Tip Pooling Calculations

[Eliopia]

I am a previous employee of a restaurant that is now involved in a lawsuit for not paying employees correctly. This got me thinking about the way tip pooling is calculated, and it turns out, it gets more complicated than I anticipated. I wanted to come up with a formula for how it is calculated, and in doing so I think I found the reason for the lawsuit in the first place.

Lets take the most basic example:
2 employees, $200 in tips for the night. Each employee gets $100.

The problem is that in every restaurant I've ever worked at that has tip sharing, the % of the cut you get is often determined by the time you've been there, ie: 0-3 months 70%, 3-6 months 80%, etc.

Lets do this again with the same 2 employees, except this time, 1 employee is getting a 80% cut. Its not as cut and dry as 80$ for employee(80%) and 100$ for employee(100%), because this leaves $20 undestributed.

You need to set up a simple algebra equation. x=$ the 100% employee gets.
x+.8x = 200. Employee(100%) gets $111.11 and Employee(80%) gets $88.88.

This is where the fundamental flaw in tip calculations lies I believe. I've seen the tip sheets and it usually has a total tips column, # of sharers, and then the amount each gets. It just never occurred to me that they might be pocketing all those little excess amounts from the people not at 100% share. I guess someone did think of this and hence the lawsuit.

Now imagine you have 50 people on the roster for a Friday night. A are at 70%, B at 80%, C at 90%, and D at 100%. The tip calculation should go something like this: (again x=$ a 100% would make)
Dx + .9Cx + .8Bx + .7Ax = $Total.

Lets say Saturday night tips totaled $10,000 (in a restaurant big enough to have 50 people splitting them, its reasonable). According to the formula I just outlined, all the money would be dispersed among the 50 employees with no leftover, except odd cents.

If you calculated tip share the way I think they've been doing it, you would get excess from every person that didn't have a 100% share ie(from above):
$10,000 total / 50 employees = $200 share
.1C(200) + .2B(200) + .3A(200) = total undestributed money.

You can plug in some trivial numbers just to get a feel for it, but add those numbers up for every single lunch and dinner shift, every single day, for god knows how many days, and you be talking six figures. Not to mention the restaurants where the owners are illegally taking a share in the pool.

Of course I'm just being theoretical, and I don't know if standard payroll software includes these calculations for tip sharing, but from what I've seen, I'm lead to believe it doesn't.

I'll be waiting for my check in the mail.

[Aetos]

My understanding has always been that a tip is given to someone for doing above or beyond what is typically expected, not tip just because that is the social norm. on the other end of the spectrum, the only job i have worked that received tips was at a beach club in college and anything I got in tips stayed right in my pocket. Something about pooling tips like your example bothers me

[MrGraham]

Originally Posted by Aetos

My understanding has always been that a tip is given to someone for doing above or beyond what is typically expected, not tip just because that is the social norm. on the other end of the spectrum, the only job i have worked that received tips was at a beach club in college and anything I got in tips stayed right in my pocket. Something about pooling tips like your example bothers me

Why did you do this? His post has nothing to do with whether or not you should tip, nor do we really need yet another discussion on this.

To the OP - Your ability to form complete sentences and use correct punctuation and grammar makes me think that either a) you work for a low end restaurant and really need to get a new job, or b) you work for a high end restaurant and are making bank already and this is going to be icing for you. Congratulations on B if so.

[Aetos]

Originally Posted by MrGraham

Why did you do this? His post has nothing to do with whether or not you should tip, nor do we really need yet another discussion on this.

To the OP - Your ability to form complete sentences and use correct punctuation and grammar makes me think that either a) you work for a low end restaurant and really need to get a new job, or b) you work for a high end restaurant and are making bank already and this is going to be icing for you. Congratulations on B if so.

Thank you for telling me what you think the discussion needs and doesn't need, but then you would be voicing your opinion and someone would come and tell you that the OP's post has nothing to do with whether or not you should tell someone what they should and shouldn't post, and frankly I'm beating a dead horse, so really we dont need another discussion on this.

There is no incentive to do more work for more 'pay' if what it is you are working harder for gets put into a pool and you don't even receive all of the benefit.

[Korioni]

This is a thread about math and legality issues.

Not tipping.



Just thought I'd clarify.

