some restaurant info for you

i read a thread on here concerning mcdonalds earlier, and while i cant say for certain if the things there are true, i can relate my own expieriences. ive worked in restaurants for the last 12 years and have watched the quality of the food decrease greatly across the board.

here are some examples:

1) baked potatos...already delivered to the restaurant cooked. merely reheat in 350 for 15 minutes..

2) steak, chicken and pork..all precooked with grill marks included. all we have to do is slap it on the grill for 5 minutes to heat it...

3) you know the fired onions that everyone loved so much? (awesome blossom, bloomin onion, irish haystack..their all the same) they cost about $.25 to make...we hit you for 5 or 6 bucks...lol

4) the four dollar bowl of soup is nothing more than a gallon bag bought from a distributor and boiled to serving temp....huge money maker there..not as good as the onion...

5) then the best....pop...lol..2 bucks a glass....cost $.03 a glass....but hey..we give you free refills....

if you visit any of the major restaurants this is common practice...chillis, bennigans, olive garden (dennys of italian food, i say), tgi fridays..it doesnt matter.


lastly is a note to the public about your servers you might not know. EVERY place ive ever worked at does this and i think it is totally unfair. servers are charged a fee to work at the restaurant. 3% of our sales. regardless of what our tips are. this 3% is to "tip out" the bartenders, hostesses and bussers. the managment claims that these people are not neccesary in the restaurant. they are assistants to us, therefor we own them money...bartenders arent neccesary? hmmm...someones got to make the drinks...no bussers? whos gonna clean? and hostesses? they are all neccesary. but what every place does (in one form or another) is to take back a certain amount of the servers tips to help pay the other employees...oh by the way...we make $2.13 an hour and are taxed at aprx. 65% of our check. i work 70 hours a pay period there, take home about $35.00 per check...

how can this be legal? is there nothing we can do? i dont know what theyll want us to pay for next. the cooks? they help us by making the food. maybe they should only pay them 5 bucks an hour and let us tip them out to. its ridiculous. is there anything, anyone would suggest?

What is the minimum wage where you live???
Where do you live?
2.13/hr is an exaggeration, or you are underage/illegal alien ???

oh, i live in indiana. minimun wage is federal law. however, servers are not covered. see, we get "tips" so the restaurant can pay $2.13 and assume that the tips we make will make up the difference. even though there are night when i leave there, i have given 25-30 bucks back to them, for letting me work there....

In Massachusetts and California ( 2 of the 3 states I have cooked in) "tipping out" in a forced manner is illegal . The waitstaff has the right to a secret ballot deciding on the practice with no intervention allowed by management . One restaurant I worked for voted against pooling their tips so that everyone kept what they earned .

The problem is getting a vote to take place without being a whistle blower , and losing your job in the process . I know you are also taxed on your gross receipts , and if someone stiffs you , you actually wind up paying for part of their meal .

You might want to drop an anonomous dime and rat your employers out . They should take the full responsibility of compensating individuals , and if you have a busser who busts their tail for you , and helps you get an extra turn of tables , it should be your good judgement to reward them , not forced upon you .

This is a common tactic used in the restaurant industry in my experience , to lower the wages used to guide insurance benefeits , full time employment status , social security deductions etc.

These rules are required to be posted in California , and you can usually find them posted under the bottom shelf , behind the greasy rags , next to the dishwasher chemicals next to the garbage disposal , which are behind the stumbbly feet of my drunken dishwasher buddy Javier. Good luck finding them .

Try the labor board before you say ANYTHING at work , usually a quick trip to the door if you make waves .

Or the IRS , lots of $$ in restaurants , and you may be a small fish , but the owners aren't !!!

good luck !

When I first waited tables all I had to tip out was the bar. Even that outraged me. My boss would reply " The bartenders are helpin you out. Without them, who would make your drinks?" His answer insulted me more than tipping them did.

Then over the next few years (a few restaurants) it has gotten worse. I mean, why should I pay for them to have a hostess? I can understand tipping out for a busser. Alot of places make the servers buss their own tables. I've done that and it sucks. Since an owner has an option as to whether or not they want a busser on the payroll, i like the services and will chip in a few bucks at the end of the night. However it should stop there and it doesnt.

I'm sorry, but I cant see any legitimate reason for me to be subsidizing my owners restaurant under the guise of "you make good tips". It makes us resent our job even more, and damn, when you get stiffed by someone its bad enough, but when you realize that you have to give the house back 3% of that guys check? oh man....it just sucks and it aint right....

I've worked in the restaurant buisness most of my life. From busboy to restaurant manager. I agree with alot of what you say. Mostly it depends on how the restaurant is run.

