Parasole restaurants dipping into tip jar, taking 2% of wait staff's credit card tips

• I am a server in Kailua Kona and I get only 10%on of my tips. They will not give me a w2 form to fill out. Makes me made. I feel for these servers.

• Local #17, supports tipped employees (servers & bartenders), but throws all other "much lower" paid hospitality workers (cooks & other kitchen help, dishwashers, greeters, bus persons, etc.) under the bus by lobbying against tip credit and making MN one of only 7 states that does not allow tip credit.  When minimum wage last increased by $2.10 an hour ($.70 a year for three successive years), tipped employees received a 40% raise while non-tipped employees received no legislative increase (unless they were paid less than minimum wage which would be highly unlikely).  In nicer restaurants like the Parasole restaurants, tipped employees probably average close to (and probably over) $20 an hour while kitchen help and other non-tipped hospitality workers would generally earn between $10 and $13 an hour.  The point being is that without tip credit the highest paid hospitality workers continue to get legislative raises while other lower paid restaurant do not.  So, you probably say, then why don't the greedy restaurants just pay the other employees more?  Well, of course, this could be done, but then the costs charged by restaurant would have to increase and when costs increase fewer people can afford or justify going out to eat, so sales suffer (as do the corresponding tips) and jobs are lost ... and even some businesses fail.  It is a vicious cycle with no good answers, as all hospitality workers work hard and are very valuable (tipped and non-tipped).  Those that are concerned about the 2% that goes to the credit card companies can either pay cash (which tipped employees of all kinds such as hair solon workers prefer) or increase the tipped amount on their credit card by 2%.  It really is all that difficult for customers to remedy, if they want.  Okay, I can hear it now from some of you ... why don't the damn greedy restaurants just pay the 2% rather than suggest customers do it (by increasing their tips).  Where do you think the restaurant get their money ... only one place, from customers.  I guess the restaurants can raise their prices by 2% and pass it on to the customers, so one way or the other the customer ends up paying "all" the restaurants costs.  

• I'll start off by saying that I was a regular customer to some of these restaurants in Minnesota.  After hearing this, however, I will be rethinking that decision.  I believe that this will be the trade off unfortunately for Parasole.  I strongly believe that this is exploiting low level workers.  As for the argument that if the employees don't like it they can always choose to leave, that is just an ignorant notion.  Employee in these types of jobs often have very little choice in jobs.  Of course, they could find another restaurant where they can make minimum wage again plus tips, but the fact of the matter is that among the employees ranks are those supporting families.  Perhaps young mothers with a few babies to feed and provide shelter for.  Being so young, i am assuming that the average education level is high school.  Choice, therefore, is limited to sucking it up or starting over fighting for hours at another place as I've talked to more than a few servers about in my time.  That is Parosole's internal rational.  Yes, cost may have increased (even as the federal government limited credit swipe fees to 21 cents?), and more customers use cards.  But, as a business weighing your right to profit over your social and ethical responsibilities can, over time, damage your image.  Yet, like many other businesses profit wins over people every time....we remember though. This may be a trickle down from banks being limited in those swipe fees; traditionally restaurants receive lowered fees as a rider attached to their processing agreement and this may have been eliminated as a result of big banks having to chase profits elsewhere (can you say monthly debit card fees).  However, credit cards eliminate all the problems of getting paid, they pay fast, unlike checks, and their guaranteed (same reason some bars/restaurants take your card to start a tab)  Exploitation of lower level workers, in my mind, is not the answer.  Business should consider these swipe fees a convenience charge for themselves.  To contrast the 25% higher tab argument in Parasole's tweet, SEE! you make more money by accepting them!  Don't exploit your workers to pay for that convenience. I, for one, will make a conscious effort to steer clear of Parasole's family or restaurants in the future.  That's the only way we, as American consumers, can speak....with our wallets, or refusal to open them.

