Posted on 02/26/2010 7:48:42 AM PST by dennisw
WINSTON-SALEM -- A woman who a local restaurant manager refused to serve claiming she is a habitually poor tipper told WXII Wednesday she is in the process of consulting an attorney.
Monica Covington was recently banned from the Kanpai Japanese Steak and Seafood House on Stratford Road after manager Michael Lam said servers and chefs refused to serve her because of her less-than-expected tipping history at the establishment.
Covington, who started a boycott petition against the restaurant, said the restaurant slandered her in the WXII report, which has set off a firestorm of opinions surrounding the issue of tipping.
"At this point, I am securing an attorney to address the slander against my name and character," Covington said in a statement to WXII. "I have always left a good tip at Kanpai Restaurant , even when I was given poor and less than honorable service."
Covington said her spat with the restaurant began in 2008 when she was told she would have to pay an 18 percent gratuity to dine.
"Yes, because we can't keep continuing to serve her anymore because the servers and chefs are not willing to serve her," Lam said Tuesday when asked if he refused Covington service.
On Wednesday, Lam said his establishment has never tacked an 18 percent gratuity on to her bill without her knowledge.
So far, 300 people have signed Covington's petition. Supporters of Lam's restaurant have also started an online petition.
I managed a restaurant for a few years (the Hell years).
I had to threaten to fire a young waiter for refusing to wait on black people-—he was a young black man as well...
At TGI Fridays the wait staff have to give three percent to the tip pool based upon their gross sales. So if their sales were $1000 for the night then they should have gotten around $150 for the night of which they have to give away $30 to the pool (goes to other staff). So when a customer runs up a bill of $90 because of drinks and so forth and then stiffs the waiter or waitress he is actually costing him/her money since their salary is $2.05 per hour.
I should sue because the Taco Cabana guy keeps giving me a senior discount and I am only 53! ; )
**African Americans are notoriously bad tippers.**
Only 20% of African Americans are bad Tippers..
79.9% are NON tippers.
Driven taxi (sporadically) for 35 or so years.
I have two big problems -
1. I am flat-out against mandatory tips. If that is necessary, then just raise your prices and pay your darned employees instead of expecting me to make up for their $1.50 per hour wage you cheat them with...
I have been known to be a cheapskate when tipping, but have also been extremely generous by any standards. When service meets minimum requirements (I don’t have to ask for refills of my tea, and food is brought out still hot, etc.), then I usually stick around the traditional 15%. If I have to constantly ask for my tea to be refilled and/or have to wait for a very long time to even place an order, etc., then the tip goes down from there based on just how bad the service was (I don’t penalize the wait staff for kitchen problems). On the other hand, I have given 25%+ tip when staff went so very far above-and-beyond any expectations I might have had.
If the service would have been better had I served myself, should I give an 18% “tip”? I will say this - the few times I have found myself with a mandatory tip added to my check, I pretty much have a rule that I don’t give anything extra beyond that, no matter how good the service was. So the staff is actually penalized by the management charing a mandatory tip. As well - if you are going to charge me an 18% premium, the service had better be better than average!
2. What ever happened to a business being able to serve whoever they want? If I open a mechanics garage and just flat don’t want to service a particular brand (for whatever reason I choose), then can I be made to service them anyway? And whatever happened to consumer’s ability to choose who THEY do business with? If a restaurant doesn’t want your money, then move on down the road. There are many others who would be more than glad to have it.
Foot- what would be any different if one opened a buffet restaurant but had a strict limit - no-one over 300lbs could eat... or you charged people by their starting weight? Don’t like it and enough people agree - then I go out of business. What the heck happened to our freedom to do business?
Same here, I just want to budget a lunch, I don't want to get involved in computing some portion of employee wages after I finish.
Tipping is just too liberal or European for me, just write down what the cost is for lunch and let's git'r done.
I remember working for a company once that when you were writing the bill you were supposed to include a five dollar "truck charge" I hated that and tried to raise cain with the company by pointing out that we should just be up front and include it in the service call rate rather than play games.
ping
yes, there are extenuating circumstances.... but none of my employees will ever say that they refuse to serve a customer.
Now if the customer is sitting there naked... if the customer has a bomb strapped to them... if the customer smells like a homeless garbage diver.... yes, these are instances.
But as far as tipping.... you have a whole day with good tips from good customers and part of the business is putting up with that small fraction of bad customers WITH A SMILE.
I am not in retail service but I do deal with customers all day. I take the good with the bad.
You are right a manager should support his staff. But I imagine his staff has a few customers who tip more than required and they surely are not fussing about that.
You got me on that. Absolutely correct.
**African Americans are notoriously bad tippers.**
**Certain classes are immune from their behavior being discussed or generalized**
Sub continent Indians are even WORSE!
this “””Victim””” is worried about her reputation, SHE was the one that went Public... wasn’t she???
The Lawyer doesn’t depend on TIPS ... unfortunately!!
/s
Professional victim.
I’ve waited tables here is Florida. The last place I worked on Panama City Beach, I had to tip out the bartender, busser, and expaditor.
BTW, my experience with the public here is blacks tip average. Canadians and old people tip the worst. While gay men tip the best for good service.
Good for you, ar.You should seek reparations ;)
I usually tip 20% or more, because I know there is always someone stiffing the wait staff.
If the service is nominal, I still leave only 15% as a minimum.
They work hard for the money.
One of those Benihana type restaurants.
I delivered pizzas in a gas guzzling 1976 F250 Ford pick up truck in two different states, tips were where the bulk of my money came from and I liked them very much, but I always saw my job as delivering the pizzas to the customers and I tried to avoid any association with an address as to whether they tipped me or not, or even if they were very generous or were not at all generous, I tried to encourage other drivers to do the same because they would sometimes slip into that negative trap of forgetting what their mission was, which was delivering pizzas, not determining preferred customer status.
Papa ... that was not a GOTCHA!
That was a nonbiased assessment of the tips I receive from African American passengers in a taxi. MOST of the time.. the first question “WHAT’s this gonna cost??” Don’t know UNTIL you tell me where you’re going..then give me a 2 mile radius..
I could give the entire “conversation” but it will kill the bandwidth.
Your post made me LOL!!!!
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