WTH are you coming off with these ex cathedra pronouncements of what’s possible and what’s not?
In my experience, watching a table is not hard at all for the waitstaff, and, since they’ve been entrusted with the company’s food, they should be held accountable for the lost payments.
Their job also requires they do side work, such as cleaning server stations, refilling ice, expoing food, portioning sauces, etc. Oh and I forgot one of the biggest one, going to the kitchen to get and verify your food. (putting in on the tray, grabbing sauces, etc.) You just expose your own ignorance in the restaurant industry claiming they can ‘watch’ the table 100% of the time and that is their only job. And that thusly they must be responsible for someone who runs out on them? Are you that dense? :rolleyes:
In the final analysis, it’s the Department of Treasury that deals with money and the Secret Service should be held accountable. You are going all over the place with this one. Anybody should know that a server’s job is not just to serve and get paid huge tips, but, to serve and watch their charges.
Close to 10 years of experience in the service industry. You just do not understand the business of a restaurant if you think the entire waitstaff can somehow cover for walk outs of others. One server does not know what another is doing with their tables.
It simply IS NOT POSSIBLE that a single server can be in the kitchen/bar/whatever and watch every one of their tables for the 60 seconds it takes someone to stand up and walk out. Like previous posts have stated, in any job an employee can be responsible for lost funds… how is it servers should be the only ones expected to make up the difference?
Nice strawman, dumbo.
Serving food is their job. Providing security is not. And no restaurant actually wants its servers to provide security. A server would probably be fired if they actually tried to stop a thief from walking out.
Not to mention, that in a party of two, it would be entirely reasonable to both go to the bathroom between courses, or one to go get something from the car while the other visits the bar.
there’s really no way a waiter can stop someone who wants to walk out
I think there are two very separate issues here: 1) are servers able to prevent or reduce walk-outs and 2) if they are, is fining them a reasonable penalty? I tend to think they can play an important role in reducing walk-outs, and it’s reasonable to expect them to be vigilant, alert management, etc. If one server has a series of walk-outs and no other server does, I think it probably reasonable to fire them–much in the way that you can’t hold a clerk responsible for every case of shoplifting, but if it’s a lot worse on their shift, you can assume they are either in on it or being much less vigilant. But I don’t think it’s ever reasonable to charge them for the price of the meal, or even give them the opportunity to make it up. That’s not how jobs work, and that’s a system too open to abuse.
I mean, what’s next? server forgets to write down “no mayo” and now they have to pay for the discarded burger? Customer throws a fit over a dirty spoon, meal is comped, server pays for it? Why do those seem ridiculous but the other is standard practice?
If I were going to dine and dash, I’d wait until my waiter was busy doing something else. And in a restaurant, they almost always are. A small expensive place where the waiter is watching maybe three tables and everything can be seen from the kitchen and in addition to the waiter there is someone else running around with water and busing tables - maybe the waiter could prevent dine and dash (but also wouldn’t want to cause a scene in such a place), at Outback steakhouse - there is no way that someone interested in dining and dashing couldn’t be out the door during the dinner hour while the waiter got another table’s meals, unless maybe they were 84 and needed a walker.
The other thing is that around here, its traditional if you are paying by cash to leave the cash plus tip in the folder, and if you don’t need change, walk out. The waiter isn’t going to know there isn’t any cash in there until he gets back to your table to bus.
I’d imagine that there are a number of people who don’t dine and dash BECAUSE they know that the waiter would have to pay for it. If they knew that the business was going to absorb it, they’d leave without paying often and not feel one iota of guilt over it, especially if it was a chain restaurant. There’s a growing perception in this country that business=bad and workers=good.
When it becomes a problem, the restaurant will start making you put your credit card down “on file” before you order.
There is an easy way to solve it from the business perspective, which is to do just that. If it were to be an industry standard, we’d whine like babies for eighteen months and then just get used to the restaurant holding a card on file until your bill was closed out.