• Parasole is sitting on huge sums of cash. That's how they are able to continually open new restaurants all the time.  CORPORATION. People. Yes even in little ol' Minneapolis you can act like and be protected by the same rules of a big bank.     They are not bleeding anything, this is just an excuse to scrape more money into Kip Clayton's Republican warchest.

• The new banking regulations actually lowered fees paid by businesses to credit card companies!  That's why the banks are charging fees for debit card usage.  Does anyone here read the news?

• This is disgusting!  I can't beleive a succusful company is sucking 2% off their servers to fullfill an endless corparate greed for more money.  

• Your friend should call me: 612-372-3753.

• As a chef, I can say that I hope those of you who are saying "Oh, it's only a few cents, big deal. If they don't like it, get another job." , here in Texas, minumum wage for a wait person is $2.13 an hour. Let me spell it out, TWO DOLLARS AND THIRTEEN CENTS AH HOUR! And NO ONE is getting an average of $20 a table. The higher priced restaurant, usually the worse tippers. So yea, the places here that do this are screwing the wait staff big time. And all you jerks saying 'boohoo', you might want to watch the movie Waiting before you start mouthing off about this in real life, instead of hiding behind a computer screen.

• I have been a full-time server for many years. I have also worked for Parasole for almost 12 of those years as a server/bartender and even a manager/supervisor. My history with the company notwithstanding, this is my general perspective: A server, before implementing this new 2% 'service charge', is already passing down 25-33% of his/her tipped earnings to support staff. This is based off a full-service restaurant standard (food/full bar. much like most of Parasole's dining spots). Additionally, the overwhelming amount of cards used for business dinners/expense accounts/holiday parties is, pardon the pun, tipped. On any given day/night, the likelihood of receiving no immediate cash from a guest is more likely than receiving any at all. Tipped employees, especially those who make minimum wage with no chance for raises, are ultimately getting nickled and dimed. It also trickles down to the staff that gets compensated from these tips. Bartenders, barbacks, wait assists, food runners, and sushi chefs will all get a smaller piece of this proverbial pie. In the end, and after taxes, you would be surprised how much of that 18% credit card tip your server, from Burger Jones, is really going home with. Frankly, whats another two percent, right?

• A friend of mine works at Baja Sol in Arden Hills and the employees don't get ANY of their tips. If they are lucky (and the manager remembers or feels that they deserve it), the employees get a $5 gift card to Target once a month. I hate that hard working, food industry employees are getting robbed of their hard earned tips. But I am happy that it's getting acknowledged; maybe than it will come to an end!

• FYI, the Good Earth average tip is no where near $20. And 40¢ times 10 (lets call this the average table count in a shift) is $4 and $4 times 4 shifts in a week is $16 and $16 times 4 weeks equals $64 in a month! That adds up. I'm sure you wouldn't be thrilled if someone took away part of your income with the cost of living rocking up, so maybe when someone comes to cut your pay you'll pick up a pitchfork.

• If you don't like it quit. if you don't like it don't eat or drink there. There are still many places that don't do this. The banks and the credit card companies are the ones really making out.   I do think it's interesting that parasole responded to this article by twitter. I wonder if Steve Jobs would have addressed a controversy via twitter. fyi D'Amico doesen't take 2%, and it's great food.

• For the people who can't do basic math, if the average tip is 17% you would need to raise your prices by .34% NOT 2%.  It's funny how people are upset about giving 2% of their tips to the credit card company, but don't seem to realize that they are giving 2% on the rest of the bill. 

• Simply raising prices is NOT that easy.  Ask anyone who has owned a thin margin business.  BTW, for the people who can't do basic math, if the average tip is 17% you would need to raise your prices by .34% NOT 2%.  It's funny how people are upset about giving 2% of their tips to the credit card company, but don't seem to realize that they are giving 2% on the rest of the bill.  After owning a business for 17 yrs. I ALWAYS pay other LOCAL business in cash (typically if it's under $300) so they can avoid the CC fees.  It helps with their margins and keeps the money local.  

