A US restaurant has left customers unhappy after adding a mandatory 18% tip to the bills of children dining without their parents.
Checks at Wayne Hills Diner in New Jersey state that ‘gratuities are appreciated’ but while adults are given the opportunity to tip whatever amount they please, children and teenagers are faced with a compulsory tax.
Melissa Desch was outraged after her 11-year-old daughter was targeted by this tax when a 90 cent tip was unkowingly added to her milkshake bill.
Talking to WCBS TV, Mrs Desch said, ‘It’s not about how much she is paid, it’s the simple fact that she didn’t have a choice.
‘So she was double tipping the server because she didn’t realise that they were actually adding the tip onto the bill.’
Melissa’s daughter Bella claimed her and her mum both visited the diner on the same day and, while her mum didn’t get charged a mandatory tip, she did.
‘I was angry because I had been there the week before and I had been there with a group of five, some kids and some children, and I was not charged this gratuity,’ Mrs Desch said.
According to the diner’s lawyer groups of twenty to thirty children have been showing up at the restaurant and staying for an hour or two, with the vast majority of them not leaving a tip once they are done.
In the US, waiters often rely on tips to earn a living and the lawyer claimed that it is not fair on them, which is why the tip has been added.
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