(I could do a whole rant on the “big evil corporations who have endless money and how its perfectly ethical to rip them off” point of view.)
(Disney World now requires a deposit on all reservations, don’t show and you lose your deposit. If you call and say “we aren’t going to make it, little Sophy just puked all over Goofy” they’ll likely refund your deposit, even if its past the 24 hour required notice. I suspect that credit card remains open until your bill is closed out - so if you show up and dine and dash, they can still charge you. They are one of the biggest corporate targets of “they have lots of money, its perfectly ok for me to steal from them, it isn’t like they are a person or anything.” )
Right, and most bars that offer table service, or that allow you to run up a tab, already do this.
You know what, though? More often than not, the kind of jerk who justifies stealing from a corporation because it’s a corporation would steal from this server because he was “snotty” and that server because she was “rude” and the other server because he was “awful at his job and needs to learn”. Crappy people find rationalizations.
By your logic, Wal-Mart workers should have their pay docked the value of goods stolen from their sections, because that will reduce shoplifting.
There are different kinds of crappy people though - and some people demonize corporations. They don’t understand that a corporation doesn’t have unlimited resources, but an individual might (unless its a wealthy individual). Its a political thing, not merely a crappy person thing.
I disagree. Just today there was a thread from someone who complained that a hospital took nearly 2 years to bill him. Instead of being happy about getting to keep that money for an extra two years, he was pissed. And many posters encouraged him to not pay it, even though it was a legitimate bill for a legitimate service he received. Now if the biller was a PERSON, let’s say a contractor who did work on the OPer’s house, I daresay more people would encourage him to “do the right thing.” But it was a corporation, so screw 'em!
Similarly, I know plenty of people who’d accept compensation from another driver’s insurance company, even if they weren’t remotely injured, who’d look at you like you had two heads if you asked them if they felt badly about it. Because it’s just the big, bad insurance company who’s getting screwed, stupid. It’s not like the driver had to cough up the cash!
And finally, I also know lots of people* who receive a lot of cash as part of their business who routinely under-report how much they make to the IRS, so that they can avoid paying taxes.
*including waiters!
Not that this justifies the policy that the waiters should pass for deadbeats. But it does support my opinion that the knowledge that you’d be screwing over the waiter instead of the business actually helps deter deadbeats who wouldn’t bat an eye screwing over a business.
I opined that the policy of docking waiters undoubtedly deters some dine and dashers. However, I didn’t argue that this somehow justifies the policy.
But, yes, to answer your other question, if Walmart implemented a new policy, and thieves knew that the employees of the store would have to cough up for any stolen merchandise (as opposed to the EvilEmpireWalmart), I’d predict that shrinkage would decrease.
This is a rather disingenuous summary of the thread in question, at least as it pertains to the issue that you are discussing in this thread.
No-one in that thread told the OP that he should refuse to pay money that he legitimately owes. The OP has not indicated that he wants to avoid his legal obligations.
Just about all of the advice, including those who have suggested not to pay, has involved not paying before he knows the full story. People have recommended that he not simply take the hospital’s word for how much he owes, but that he get in touch with both the hospital and the insurance company in order to ensure that he doesn’t get screwed. The OP himself has told us that the hospital and the insurance company have each told him a different amount, and if i were in the same position, there’s no way i’d pay until i sorted out exactly what my obligations were.
No-one is saying “Don’t pay what you owe, because corporations are evil.” People are saying, essentially, “Don’t just take their word for it. Corporations sometimes screw up or act like assholes, so don’t pay until you’ve checked all the details and have a clear sense of how much you really owe, especially in a situation like this where they’ve already shown themselves to be rather incompetent.”
And given no evidence, apart from some personal observations about human nature, and people you know.
There are states where making the waitstaff pay for skip-outs is illegal, and the restaurant has to eat the cost. If you can demonstrate that dining and dashing is more prevalent in those states, it might support your argument. Otherwise, it’s nothing but rank speculation.
Perhaps you’re confused by the meaning of “In My Humble Opinion” forum.