• If you use a credit card, you ALWAYS have been... You just didn't realize it.

• I find it interesting that City Pages decided to pick on Parasole regarding the new tipping policy.   Other restaurants have been doing this for years!!!! 

• To all of you, "If you don't like it go get a different job," I ask you...how many of you would be willing to go and do your jobs for one week for no pay? This is roughly how much servers/bartenders will be losing.

• It's just another case of the haves dipping into the pockets of the have nots. Greedy employers.

• Where did you get this twenty dollars per table?!! Maybe if you have a ten top. And no, most places don't do it. Not to mention the other people in restaurant you have to tip out and claim as your own. So yes this 2 percent does matter

•  Good point. What's next, they help cover the utilities?

• Wish I were a labor lawyer and could comment intelligently but stealing from your employees seems to me to be a crime. As a customer, I tip the SERVER not the RESTAURANT. And as federal minimum wages guidelines are based on the concept of serers getting tips, I wonder what the Dept. of Labor would make of this - does the restaurant now have to pay employees minimum wage since they aren't really getting tips but 98% of tips????

• Hope everyone does the right thing and start paying with CASH. Thats absurd! web-privacy.edu.tc

• Line*

• Evil Empire? Haha, they aren't even the first to do this in this market. As people have stated here, some restaurants charge the servers 2% or more of the ENTIRE credit card sale, versus Parasole who is now passing along 2% fee on tipped money only...

• What? Not sure I see the ling between your example and a restaurant deciding to pass on the CC fee on tips...

• The City Pages should do a hatchet job cover story on Parasole. They are the evil empire. They deserve it, much more than Big E did. The legal but morally questionable stuff they have been doing over the last several decades is appalling. It shouldn't be too hard to write a story like that, nearly every restaurant lifer in this town has worked for them at some point and most hated it.

• I worked in the kitchen at Buca St Paul in the mid 90s when it was owned by Parasole. You expect hard work in a kitchen but Buca was over the top. You had to work at a dead run for almost every minute of your work week. Technically we were allowed breaks but were told that "your job depended" on getting all your prep done before service, but you would have so much prep to do that you could never get it done if you took a break. You would end up working 11 or 12 hour shifts without a break. If you were 1 minute late you were docked 15 minutes of pay. Because of the family sized portions the kitchen used extra large saute pans and plates, the weight plus the pace of work gave everybody repeditive motion stress injuries, the managers didn't believe us and thought we were all just complainers. If they needed you to work a double or come in on your day off they wouldn't ask, they would just tell you that you had to do it. Our chef used to brag about the fact that the restaurant was running a 25% profit margin, I was one of only a handful of cooks to ever recieve a raise there. It was a horrible experience in every way imaginable. Eventually half the kitchen staff quit in two week period. But yes, they did have a 401K, they were a sweatshop with a 401k plan. 

• I agree with you.  I think we need more information. However, I do think what they are doing is just wrong.  I am not familar with this chain either, and woudl there be a difference if this was an TFI Friday's kind of place vs. a more expensive alternative..  something to think about.

• The point is not how negligible the amount taken from the servers is, but rather that this is an absurd policy.  Gas stations don't change their employees wages daily based on the price of crude oil.  

• The scum is floating to the top rapidly.

• It's true you know. Blue collar, middle-class people are poor because they didn't work hard enough. Millionaires are the hardest working people in the world!

• Yep. Go ahead and assume every worker in the service industry has the job because he or she is lazy, uneducated and dumb. That's the only reason anyone ever ends up working in a restaurant.

• I'm sure it's different in every restaurant, but what the treatment I received from Parasole was horrible, demeaning and downright shady as far as legality. I have worked at low-end corporate restaurants, and I worked at a restaurant that actually adjusted my clockout times so they wouldn't have to pay me overtime, but I still consider Parasole hands down my worst employer. The job market was tough then and I couldn't quit, so went home every day feeling abused.

