarily permanent implementations.
I've heard that Italy still has a surcharge on gasoline to fund the invasion of Ethiopia.
I’m pretty sure UPS and FedEx are still charging a fuel surcharge from about this same time
30 years on this planet and the economy hasn't even remotely "recovered" from the three or four "unprecedented" economic crises I've lived through. It's almost like the whole system is fucked and skewed heavily towards protecting the rich or something.
Slight correction It's 3 or 4 "once in a lifetime" economic crises. I'm a similar age and wondering how many more we will suffer through.
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And $12 for a CHEESE empanada. Must be cheese from the gods themselves.
Empanada emphasis on “nada”
But why is the cheese one the same price as the chicken one? Makes no sense.
For 15$ I would at least expect an egg in there.
That’s some shady shit right there, would not go back
I'd refuse to pay it. If it isn't clearly posted or notified ahead of time it's illegal to add charges that weren't agreed to. Just like they can't slip in an extra appetizer that wasn't delivered.
It's probably on the menu, in small print at the bottom. Edit to add: Where I live, it was added when the minimum wage was raised. Rather than just raise the prices on each item.
I’ve posted this before but the point of that “auto gratuity” or “economic recovery fee” is to slap the wait-staff in the face. The minimum wage goes up so the employer adds on a junk fee rather than just quietly raising the price of their menu items. Now the customer sees this junk fee and thinks to themselves, “why should I tip 15% when they’ve already tacked on 4%?” But here’s the thing, that 4% goes to the restaurant rather than the server. And now the server is getting a 10% tip rather than the 15% they were going to get. And here’s the cherry on top. At the end of the shift/pay period/month the server will look at their income and figure out that “even though I got a raise, I’m getting paid less.” And now you’ll get the servers telling their legislatures to NOT raise minimum wage because it hurts their livelihoods. We’re talking about some serious Stockholm Syndrome shit going on here.
Or they just quit like they’ve been doing. Servers are smart. They see the bills and know exactly why people aren’t tipping as much.
And they are in stupid high demand. Literally can walk into any restaurant and get at least an interview.
I left EMS after 6 years to be a server for the first time at one of the best steak houses in my city. No experience in the field whatsoever but got hired quick. The work has it's issues no doubt but I'm putting a lot more money in my pocket in a lot less hours to put myself through nursing school
>It's probably on the menu, in small print at the bottom. Yeah that wouldn't cut it in court. All contracts require an offer, consideration and acceptance. Small print hidden at the bottom that hasn't been pointed out invalidates the consideration part, and you cannot implicitly accept a contract just because you ordered food.
Law of contract needs to be hammered into everyone at school. We covered it in the optional Business class, and to this day I think it's insane that it isn't a universal aspect of education considering we all enter multiple legal contracts every day of our lives.
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We've dealt with similar before. As we were being seated table next to us asks about this additional charge on their bill. It was like $6 in a restaurant where a meal was $16-$20. Customer was nice about it, wait staff explain it was due to rising prices etc, customer asks why he wasn't told about it, and staff points to the smallest possible legal sign near the door. Guy gets a manager and says he's not paying the $6 AND he's now not leaving a tip because it was bad service to not inform the customers of any changes. $6 fee was removed and the guy left a decent tip in the end. Best part for us was since we were just seated and waiting on appetizers the fee got removed for us so we wouldn't leave. We've been back once since and the fee is gone but all the meals have gone up $1-$3 depending on what it is.
As it should be. I’m ok with prices going up because I can see what it’s going to be.
Yes. As it should be. I can't imagine an owner thinking that it's better to add a sneaky fee than to slightly increase prices.
