guy who was arrested for not tipping has charges dropped
 

http://www.wnbc.com/money/3729682/detail.html

The 41-year-old Long Island man was arrested Labor Day weekend when the restaurant owner accused him of not leaving an 18 percent gratuity required for large parties.

Taveras said he wasn't aware of the policy -- and wouldn't have left that much money anyway because he and his friends weren't happy with the service. He said he left about a 12 percent tip on a $71 bill. He added the service was slow and the food was not that good.

I think the restaraunt should have let it slide, in the long run it will probably cost them more money in lost customers than the tip could have ever been worth.

Come on baddog and all you other fuckers saying it was right.

"The Warren County District Attorney's Office said a restaurant patron can't be forced to leave a gratuity. Prosecutors said establishments have to call it a service charge -- not a tip -- in order to make it a mandatory add-on charge."

Just like I said biatches. :321GFY

:winkwink:

How the fuck can they arrest someone when the extra charge is NOT part of the total on the bill? If it's not on my bill then why should I pay it or even have to know anything about it?

Check out the poll they have up..

Do you think it was right for police to arrest the man?

Yes 8432 8%
No 91032 92%

And I agree.

I still think it's right.

That's just one small towns opinion of their law...every state has different laws.

And regardless...it's in the TOS...all they have to do now is say for parties of 6 or more you will be charged a "service" charge of 18%.

Just a rewording of the TOS to fit the law.

Already discussed to death the other day...it WAS on their bill.

You know what really sucks?
You go to a pizza place and the choice for pizza and drinks are Medium, Large, Extra Large.

News flash: In order to have a size called "medium", it has to be the MIDDLE size...

Bring back size Small! Rally to my call!

Well it's annoying to me anyway... carry on..

i bet the restaurant is out of business in a year


i know if ilived in that town..i would make it a mental note to never go back there.

Yep and when they call it a service charge it does not have to be given to the waiter / waitress and they must pay taxes on it.

I refuse to leave a tip for a shit ass waitress and I really wouldn't care what the law said. Any service person worth a damn makes more money than most of the TGP kiddies around here.

If it's a tourist town...I bet he gets more biz from locals...LOL

Locals love it when people give shit to outsiders.

My grandmother lived in a town of 19,000.

Blockbuster not only moved in but they decided to move in across the street from the local video store to put them out of business.

The town's not huge, but there were plenty of places they could have put the new Blockbuster without looking like it was coming in for an attack.

People boycotted that sucker...the local video store dropped it's rentals on movies that were not new releases to 50 cents and 99 cents and within a year Blockbuster packed up and left..they have never returned..it's been about 7 or 8 years now.

ya that sucks they give u bad service, ur food sucks, then u get arrested haha

Exactly..they have to deserve it.

i helped pay for my schooling and when i travelled i could land in any town get a quick job amek a ton of cash and quit and travel for awhile longer.

id work 6 hours a day and leave with 140 bucks cash...plus a wage...not bad considering all i needed was some beer money..lol

I hope lawsuits are to follow. :Graucho

I dont think madatory tipping is right, even if they call it a service charge. if the service is good, then I tip good. If the service sucks ass, then so does the tip.

Yep

There's places around here that will try to slap on the mandatory tip if you are young or don't look wealthy.

:321GFY

I thought this was common sense. As I mentioned earlier, there is no such thing as a Mandatory Tip. A tip by definition is OPTIONAL. If it's a mandatory charge it's called a bill or a tax. Thank goodness the law really does work sometimes. This "tip" was a charge and not a tip. They need to state this CHARGE instead of using the "tip" bs to get extra money for nothing.

It's an underhanded unprofessional way of doing business.

If you show up to a restaurant with a larger than normal party and the staff does everything in their power to seat you in a timely fashion and together *which is not always the easiest thing to do* by pulling tables together, chairs causing a distraction to other guests and then take care of you and your large party and you can't find it in your heart to tip them more than 15% you're a cheap fucking bastard.

The 8% that voted yes are food service workers who hate bad tippers (and their jobs) no doubt.


What a joke.

I think we would all agree with this. But that's not what happened to this fellow according to him. Apparently he claims to have received poor service and the bill only came up to $71 so it couldn't have been a large gathering or everybody at it must have ordered water and nothing else. He even left a 12% tip even though he said the service was poor. Pretty generous if you ask me.

id like to share the story of how i "quit" my last service job....lol

i had been a waiter for years going to school etc. and i was doing it at nights and weekend while working at Dell computers

i didnt need the extra money, but it was nice.

well anyway i got stiffed on a tip from some people...and i give 120% service..i mean top notch. anyway i followed them into the parking lot and gave them back the 27 cents....told them they needed it more then me....got in my car and went and partied in peterborough..lol

fuck that noise...i like to be served now not the other way around

My normal party is 10 people. Restraunts shouldn't be set up to accomodate parties that big without a 15% service charge? They should be happy to have the business of 10 people and instead of calling the police when I don't leave a tip because of their waitress with a shitty attitude they should talk with her about it.

