Waitress's frank tipping admission leaves internet divided

A waitress is sparking a heated debate about tipping culture after creating a video to educate people on how gratuities are dished out behind the scenes.

Following an interaction with a customer, the woman raced online to create her first ever video for TikTok where she revealed each servers' tips are often distributed across a number of employees.

In the clip - which has racked up nearly three million views - she said though tipping is not mandatory, it can have a negative impact on how much she takes home if she has to make up the difference when sharing with her colleagues. 

When she informed the patron, the server says she reacted with shock and only then did she realize how little some people know about how tipping actually works.

The fledgling content creator recalled telling her, 'Other people will tip and some people tip more than others and it evens out for me. I just would prefer that my tables do tip.'

The lady fired back: 'So you prefer? Why is that?'

The waitress, who explained in a subsequent video that she lives in Canada, then had to explain to this customer that if she didn't get tips, 'servers will still have to pay money on your bill, and you [are] actually costing us money.'

'I feel like no one had ever actually explained this to her before,' the waitress said.

Apparently, many of the people who stumbled on her video had never had this explained to them before either. 

Commenters expressed confusion and outrage at the system she referred to as 'tipping out.'

The concept of servers 'tipping out' to support other employees in restaurants like dishwashers, bartenders and hosts has long existed in both the United States and Canada. 

Essentially, waitstaff need to contribute a certain percentage of their total tips to a shared pool that goes to all tipped staff. 

This exists so employees that don't have the opportunity to interact with customers face-to-face to win tips still get to share in the prosperity.

Each restaurant usually has an agreed-upon policy between the owners and the employees of what is a fair percentage for servers to 'tip out.'

This is sometimes called tip pooling and can be done in two different ways.

Servers can be required to give away just a percentage of their tips.

According to an example by business management consulting firm Homebase, if a server makes $100 in tips in a particular night, they might have to hand 10 percent of that to the bartender, 7 percent to the busser, 5 percent to the runner, and 3 percent to the host.

This would leave them with $75 in tips that they get to keep free and clear.

Some restaurants, including the server's, operate on a 'percentage of sales' model.

Under this regime, servers need to tally everything they sold that night, including food and drinks.

So, if a server sells $100 in drinks and $400 in food, plus earns $100 in gratuities, per a hypothetical from Homebase, the restaurant can deduct certain percentages of the food and drink sales from their tip total.

The server might be obligated to give 10 percent of the $100 ($10) in drink sales to the bartender. They might also have to give 3 percent of the $400 ($13) in food sales to the runner.

Based on the $100 in tips they received, this hypothetical server would tip out $23 to the other staff and be left with $77. 

The TikToker broke down her total for one night in a subsequent video, which showed cash and card transactions, as well as the types of things customers bought, including food, wine, beer and scotch.

However, she wasn't able to recall the specific percentages she had to give to various employees.

So theoretically, if she didn't get tipped enough, she would have to cover her customer's bills out of her own pocket. 

Of course, this wouldn't mean that she wouldn't get paid or would be 'paying' to be a waitress. 

Over the course of a pay period, waitstaff still need to earn whatever the tipped minimum wage is in their state in order for the restaurant's tip pooling policy to be legally compliant. 

Her viewers erupted in the comments with their opinions on the matter, with some saying it shouldn't be their responsibility to support waitstaff and others blaming restaurants for this seemingly convoluted system.

'When you don’t tip bc you wanna hurt the employer for not paying them a livable wage, you’re actually only hurting the server. The wealthy employer doesn’t take the loss,' one person wrote.

Another wrote that they thought 'tip out is a crazy idea to me, no one should be liable to pay tip out when there is no tips. a job is supposed to earn u money not cost you.'

'Say what?! Tip out is inhuman. What is wrong with the USA?,' a third wrote.

Others were more indignant, believing that regardless of how restaurants function, it shouldn't be on them to tip a certain amount. 

'Bro that’s not OUR job. That’s your employers job,' one person wrote.

Another chimed in: 'None of this is the customer’s problem.'

Americans are quite divided on the tipping debate, according to a 2023 Pew Research poll.

Overall, 21 percent of US adults believe tipping is a choice, 29 percent say it’s more of an obligation and 49 percent say it depends on the situation.

Younger Americans were more likelier than older Americans to see tipping as obligation.

Richer respondents were also more likely to see it as a duty when compared to those with lower incomes.