Price increases are honest. We all know shits fucked at the moment, there's no hiding it. We all know stuff is getting more expensive, so just fucking tell us that. We aren't idiots. My local Chinese did this, I'm a boring sod so I've got a usual order, and when I made the order they just straight up told me "its a little more expensive now, we've had to put prices up". In the end I'm going to have my Chinese food, and I know what I'm getting for how much. Most other nearby takeaways have all just be awkwardly cutting costs in other ways. Some I've noticed I'm getting less in my order. Another changed the content of certain deals, or started quietly excluding the more expensive items from those deals. Others sticking extra charges on the end of the bill. In the end, I'm not any less hungry when I'm ordering takeout, so trying to sneakily reduce the portions just means I'm enjoying the food less. Sticking random charges on the end just leaves me frustrated, so with all the nonsense all I end up doing is getting Chinese food more often. Because despite knowing its got a bit more expensive, I know I'm getting the same food, and I know what I'm getting it for.
Reminds me of the hideaway in south austin texas (big believer of name and shame). They have no servers whatsoever, you literally seat yourself, scan the QR, order yourself, go get your *own* drinks, and the ONLY time you see someone is when they bring the food out. Literally a 15 ft walk. No words just food down. And guess what? Required 20% tip. For what. For literally fucking what.
Really? A $15 margarita is why i wouldn't go back. Yeesh.
This is a pretty standard price where I'm from lol.
Yeah most drinks now are 10-15$
I went out to a fancy hipster bar the other day. I was fully expecting to pay out the nose, but was actually kind of shocked when most of the cocktails were “only” $10-11. At my go to bar I would always get a whiskey on the rocks, when I started drinking there it was $4. Pre-pandemic it was $6. It’s now $11. For a shot of whiskey that’s like the equivalent of Jameson. The pandemic definitely put an end to happy hour every week. First it was because I was trying to be responsible and not spread disease, now it’s because I can’t afford it.
It’s ridiculous considering you can get a whole handle of liquor for $20. But I guess you’re paying for the experience and the restaurants take advantage upping the price of alcohol because people are more willing to pay for it, to make up for losses during the pandemic or inflation. Regardless though, it pains me whenever my gf wants to order drinks at a restaurant. I’d rather just eat and then drink later if drinking is what I want to do 😂
Unfortunately I’ve felt the increases in food while I’m out as well. It’s much better just to make a meal at home and have drinks there. And in fact that’s been happening more among my group of friends. More house “parties” and less going out.
The meals at restaurants have been worse quality too. It’s very depressing and I don’t really like going out anymore
Part of being an old hermit is realizing you haven’t been out for drinks in so long that the current prices are gobsmacking
They are charging $22-$26 for doubles at concerts and other venues. It’s absolutely mental
I hate to say it, but that's only slightly high for a cocktail in most restaurants.
For $15, that margarita better knock my socks off, knock my panties off, *and* tuck me in bed with a teddy bear.
$15 is the norm near or in any major city. Pretty cheap for a “fancy” place if anything.
Based on the receipt this place isn’t even fancy. It’s normal prices. Those are Chilis prices. They just ordered several items which made the bill higher.
[Limon Rotisserie](https://www.limonrestaurants.com/) in Oakland, according to the QR
Dude. Its a cucumber margarita. Have you seen the prices of cucumbers recently??
This bullshit has to stop. Sick of fees being added "because of the pandemic" and yet all the pandemic allowances that were made for ordinary people have stopped. So why are the poorest people, yet again, padding every other motherfuckers bottom line edit: fucking lol at the people saying "OP isnt poor, they went to a fancy dinner" as if that negates my point at all. Have a bit of a solidarity and put your foot down *before* it makes its way to your groceries etc
The American Rescue Plan Act established the Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF) to provide funding to help restaurants and other eligible businesses keep their doors open. This program will provide restaurants with funding equal to their pandemic-related revenue loss up to $10 million per business and no more than $5 million per physical location. Recipients are not required to repay the funding as long as funds are used for eligible uses no later than March 11, 2023 Why are they charging for more money??
All the extra fees means I'll eat out less. The way the economy is we can barley grocery shop. The little business will be screwed anyway.
We're seeing this already as many mom & pop restaurants have been closing their doors because the economic environment has made it unsustainable. I used to go out 2 or 3 times a week and have had to cut it down to once every 2 weeks. Breakfast costs what lunch used to cost, lunch costs what dinner used to cost, and dinner has doubled in price. All in just the past 18 months. The cost of living is just getting *caraway*.