No if you read the original story he had a large party *more than 6* and the menu stated that a party over a certain # would be charged a mandatory gratuity charge.

Edit: Even you give a discount on bulk orders but a restraunt wants to charge me more? :1orglaugh

LOL

It would be great if grassroots organizations did the same thing to those companies that come in and fuck up the economies and drop the incomes and health benefits of people in little towns like that.

Put up the same business right next door or across the street or whatever.. and whore the shit out of whatever it is the bad guys pack up and leave.

Then someone local can provide those goods or services, treat their employees right (pay more than minimum wage, and offer bonuses, healthcare etc) AND keep much more of the money within the local economy.

Long live the american dream :)

The last mandatory tip I paid was at a restraunt that never added it to any of my bills before. Been there dozens of times. Me and a friend (both young) came in with work clothes on and they tacked 15% to the bill.

Service was great, so I left the 15% tip they tacked on and told the server in front of his manager he would have gotten much more if his prick of a boss hadn't put it on the bill.

Tramp.

I tip 20 percent. I do this for three reasons:

1) I was a waiter. This idealogy explains why many celebrities tip well.

2) You can't blame the waiter for everything. Most people who blame the waiter are cheap. The guy had nine friends and a $70 bill, lets think about that. He said the food was bad, I will go out on a limb here and say the waiter probably did not cook the food. Just a guess.

3) I have class. We can argue class as much as you like, but not tipping is an indication of not having class. Seeing that you were all on the Oprah Winfrey bandwagon this week, check out her episode on tipping some time. It is an act of "class." Poor service should be handled differently. I have both taken out clients for dinner and been taken out myself, tipping is without question a major role in someone's character. Take a girl out to dinner, pay the bill, and go to the restroom. Many girls will look to see if you tipped :)

As far as arresting the guy, that is a bit much. Waiters and waitresses take the good with the bad. That is life. Putting a mandatory tip on you because you look young is a part of life. I have had it happen as well. But I assure you, in Newport and many places in Hollywood, I rarely get the "Mandatory" tip placed on me. In the long run, tipping pays off.

20% is too high anyways. Unless the service was excellent i only give 15%. If it was crappy then 10%

I think the whole tipping this is out of hand anyways. People expect too much.

i wouldnt have left that much if the service was bad. who knows if that was his excuse so he doesnt look cheap though.

But see I can understand why they have this gratuity charge.

Why?

Because in the past 4 months I've been to about 5 dinners with adult webmasters and out of 2 of those the parties were huge and the waiters wereso busy dealing with us it was apparent they had difficulty in taking care of other tables.

And when it came time to pay the bill....people were leaving without paying their share or attemtping to..the waiters spent seriously a ridiculous amount of time going around and collecting from each person.

At one dinner I ended up spending $80 on 2 hamburgers 2 sodas and one appetizer..just to pick up the slack of someone else.

At another dinner I didn't do that. I just asked the waiter to put my order on a seperate bill which came to roughly $12 and gave him $20 and told him to keep the change.

People are cheap...and maybe one of the reasons a waiter at some point may seem snippy is because he/she knows those cheap ass fucks filling up the table asking for drink refills every 5 minutes aren't going to tip him/her anymore than the couple at another table who spent $30.

I can't argue with you about cheap asses. I'm the type that would have embarassed them about it by calling them on it right there. :winkwink:

I have had people cheap out on paying their part of the bill also and I ended up making up the difference. Other times I have seen someone pay for the meal for the table, and leave a 5 buck tip on a 200 dollar bill. I always slide extra money for the tip as everyone leaves just to make sure the waitress isn't short changed because someone hates to tip.

I think it's funny when you go to dinners with groups of business people that want your trust and they try and walk out on meals without paying and stick it with their colleagues.

Says alot about them.

I have 2 people on my list now who IMO have very questionable integrity.

I have no class! Crapy service and food = crapy tip.

The waiter doesn't cook the food, but he sure can bitch if things aren't as they should be. It directly affects his tips.

If you're gonna be a regular, you tip well. If the service is for shit, you're not going to be a regular anyway, so fuck them and their mandatory tip.

See. I told you so.

I feel a lawsuit coming for illegal arrest. The restaurant owner filed an illegal complaint.

Don't blame you if someone tried to skip the bill. That's sad. :1orglaugh