Thread: Waitress denied awesome tip because Waffle House sucks

http://www.newsobserver.com/2014/06/...-waitress.html

RALEIGH — Shaina Brown works the late shift at Waffle House, serving cups of second-wind coffee to wobbly diners with butane breath.

After seven years, she’s learned to coax a good tip with a smile and quick refill. Even the barroom crowd will throw her $5 extra.

But nothing short of greasy spoon magic can explain what happened at 3 a.m. on Mother’s Day, when a patron eating a Texas bacon patty melt called Brown over and said, “I’m going to bless you tonight.”

He paid his bill with a credit card and wrote $1,500 on the tip line, asking Brown to share $500 with a haggard-looking woman at a table nearby.

Then he vanished into a cab, telling Brown, “You have a good spirit.”

If this were a fairy tale, Brown would have taken that money home and spent it on her three kids. She might have fixed the broken transmission on her car. A thousand dollars presents endless opportunities to a single mother working two jobs.

But this is Waffle House, where magic gets poured out like cold coffee. They wouldn’t let her keep the money. They sent it back to the angel with the late-night appetite.

“I feel like they stole from me,” said Brown, 26. “They did exactly what they teach us not to do.”

This really happened. I confirmed Brown’s story with the customer who left her a tip the size of a mortgage payment, a Raleigh businessman who didn’t want public attention for his deed.

Then I contacted Kelly Thrasher, a Waffle House spokeswoman, who told me that large tips are refunded to patrons as a regular procedure. Generous tippers are asked to tip again by cash or check. The restaurant handles it that way, she explained, in case the customer decides to dispute the tip later or ask for a refund.

What garbage.

Pretty shitty, but I cant say I really expect better management decisions at a Waffle House at 3am

Well, if they contacted the "late night angel" he can go back in and give her cash or send her a check in the mail. Sounds like she could sure use it. Single mom working 2 jobs.

It is shitty, but in the restaurants defense...When you pay by credit card and tip by credit card, the restaurant pays that cash to the employee up front when they close their shift. If the customer decides to go back and dispute the charge, the restaurant is out the money they paid the employee until either the cc company finalizes of the employee pays it back.

What they should have done is made her hold out until the transaction cleared and the money was in the restaurant's account.

Originally Posted by GEM

It is shitty, but in the restaurants defense...When you pay by credit card and tip by credit card, the restaurant pays that cash to the employee up front when they close their shift. If the customer decides to go back and dispute the charge, the restaurant is out the money they paid the employee until either the cc company finalizes of the employee pays it back.

What they should have done is made her hold out until the transaction cleared and the money was in the restaurant's account.

Not only that, but even if the customer doesn't refute the charges the restaurant has to pay a processing charge of the total, which in that case would probably be $50-80.

Credit cards are evil and the banks are crooks

Only in Obama's America.