Re: The Latest Salvo in the Tip Wars

On Aug 20, 2024 at 8:37:08 PM PDT, "Rhino" <no_offline_contact@example.com>
wrote:

On 2024-08-20 10:23 PM, BTR1701 wrote:
 

 The latest in the tip wars... businesses covering up the "no tip" option on
 their card readers. I was at Subway a couple days ago and saw this. I ended
up
 tapping the "custom tip" button and entering $0.00. I don't tip fast food
 workers. They don't do much more than just hand me a bag, and in California,
 they're making $20/hour by law already, which is why my $5 foot-long now
costs
 $14.00.
 
 https://ibb.co/pW3khYk
 

If your technique catches on, they'll simply remove the "custom tip"
option and make you pay a mandatory minimum tip, say 15% to start and
then raise it if they get away with that. If that causes a backlash,
they'll just raise the prices. AGAIN.

Rhino has proven to be prescient. I'm now seeing more and more restaurants
adding tips to the bill automatically as a mandatory charge. They don't call
them tips, since legally tips have to be voluntary. They label them things
like "staff health care fee" and "worker compensation fee".

I had one restaurant recently charge me an 18% "living wage fee". Not
voluntary, no choice but to pay it. So on the tip line, I drew an arrow up to
the 18% charge, circled it, and wrote, "That's your tip."

They would have normally gotten 20% from me, but because of their obnoxious
mandatory fee, they only got 18%.