I’ve basically done this. But we still socialize with her parents and when we do they’ll suggest stopping for a beer. They grab the check and I look the other way. 
The owner and manager are good guys. They’ll comp me a beer every now and then, and I know from conversations that they do not allow the ‘tenders to give freebies out, mostly to avoid issues with the liquor control people.
I think that’s kind of what I meant by “he’s OK with it”. My point is that if “letting it slide” simply means the attendant says nothing , you don’t know why he said nothing and therefore it has no effect on the rightness or the wrongness of the action.
Please don’t assume the bartender is ‘stealing’ those free drinks. Bartenders often have a ‘comp at will’ tab, to shoot free drinks to regulars. Or, they have the ability to pay a minimum, ($2) for drinks they want to buy for customers.
I’ve bartended in places where that was the case.
Another ethical quandary. A local pizza place sends out fliers with their current specials. On the flyer it says the specials are “good for one week” although the flyer isn’t dated.
Last year there was a special that looked good. Promo Code “5OFF20” would give $5 off any order over $20. I order online and saw that the meal I always ordered came to $20.25, so I placed my order and used the promo code. My food was $15.25, a really good deal.
I ordered from them a week later and entered the promo code and it worked. I thought I got lucky. Three weeks passed and I ordered food and again the promo code worked. I continued entering it and it continued to work until just recently.
Pennsylvania liquor control is archaic. Freebies are tightly regulated. A bar I know had a huge fine when their Facebook page mentioned mix-sixes as buy five get one free. They’d always said buy five, the sixth is a penny and that was kosher, but “free” got them a big fine.
Also, the manager would give me free drinks and once mentioned that his bartenders were not allowed. Portion control is easier with liquor. With beer there is often some beer poured down the drain as the keg is settling in.
Of course, ethics isn’t maths. There isn’t a right answer you can work out or look up. Different ethical approaches may give different assessments of ethical questions.
My undrstanding is pretty limited, but I belive there are three main strands of ethical approach:
Virtue ethics: one should aim to think, feel and act in a morally good way with the ultimate aim not of doing good but of being good, of embodying virtue. Relevant virtues here might be honesty and trustworthiness; equally they could be thrift and loyalty to one’s family above all. The question is: is Joe being a virtuous person? Is he being good?
Deontology: one should adhere to moral obligations. This is Kant’s turf, and also where I get very fuzzy. But basically, there is a set of principles to judge an act against - if it follows them, it is ethical. If it does not, it ain’t. Only act in a way that you would be happy if it were to be the general rule. One principle that we might be happy to have as a general rule is: don’t break the terms of a deal. Another might be: everyone should be free to get whatever they can get away with. Here the question is: is Joe being true to his principles, and acting in a way he would be cool with if everyone else did it too?
Consequentialism: all that matters is outcomes. If what you do ends up with bad things happening, then it’s bad. If good things happen, then it was a good thing to do. This raises the question of how well an actor can judge the consequences. In fact, this is the question: do Joe’s actions hurt the car wash, are they neutral, or as @chela hypothesised, might they even benefit it? If Joe has good reason (discounting his self-interest) to believe he knows the answer to this question, then he knows if his actions are ethical.
How you choose which framework to use is a puzzler as strictly you can’t do it on the basis of an ethical judgement, as you haven’t yet got an ethical framework from which to make judgements!
But it’s interesting, I think, that most judgements that Joe is unethical stem from a virtue or deontological framework, while most judgements that Joe is ethically neutral or perhaps an unsung hero stem from consequentialism.
A side comment that I’m sure you’ve thought about …
If this bartender is comping lots of drinks for you in effect in exchange for tips, it’s a decent bet she’s doing the same thing with other regulars. Or if she isn’t, that’s really “isn’t yet”, and she’s going to be starting soon. You know from your relationship with the manager that she’s not allowed to do that. You can reasonably infer she knows that too and is doing it anyhow. Bad behavior doesn’t normally subside on its own; instead it continues (and usually grows) until stopped by an outside force.
You are friends with her, her parents, and the manager. You’re stuck in a bad spot almost no matter how the future plays out. But rest assured it will play out.
Good luck! Seriously, not snarkily.
You would be guilty of receiving stolen goods😄.
Seriously, I don’t think that’s on you, although if it was unauthorized the mini-mart would be justified in firing and possibly even prosecuting the clerk. I think it would be a stretch to prosecute for a free soda, though.
I used to stop in at the Subway restaurant in my neighborhood, and due to my schedule I was frequently there shortly before they closed.
