Proposal on how to share tips divides restaurants and servers
When a diner leaves a tip, the server doesn’t always get to keep all of it. Many restaurants require tipped workers to share their gratuities with bartenders and bussers.
For the last seven years, federal regulators have drawn the line at managers taking those tips and redistributing them to other employees such as cooks, dishwashers or the managers themselves.
But a new Trump administration proposal could revert to old rules in which restaurant managers could mandate who gets tips and how much. With Central Florida’s sizable restaurant industry, it could impact more than 38,000 local servers who are first in line for tips and tens of thousands more cooks, bussers and other kitchen and front-of-house-staff.
Some worry restaurant owners will take away cash from tipped workers rather than raise wages for other workers. The average server brings in about $28,900 in tips and wages in metro Orlando, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
“One of the biggest issues in the restaurant
industry is the disparity between front-of-the-house and back-of-the-house pay,” said Chris Muller, a hospitality professor at Boston University. “Restaurants are struggling with the rising pay for cooks while a lot of servers are taking home $20 to $40 an hour.”
The Department of Labor proposed the rule in December; a public comment period ends Feb. 5, after which the agency can make a ruling. The repeal is spearheaded by the National Restaurant Association, which has sued over the rule several times, including a recent case that was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday.
Sharing tips divides restaurants and servers.
Stubborn Mule and RusTeak co-owner Brian Buttner said he likes tip-sharing to ensure the serving team is working together, but doesn’t think it should be used to subsidize the pay of kitchen cooks and chefs.
“We try to pay the chefs what they deserve and we put a lot of value on the quality of our food,” he said.
Management does assist in the tip-pooling by fronting cash at the end of shifts, but how it is allocated is ultimately up to the serving team, he said.
Orlando-based Darden Restaurants, parent of Olive Garden and LongHorn Steakhouse, said in 2014 that servers make about $20 to $22 an hour when tips are factored in. Darden requires servers to share gratuities with workers such as bartenders and bussers, but not with kitchen staff, said spokesman Rich Jeffers. Darden leaders have not released a public position on the new tip-pooling proposal. The rules on tip-pooling have changed several times in the last three decades, depending on which party controls the White House, Muller said.
“[The proposed rule change] essentially takes away ownership of tips from employees and gives it to owners,” said Teofilo Reyes, research director for Restaurant Opportunities Center United, an employee group that advocates on issues such as health care and wages. “Then they can use tips for capital improvements or to pay for food or for anything they want.”
Recently servers have taken on more responsibilities at restaurants in order to cut costs, such as bringing food to customers and bussing tables. Earlier this month Colorado-based Red Robin announced it will cut bussers, a move aimed at stemming rising costs because of increasing minimum wages. It should save Red Robin $8 million a year, the company said.
Still, some servers say tip sharing is a long tradition that promotes unity and helps get them faster service from those making food. But it’s always been optional under the law.
“I think tipping out [to other workers] is important and it caused a lot of problems when there was no mandatory tip out,” said Carrie Cherkinsky, a former server who has worked at several local restaurant chains in the last decade.
Since tip-pooling was restricted in 2011, restaurant employees could still share their tips with non-service workers, but it had to be organized among staffers, not by management.
“I’ve worked at a few restaurants with different policies,” Cherkinsky said. “When I worked at Roy’s, the servers tipped out almost 40 percent of their tips to back servers, food runners, and bartenders.”
Others say they’ve seen their share of the work increase in recent years and don’t see why they should share when their base pay is only $5.23 an hour in Florida.
Cooks and chefs at fullservice restaurants usually make more than $11 an hour, Muller said.
“They would have to fix that disparity to even consider it,” said Jeff Lawrence, who waited tables at an Orlando chain restaurant until he quit last year to go back to school.