Do we need a new law to ensure waiting staff get their tips?
Hospitality businesses forced to hand all tips to staff under proposed law
Restaurants and other businesses would be forced to hand over all tips to their staff under new proposals tabled in Parliament following Government delays.
Several pledges have been made in recent years to stop employers making deductions from money left for their staff by customers, although legislative action has failed to materialise.
A new Tips Bill has been brought forward by Conservative MP Dean Russell in a bid to make progress on the issue and put protections in law.
The Bill would prohibit employers from retaining tips intended for staff and also enable arrangements to be made about how tips are divided between staff.
Mr Russell, MP for Watford, told the PA news agency: “When we look at the role that many people have when working in bars or restaurants and so on, the tips are often seen as part of the salary in a way – rightly or wrongly.
“It’s always felt wrong to me that businesses can take the tips that have been given by the customer directly to that individual or to the staff for businesses to go ‘Well, actually, that’s part of the payment for what they’re getting’.”
Mr Russell said there is a need to support the hospitality sector given its struggles during the coronavirus pandemic, and this includes helping staff via a tips guarantee.
He added: “So, really, the idea of the Tips Bill was thinking, surely there must be some rule or regulation or law that means that, if someone is given a tip, they either can keep that tip and not hand it to the business, or there’s an agreement on how that tip is shared out – so if there’s a pool of tips, surely there must be an agreement in place that isn’t based on informality.
“The idea of the Bill, if I can hopefully get it through, is to make it so that effectively tips are protected for the people they’re given to, and businesses can’t assume they’ve got a right to decide what that tip is for.”
He said the Bill aims to ensure “fairness”, noting: “I think for most people, when they do leave a tip for someone, they’ve left it for that person or for the staff, not for businesses to take an extra chunk of it.”
“I don’t want it to be an anti-business thing, it’s not about making businesses the bad guy,” he said.
“This is about making sure there’s fairness for the staff that work in restaurants and that hospitality sector.”
Do you agree with the idea of the Tips Bill or do you think businesses should be left to keep an informal arrangement for tips between themselves and waiting staff?