When I came in right before close, I almost always got a free cookie with my sandwich…….simply because they were all going to be tossed at the end of the day. I’m assuming this was store policy but maybe it wasn’t, maybe the clerks were all rogue. I didn’t question it though, and sometimes it even factored into my decision to go to that restaurant.
And if giving me cookies that they were going to throw away in a half hour caused me to go to the restaurant more often, it may have been a good business decision. But I assumed it was authorized and if it wasn’t, I’m not expected to do due diligence before I accept a freebie at a business.
ETA- sometimes freebies help the business in unexpected ways. I had a six figure income at this time, and a cookie cost something like .99. But I would almost never buy the cookie, because self-discipline and calories and bad habits.
But I’d always take the freebie, and sometimes seek out the freebie. People are weird.
Forgive me, but for me there was a glaring juxtaposition between dining at Subway and tossing cookies.
I admit that I enjoyed the … sub … text
Honestly, there are so many “one day sale!” perma-sales going on in the world today (online clothing retailers are lousy with 'em), that I would assume the undated “one week only!” specials were in that category: the business is lying about the “one week” part in order to engender a sense of urgency. If the flyer is undated, it’s not on me to keep track of when the sale is supposed to end
Actually, the store does, eventually, for manufacturer’s coupons at least. If someone buys a $2.00 item with a 50¢ off coupon the store gets $1.50 up front and the 50¢ after it turn the coupon in, plus another 7 or 8¢ for their trouble.
A store coupon is different but somebody somewhere decided it was worth it to offer the deal.
That was my thinking as well.
Here is a thread from 2015 on a closely related topic: the intended one-time use coupon that gets reused and reused and …
With my personal part in a similar thievery laid bare to the world in post #8.
You guys understand I am not trying to pick a fight with any of the questions I have asked. These are only debate points based in real life knowledge in the interest of your opinions.
And none of you have disappointed! Carry on. This is great!
Residential trash is different. You don’t have people compacting trash on a large scale to get more trash into a dumpster, which you do have in some commercial customers.
I see I wasn’t clear. I was referring to the trash removal costs of the retail companies I have worked for or consult for.
I didn’t intend to suggest you were wrong or misinformed. I hope you didn’t get that vibe from my post. I was simply pointing out to the general audience that per-pound (per-ton actually) charges are less than universal in dumpster contracts.
I now live in a much larger apartment building with almost 500 units. They do have automated compactors attached to the several trash chutes which are the primary outlet for all resident trash. I’ll see if I can get a straight answer from the front office on how their trash charges are computed. Hooray for random curiosity!
Pennsylvania is similar. The guy who used to (RIP) live next to my business was a bored busybody. He saw someone putting stuff in my dumpster. He took pictures and wrote down the guy’s license plate.
The next day, armed with this information, I called the cops. There are no local police, so Pennsylvania State Police responded. The officer pulled up information using the license plate and went to the guy’s house and brought him to my place!
The guy initially denied dumping stuff, then he was shown the Sports Illustrated magazines with his name and address on them. Turns out his son was the guilty party.
The cop asked if I would “drop charges” if the guy emptied my dumpster. Sure! It was pretty disgusting. He took everything out of my dumpster and put it all into his car.
Can you answer my question from upthread? Since you’re also a business owner, how would you, yourself, feel about what Joe was doing if you were the owner? How about if several customers were doing it?
While I said I understood Joes point of view I don’t necessarily endorse nor demonize it.
The closest I can related to it is this:
Folks can buy range time in bulk at a discounted rate. 12 one hour sessions for the price of 8. Sessions are printed on a business card and the bulk deal has the cards come in a wax envelope. When you come to the range you either pay in cash or present a card.
Now say Joe does this but one day gives one of his cards to Clint as a gift to come in and use the range. Do I consider that had Joe not done that Clint would have bought his own range time? Or do I consider that Joe paid for 12 range hours (at the discounted price) and it doesn’t matter what meat sack is occupying a bay in the range, the time has been paid for, I got my money? The bay is going to be used 12 times eventually from those cards, does it matter who uses them?
Another scenario is when folks buy a gun they get a free box of ammo and 1 hour on the range. What if Joe buys a gun but gives the range card and ammo to his friend Clint? Do I object because if Clint wanted a free hour and box of ammo he should buy a new gun from me?
These may not be identical to the car wash scenario but it’s as close as I can personalize it.
I think the car wash businesses are betting that folks are not going to use the subscription service every single day, which is why they limit it’s use to one car. Which brings us back to Joe using it every single day without exception on his own car. Even though that’s what he paid for is he exploiting the spirit of the program to a gaun he doesn’t deserve?
You can’t really answer these questions without knowing what we’re in the terms and conditions of these offers.