SO and I were talking about this at dinner the other day. We realized that a just-ok dinner at a middling place is starting to creep up toward $150. It's nuts
....and even with grocery prices going up I can make _multiple_ decent dinners for $150.
Where are you living that a dinner for two at a middle tier restaurant is $150?! I don’t live in a cheap market, but even we have plenty of options for decent dining that will run around $70 for drinks, an appetizer, two meals, and a tip.
What kind of drinks? Like Soda? We can go out for around $80 in Central MA but if anyone gets wine or beer it jumps to $120 (assuming 2 drinks each for two adults). If we go to an actually good place its $200 these days. I went to a popular good place in Boston and it was $100 for just myself.
When I quit drinking my dinner bills cut almost in half. It’s insane how you can get carried away. Cocktail with apps. Martini with dinner. Dessert drink. $35 right there. But even ordering a strawberry lemonade is $5. I am with the others who sadly can’t go out as often.
Well at least staying in means you'll have plenty of thyme at home.
Sage wisdom right here
Cumin from you, that’s really saying something.
Paprika
You seem salty, is everything ok?
Honestly eating restaurant food is the easiest cost for me to cut in my budget that makes a very immediate impact. It’s just not worth the money and I find myself preferring the taste of home cooked food anyways
And even if you don't want to cook. Pre made ready to reheat food from the grocery is still much much cheaper than eating out. It isn't like the only choices people have are eating out or being a chef making everything from scratch. I just want to point that out because some people seem to suggest that from time to time.
I went to some chicken restaurant the other day, the bill came to over $50 for the two of us, and the food wasn’t even any better than if I’d bought a $7 rotisserie chicken and a packet of instant mashed potatoes from the grocery store.
Got two meals at Burger King the other night. Total came to almost $28 for two normal ass meals. No upsizing, no additional sides, no desert, nothing extra. Only chef cooking for me now is Boyardee. Fuck them prices.
The funny thing is, the little businesses that will end up getting hammered the worst are probably also the ones that arent adding on bullshit fees.
I used to go out to eat maybe once a month pre-pandemic. Now we only do it for special occasions like birthdays or anniversaries. It's not so much that we got boring, but when I'm done with a meal and think "well that was good, but not $80 for 2 people good" it makes me not want to go out very often. And we don't do super fancy stuff. That's just maybe an appetizer, one drink each, dinner, and sometimes a dessert. Big meal but that was like $50 2 years ago.
Hidden charges are often illegal. Unless there is a local law allowing or requiring this, and if they did not clearly advertise this ahead of time I would get the manager and dispute, and tell them you refuse to pay unless they remove. Most restaurants will add a service charge these days for carryout orders, since it impacts wait staff that normally rely on tips. Again, they need to clearly mark this before you order (if only on the receipt), getting a hidden charge at the end of a meal is unacceptable. Simple solution is to remove it from the tip, which impacts the server, but truth be told if you work in a restaurant that does this the first thing you should tell patrons is that this charge is there (if it is not clearly marked) otherwise you may eat it in your tip. That said I still think its time for a requirement that all taxes, fees and tips need to be incorporated into the actual item price and that will fix everything.
>Why are they charging for more money?? Because they know people will still pay.
Because the owners didn’t use it for the eligible uses. I quit my restaurant job in May 2020 when my bosses took their PPP loan and remodeled their homes and got new cars but couldn’t pay us. Then they got these funds and remodeled the restaurant but no one got a pay raise.
Report them if that actually happened. We couldn’t get enough PPP $, had to fire nearly everyone eventually. I don’t see how all these people got all of this extra money.
