A woman is exposing a system in restaurants that forces servers to share their tips with non-tipped staff in order to compensate for their low wages.
In an eye-opening new TikTok video, user Alex explained that she was sent a screenshot from an anonymous Chili's server, which shows how her personal tips are distributed among restaurant staff who don't normally receive tips.
As per the tip distribution breakdown, the server received $61 in credit card tips. Of that $61, she had to share $10 with the bartender, $34 with the cooks, $4 with the expo, and $12 with the food runner.
This left the server - who had received the tips in the first place - with a meager $0.91.
Check out the video here:Overall, the server walked out with just $65.91 on a $1,000 sale - and the fact the average customer was tipping well under 20% didn't help either, Alex explained.
She continued: "Chili's, I'm sorry but this is abuse to your staff. You're making your servers pay your entire staff. People have messaged me that they've been in the negative at the end of their shift so they have to go to the ATM to pull out money to tip out the f**king staff. This is bulls**t"
Alex, who states that she had previously worked as a server at Chili's herself, explained in the comments that while "tipping out is common practice in mostly all restaurants", not all restaurants will "drop cooks wages from $20 to [minimum] wage and force servers to pay them."
She added: "From what I know this is only happening in California because it's legal here."
Speaking to Bored Panda, Alex added: "In CA, Chili’s dropped the cooks’ wages to minimum wage, which at the time was $13 an hour, and started having servers tip them out. 3.4% of our sales were going to the cooks. Another 2.1% was going to the rest of the staff; bartender, expo, and food runners.
"It’s broken down differently at every location but that’s how it was at mine. I had moved from FL where tip-out was only 1% to the bar. Not too bad,” she said and added that it all changed when she transferred to CA. “I was shocked to learn it was 5.5% because the average check at Chili’s is $12."
Alex also criticized the excessive promotions for customers, which entails making sides, desserts, and appetizers entirely free for the diners or giving them 3 for $10 and 2 for $25 deals. This means extra work for the servers without the extra tips.