Some places have a bartender and a barback/service bar that will pour the server drinks and whatever. Some have to take away from their own customers to make your drinks. Most bartenders only make 2.13 an hour like you. I dont think it should be mandatory but I do think the server should tip them out anyway on their own accord. That way the bartender can decide whos drink to make first next time he or she has 10 service bar tickets and 8 of his own customers waiting for drinks. The better you tip the better chance you have on getting your drink fast.

Probably most the restaurants I've worked were either owned or run by complete idiots that could not wait a table or pour a drink to save their life. The servers and back of the house are treated like # and female servers are regularly sexually harassed. For some unknown reason it's easy to get away with this in the restaurant buisness.

I don't think many people choose the restaurant buisness as a lifelong career due to the fact that turnover is so high. Most people get wait jobs to tie them over thru school and between jobs. Drugs (especially coc aine) are usually easily found at the bar scene and every restaurant I've worked the staff usually parties pretty hard.

Restaurant managers also try to get employees to pay for walk outs which is wrong and illegal to force someone to pay. Last time I checked, someone had to take you to court to garnish your wages. Something servers always fall sucker for. You can't police the table the whole time.

Uniform Nazis make you buy their overpriced special shirt at a minium of 3. Or make you pay for dry cleaning. This is also wrong. Here in Virginia it's illegal. The restaurant must let you wear something that is most likely in your closet. Like an oxford shirt or similar. They can't require you to buy their uniform from them.

I stopped being a manager because it's basicly babysitting. Working 55-60 hours a week because i'm salary and some servers that work half the hours made more than me. Mostly, because most managers are on a power trip and the job is perfect for those types not me. Now, bartending and cooking, I make way more than I did managing and in way less hours.
Less responsibility too.

The restaurant buisness sucks you in and it's hard to get out. Leave while you can!

sublime....I had a friend tell me stuff about restaurants like you said in your original post. Its disgusting that they can get away with that sort of stuff.

PS- Where do you live in Indiana? I just moved to Indianapolis from Kansas.

Some have to take away from their own customers to make your drinks. Most bartenders only make 2.13 an hour like you. I dont think it should be mandatory but I do think the server should tip them out anyway on their own accord.

that much i can concede. when they have a mandatory 1% of alcohol sales tip out, Im cool with that to a point, but realisitcly, they should be paid more than $2.13. they are doing more work. and usually they have a service bartender who is there just to make server drinks.

as far as the uniforms? get this. they make us pay them $18 bucks per shirt, 10 bucks per apron. even if the apron falls apart. which they do after about 2months..

and then the meal plan..this is the best one yet.....every one of my checks gets $12.50 taken out. this is to be a part of the "meal" plan..for the low price of $25.00 a month I get the privilage of paying half price for meals. (steaks,ribs and shrimp not included...) and i also can order any item from the kids menu for free!! thats right!! free bag of mac and cheese, or a hot dog !!! Now the $12.50 isnt mandatory, you can opt out...however, dont get caught sipping pop....fireable !!!

I almost universally hate restaurants after working in many.

Also, the food at say, Olive Garden, Outback, Chilis, basically any chain restaurant, is not nearly as tasty and fresh as the food you can make at home if you have basic cooking skills.

The chain restaurants depend on unskilled labor. The entire process of making the chain's food can be taught in a series of easy-to-learn steps through instructional videos. People who make a true living out of cooking at a restaurant, such as bakers, sauciers, might be found at Outback headquarters helping to devise means of mass-producing and preserving the food they use in the restaurants, but at the restaurant itself you usually have a staff of people who never even did 12 months at a culinary institute, except for maybe the manager.

Four-star restaurants are expensive, but unfortunately they're the only ones worth going to if you're really interested in a culinary experience.

Here in Portugal we have very good labour laws. Some time ago I heard someone who worked as a cook in a restaurant complaining for doing work that wasn�t hers to do, and she was advised to make charges against the owner of the restaurant to the authorities.

Also, I never worked at a restaurant, but I think that we are paid better than that.

Oh, and we have very good food in Portugal.

jazzerman--i live in the northwest corner of the state. about 20 minutes outside of chicago.

ArMaP -- im movin to portugal...lol..

dont get me wrong. i do allright with tips and all. i usually can take home anywhere from 70-$120 a night. just depends. i also have the nights i make 20..just depends. still though, for my employer to FORCE us to pay the other employees is ridiculous.

anyone here familiar with labor laws? any suggestion? because I'd love to be the one to blow this wide open...

Read the book "Fast Food Nation" It addresses those very issues. The industry lobby is too powerful for any meaningful change to occur.

[edit on 31-7-2004 by deevee]