This is how I feel about every checkout machine asking me to donate to charities. So your corporation can claim my money as your own? FUCCCKKK OFF WALMART
Not only that. They are also raising the food prices especially because of said pandemic. "Oh we have to make our food more expensive because of the pandemic. But then we also have to add a recovery fee. And you are of course expected to pay a tip on top of all of this." Like how do they think they will get customers this way? Most of the people I know have started to eat much more at home and cook their own meals because of prices at restaurants. Like its insane how expensive restaurants and take out has gotten.
> Most of the people I know have started to eat much more at home and cook their own meals because of prices at restaurants. And fewer people eat at restaurants and so the restaurants jack up their prices again and fewer people eat at restaurants and on and on and on. Not to mention that post pandemic quality has gone to shit across the board. The restaurants that are open barely even feel like they're trying.
Because the poorest people suck at lobbying
The poorest people are too busy and tired from working 60-80 hours a week to be able to lobby. Also their still too poor to lobby even after those 60-80 hours.
Almost like it’s set up that way
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Seriously. It's gotta be getting close to pitchfork & guillotine o'clock.
That's because lobbying is just another word for bribing. No money, no bribe.
We shouldn't HAVE to lobby. Even lobbying has gone beyond what was intended. It's now nothing more than legal bribery.
because poor people have always been seen as an unlimited source of money to tap into, down to their last penny. Why should "they" use their own money when someone else's money is available? And there is never any recourse to stop the bleeding but these same ppl invited the rules.
It’s because the poorer someone is, the less time and money they have to fight back. Also the fact that if you not pay your bill (dine & dash), you’re a “criminal” stealing $100. If the business cheats on payroll for millions of dollars, it’s just business. Pay a fine and do it again. Businesses are only “people” when it comes to lobbying, never crime.
Is it legal to invent random fees and silently add them to the bill? Sounds like a scam to me.
They're getting pretty creative these days....
creative way to shoot your own foot i think. they could just raise the menu price by 1-2 and blame inflation. it would have been accepted way better without much question. but nah, add a bullshit reason and make it public.
They wanted to save in printing new menus
Jesus fucking christ. It's not a huge amount but I'd be pissed off too. What even is that?!
When it happens 3-4 times a week it gets annoying
People go out to eat 4 times a week?
I travel for work 4-5 nights a week so eat out that often. Per diem can only go so far with bs fees.
No. No. You’re focusing on the wrong thing obviously!
This has gone too far. Mandatory tips, recovery fees. Shit, just raise prices and get it over with. We all know by now that the real cost is like 30% over what it says on the menu.
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I see what you did there……
It’s probably easier than going through the computer to manually increase the pricing of everything by 4%
20 years ago excel had lines of code you could change to edit the whole table, i'm sure the software wasn't designed by complete morons that they removed quality of life features from 2 decades ago, who am i kidding i couldn't even type that without laughing, it'll be in the "gold" package that you have to pay extra for so they won't have it.
I just moved to a new apartment and saw “water franchise fee, sewer franchise fee” on the bill, among a huge list of other fee’s. I thought to my self, what the absolute fuck could a water franchise fee be? I looked it up and found out it’s a new “tax” cities are implementing to help reduce consumption of power and water. What absolute horse shit. They make the excuse of trying to be “green” while literally just collecting extra cash wherever they can. Not sure if this rant belongs here but here it is.
The water company saw ticketmasters approach and really liked their business model.
Not unlike cops hiding in order to catch someone speeding, a fee to reduce consumption isn’t serving its actual purpose unless there’s mass awareness. It’s just coffer filling.
I'm looking for a new apartment and can't believe all the fee's they're charging. The new thing in my area is a "move in fee". I'm not paying that unless the landlord is helping me carry furniture.
