Restaurant tipping leaves nasty taste Low-paid waiters are still denied their just deserts

PAY in the hospitality trade is notoriously bad, a situation made worse when hard-working staff don’t even get all the tips left by customers.

Ten years ago, the Mirror launched our Fair Tips campaign and in 2009 the Government seemed to listen.

But the industry Code of Best Practice that was introduced was only voluntary and so, unsurprisingly, was widely ignored.

In 2016, the Conservatives announced a public consultation under new Business Secretary Sajid Javid to look at all the abuses still taking place.

“Like many of us, I was surprised to learn of claims that some employers, including some of our most well-known high street chains, were acting unfairly when it came to discretionary payments for service,” he said.

Not that there’s anything surprising about this chronic scandal.

Yesterday marked two years since that consultation closed and we are still waiting for concrete action.

Labour, meanwhile, has promised to make it illegal for bosses to keep any tips left for workers.

The array of sneaky practices detailed here shows why urgent action is so badly needed. under auto-enrolment, which are based on basic pay.

A company spokesman said: “At TGI Fridays, we care about our family, that’s why 100% of tips go to our team members.

“We give 40% of tips paid by card to the kitchen teams and 60% to our servers to ensure that all team members responsible for our guests’ service are rewarded, and we never deduct an admin charge.” fought by the Mirror and Unite.

Pizza Express changed its policy and the practice is now thankfully far less common, but it does still exist.

The Italian chain Strada pockets 2% of tips left for waiting staff when customers pay by card.

A spokeswoman told me: “Staff receive 100% of cash tips.”

How kind of the company. staff for mistakes such as lost credit card receipts, failed gift cards or customers leaving without paying,” said a spokeswoman.

“These costs are taken on by the business.”

She added: “We are looking into whether there have been cases where the policy has been wrongly applied to ensure that no one has been mistakenly charged.

“We will also revisit the wording of the policy to make sure that its purpose and application are absolutely clear.”