[Jovec]

Originally Posted by Eliopia

math

Never seen a restaurant that doesn't have a Tip Out, typically to hosts/hostesses and bus boys (and possibly the entire kitchen staff), so your math needs a few more variables in the 5-10% range, which can easily account for the missing money. For that matter never seen a waiter that didn't under-report their tips either.

[Elurin]

Indeed. I was a bus boy for a while, and our tip out was between the bartenders, waiters, hosts, and bussers. Since bartenders and waiters were the only ones tipping in, the extra money would go to the two that don't get tips.

But if in your restaurant those demographics don't get tips, then I dunno.

Either way, the government gets fucked cause NO ONE reports their tips 100%. The first thing they told me when I got there was make it so your pay was above minimum wage, and that's all. Anything above that was pocketed.

[aychamo_aycono]

I'm a very cheap tipper. Most of the time the food fucking sucks and if my waitress isn't a very attractive female then I leave almost nothing. It's the fucking economy

[r3probate]

I do the inverse of Aych, I tip cute girls absolutely nothing in order to balance the force. I tip the Mexican fuckers at the local Mexican joint the best out of anyone because I figure they need it the most

[prescient63]

I live with someone who sells time clock / payroll software, and I'm relatively sure that if you are using an enterprise system it will be computing your tips correctly. The amount of rules that they build into a system like that is ridiculous. Therefore, I doubt they are screwing up something this simple. However, if it some old shitty system that the owners brother made you might be correct. As far as the bartenders go if this thing is completely automated it's probably already tipping out 10% of your drink totals to the bartenders as that should be easy to grab from your POS entries.

I'm going to venture a guess and say you work for TGI Fridays =P

[Eliopia]

The restaurant in question is a brazilian steakhouse. If your not familiar with its structure, its completely different than traditional restaurants.

All checks are run through a central cashier, as are all the tips, credit and cash. You have 3 different job descriptions that share the tips; servers, gauchos and bartenders. The % share between each does not change. (Gauchos are not pants; google some brazilian steakhouses to find out how it works if you must.)

Each restaurant distributes differently. Some distribute the cash portion on a nightly basis, others add on all the credit and cash tips to your weekly or bi-weekly paycheck.

Busboys dont get a tip share, although I always gave mine some money on Fridays and Saturdays because without his help I would have drowned. Some of them got spoiled by me and wouldn't work very hard for other people that didn't pay them on the side.

As for the argument 'why work harder when it gets thrown into one big pool': This might work out for you a few times, but managers have complete access to a wide variety of statistics including but not limited to: average ticket/person, % tips on your checks, etc. If you can't perform, you get reduced in your share, it's a big team effort.

[Korioni]

^ Tucanos


As an aside, at the Tucanos here, the bus boys often end up getting more money than the servers. My suggestion? Get a job at an equally expensive, but single-server deal. Always those Goddamn new people dragging you down in a tip pool.

[Shoeby]

Tip Pooling. Damn all the restaurants I've worked for must have been behind the times. Servers got what they got, and that's the end of it. They give the bus boys and bartenders a few bucks (Good luck getting drinks or tables cleaned if you don't.)

I don't necessarily believe that girls make more than guys. They certainly have the 'cutesy' factor going for them, but when I worked in a restaurant my average credit card tip rate was around 22%. Quite simply, I was personable, and I didn't stand around talking with the other servers. I busted my ass, but also made more than anyone else at the restaurant.

Unless service absolutely blows, I won't tip less than 15%, and hit 20 - 25% for good service. My wife of course always gives me shit about it because I don't really have extra money hanging out my ass, but as someone who's been there working for tips, I know how shitty that job is, and I appreciate someone who'll be personable and bust their ass to make sure I have a great experience.

[Korioni]

Originally Posted by Shoeby

Tip Pooling. Damn all the restaurants I've worked for must have been behind the times. Servers got what they got, and that's the end of it. They give the bus boys and bartenders a few bucks (Good luck getting drinks or tables cleaned if you don't.)

Tucanos is a restaurant where the servers circulate throughout all of the customers carrying various types of meat. No customer gets any particular server, hence the tip pooling.

[ToeMissile]

First because I'm an ass: Brazilian steakhouse/bbq = churrascaria

It's been a couple years since I've been to a Tocanos (Albuquerque), but from what I remember we had a waiter/server separate from the people making the rounds w/ the meat. I also went to a local churrascaria and it was the same way, we had a server. Granted they don't do as much as waiters at other establishments seeing as how they don't take food orders, except drinks and desert.