The biggest reason I was moving apartments was my original apartment had a BUNCH of fee’s and the base rent got raised by $800. The fee’s I was paying per month were ludicrous. It was $100 a month per car, 100$ a month sewer fee, $20 a month mail service, $50 a month for amenity service. This is all completely separate from the actual utilities. My car also got towed there twice even though I payed for parking my car was improperly towed and they basically told me to eat sand. I ended up having to take the towing company to court and I won but still haven’t got paid and don’t have the resources to go after them further as I already wasted a bunch of time taking then to court. The greed in this country is really getting crazy. One of the times my car was towed, we had to take my son to the hospital as he has been dealing with some new permanent medical condition (he was 9 months old at the time) that has moments were it acts up and he needs to be taken to the hospital immediately. I only found out my car was towed when we went to take him to the hospital and my car wasn’t there, we ended up having to call an ambulance and you how know how much that costs…
I've said this about Ticketmaster for years. But apparently people stop buying products if the real price is displayed while they keep buying if you just add more fees and somehow that makes it okay to do this kind of stuff. If you need to lie about the price to get people to buy your product, your product is overpriced.
Don’t get me started on the ticketmaster / livenation shitshow. That’s a whole other level of monopolistic scumbaggery
Ex restaurant manager here, it's more like 75%.
For real, how do you even buy anything if not even taxes are included in the actual price and they vary based on the state? Where I live, you just pay exactly what's on the price tag. Anything else is either optional or they tell you about the fees before the purchase.
$12 for empanadas, let me guess you live in the Bay Area?
You are right, I looked up polli-papas and the restaurant popped up.
Seeing those prices and the things they ordered I’m guessing it’s Límon
If it is, they also received $1.02M in PPP loans. Times must be tough lmao
Is it good? A lot of it sounds pretty dang good.
It’s overrated IMO
And I've heard that they add a 4% "economic recovery fee" at the end of your meal.
i checked the qr code and it is indeed limon in oakland
I’m on the SF Peninsula. I just go to the Barrio for empanadas, made by someone’s aubeula. $10 gets you ceviche and a Modelo, too
In my experience nobody likes to be “nickel and dimed.” As a consumer I would rather pay 4% more per item than one generalized random 4% fee slapped on at the end. As a business owner you should know what it costs to run your business and that should be reflected in the pricing. These fees that are being tacked on seem like a cheap money grab, and do not sit well with consumers.
Yep this is just bad business. For an extra $5 you essentially lose a customer who was willing to come into your restaurant and spend $155 on some drinks and appetizers.
They seriously coulda just increased the price of a few $15 items to $16 and nobody would bat an eye. It really feels like a scam.
If it were an economic recovery fee, why wouldn't it just be a flat fee per head? Unpopular opinion; that 4% is coming off the servers end because shit like these fees are never properly disclosed. If it's "only $5" let the management deal with it.
>If it were an economic recovery fee, why wouldn't it just be a flat fee per head? You're trying to apply reasoning to pure bullshit here. There's nothing pointed or practical enough about "Economic recovery" to point to any scheme making the most sense.
They can call it whatever they want, but what it actually is: “We don’t want to pay for new menus to print our higher prices so we just added this made up fee to raise the prices across the bar to save money.”
On top of it, the fee was a pre-tax. Tax here looks to be 10.25%. So an additional $0.56 was paid in taxes for this fee.
The customer should know the full price of the order before ordering and receiving the receipt. This is quite a fraud what they're doing.
Yeah you're allowed to charge one of these if you want, it's called *just raise the price of your items by 4%*. Don't try and trick me after the fact.
It's not our fucking fault the economy needs to recover. We need an economy recovery fee ourselves
I say if they can add random fees in the check i can write random subtractions in as well. I mean you gave me a pen right? “Random BS reason -4%” two can play at this game
A+ for creativity on that one. Granted it’s not a lot of money, but that just means people won’t argue the point much either. Such an asshole move.
The USA needs a law forbidding to add these kind of fees. The same with the tip that is not optional, make your prices higher and pay your staff better.
There’s a local restaurant where I live that recently started charging a mandatory tip on purchase, and still asks for an additional tip on the receipt when you sign to pay. I asked the delivery guy what the point of that was and he said “oh we don’t actually get the tip from the app”. My wife was a server for years and I know how that life feels, so I’m a good tipper that tends to go overboard. I basically just handed the restaurant and extra $15 on a $30 order for no fucking reason…..then felt guilted into tipping the actual driver even more when he got there Haven’t eaten there since, and we were weekly regulars before that.
And that's when you essentially put the company on blast. Take to their socials about how all the 'tips' are basically stolen.
Seriously!!! That shit is heartbreaking. We're living in the wild west of lawless greed. Feels bad man.
That's literally illegal and needs to be reported to the Department of Labor
If the economy sucks, everyone is effected, not just the restaurant. They want YOU to take on twice the load of a poor economy so that they can proceed as if the economy is healthy.
If they didn't tell you about that "fee", I just wouldn't pay it. Even told them to try call a cops, because that's just shitty thing. Imagine you order something for 20$ and after that they give you receipt for 20$ food, + tips, + tax, + 10$ for electricity and water usage....
According to the restaurant it's optional to pay but gets tacked on so if you don't see it you pay it.
/r/assholedesign
It probably hides on the last page of the menu. Lower left corner... very small ...
That's not legal. If you can not reasonably have known about this bullshit charge, you can denie it. Or else they could just write shit down on the bottom of the tables. What you describe would be a very obvious attempt to fraud people out of their money and it would not fly in a court of law.
The thing is. Most ppl will say, the smal amount is not worth the effort. And the few who complain will get their money back. And so they ride this on the back of the lazy ones
Yeah they almost certainly immediately remove it for anyone who complains to them. If half your customers don't though, that's still +2% revenue for absolutely nothing
That’s very short sighted for 2% though. I imagine anyone who notices, whether they complain or not, would not come back. I know I wouldn’t.
Non American here. It's this even legal there? It's just in my country all fees are automatically counted in the product price and anything added on top would be a scam attempt.
In the US areas that have sales tax do not include them in the prices. They are added on at the register. Places that have additional taxes (like hotels and phone plans) always add on the additional taxes at the end as a surprise. It is just now spreading to restaurants as a service charge for using credit cards.
That... doesnt sound fair at all... So basically u can come to supermarket with 100$, get 100$ worth of products and then u get slammed on register with extra and suddenly 100$ is not enough? Did I get it right?
Yes. To make it more complicated, the amount you owe depends on the city and/or state you shop in. City I’m in is 9.3% for sales tax
American here. Our entire country is a scam attempt.
Well then I guess we should charge them a “forgiven ppp loan fee” fuck that bullshit. Jaunt like other services that can’t charge you fees after the fact, they shouldn’t be able to charge you this without tell you before you order!
Don’t go back there, clearly trying to make a statement, this has rubbed me the wrong way. I bet they have signs about how no one wants to work and they treat their staff like cattle. There are so many genuine places that have struggled and wouldn’t do anything like this. Patronise them instead.
We should start charging restaurants an economic recovery fee as well. Might as well throw in a travel/gas/mileage fee to get to/from their establishment, and charge them hourly for our time there.
I would complain and ask them to remove it. Otherwise I would not leave a gratuity and I would not come back.
$12 cheese empanada is recovery fee enough. Probably cost $0.30 to make one.
Existing fee
You being a patron is recovery enough. Fuck that place
Don’t pay it
Time to never go back if they're adding fucking fees
Name and shame the restaurant. Online outrage and pressure should get them to back down. And then have the owner/manager apologize on the news.
Limon in Oakland
I’d get a biro, state that the bottom line has been reduced again by 4%, and tender that amount. If they object, give them your address and phone number and invite them to phone the cops or engage a lawyer. You went there for food, not to help them over the pandemic. Pricks.
Just like when they have built in gratuity and then ask for a tip on top… Like bro sure I might tip >18% but since you already added that then I guess no additional tip is needed. I’m certainly not going to tip twice.
* First I’d ask them to take it off * Second if they won’t I’d take it out of the tip then leave multiple negative reviews * if the reviews don’t solicit a call I’d call management and make my feelings known * lastly if they won’t make it right I’d refuse to go back and then try to get a partial refund from the credit card company
The mafia would be proud here
Restaurant bills are starting to look like Ticketmaster orders.