• The root of this issue lies in the Obama administration's 2010 Dodd-Frank law, which overhauled financial-industry regulations. the same reason for the debit card fees now being leveled on all of us. Wake up use you term limiting votes to get these regulations crazy tax and spend big government lifers out of there!!!!

• ... then what does this mean: "For purposes of this chapter, any gratuity received by an employee or deposited in or about a place of business for personal services rendered by an employee is the sole property of the employee." When I write in an amount on the tip line of a credit card bill, I am giving that employee a gratuity for personal services rendered. That is the sole property of the employee. There is no provision here that allows for the restaurant to skim 2%.

• Jonny you CAN read and write - no go make something of yourself! :-)

• Jonny, it's not that I hate servers, I hate your immature (as evidenced by your post) outlook on life. You chose your job now stop crying about it! It looks like you are one of the few not smart enough to get off your ass and make something of yourself and I pity you for that.

• It is funny how this story doesn't include how much this will cost this particular server annually. Then we could do the math and see how much they make in tips and I bet then people wouldn't be jumping on the poor server bandwagon! Stop letting biased misinformation that doesn't really include many facts determine your opinion or reaction

• They are not the ones charging the fee...the CC companies are. Explain to me how boycotting these restaurants to show your support for the servers makes any sense...now they will be getting even less tips, lol

• Ever stop to consider maybe they have already raised prices a few times? You just assume this was their 1st choice and action...

• Just as the rules are limiting the amount banks can charge merchants down from 44 cents to some 22 cents, merchants decide they need to charge their employs a fee.  Where is the logic in this.  It's greed, plain and simple.  Boycott these restaurants.

• Just to clarify some of this.  The CC fee a company pays on tips charged to a CC are not really a "cost of business".  The company gains no financial benefit from that tip.  If you all really wanted to be fair in this then the company should be able to force servers to disclose the 2% the company pays credit card companies for the gratuity as compensation as they are paying that fee for the financial benefit of the employee and not the company. With that said I fully agree with the sentiment of most people here in that this is insulting to servers. I think this was one of the worst moves I have ever seen from a company.  Parasole and many other organizations really would only need to adjust their prices by less than 1% to cover the costs of the credit card fees.  Raising prices by 0.5% is much more publicly acceptable than charging your employees 2%.  Horrible, horrible PR move on the part of the CFO/CEO/COO/Controller/Whoever made this decision; what an idiot.

• Credit card fees associated with sales would be overhead.  Credit card fees on tips are not overhead if the company does not want to absorb that cost. With that said, I think not wanting to cover 2% on the tipped amount and pushing it on to the employee is pretty ridiculous.  They wouldn't even need to charge 2% more to cover the cc fees on tips.  On average, an organization would really only need to increase their prices by 0.5% (1/2 percent).  Seems like a lot less of a headache to raise prices 0.5% than having to deal with the negative publicity of taking 2% of a servers tips.  The CFO or Controller of Parasole should be fired.

• Well, they are kind of right, but as usual with most people as far as taxes go they are also sadly misinformed.  Credit card processing fees are an expense and because of this, it does reduce net income of the business at the end of the year; this is also the income that is used for the company's tax returns.  That is the extent of which they are right though. There is no "deduction" in the sense that most people are used to.  Yes, they do reduce taxable income, but that is because they reduce net income.  There isn't a special instance where the IRS says, "Hey, you paid XXXX.XX in credit card fees, Feel free to deduct that further."  If that "deduction" were to go back to the servers then instead of paying the "average" 2.5% cc processing fee you want this individual wants the company to basically pay 2.5% cc fee on purchases and 5% cc fee on tips.  They aren't pocketing any money, they are actually losing money because they are paying the credit card companies a % of whatever people decide to tip on the credit card.  Don't confuse companies with individuals.

• Landrys restaurants do 1.5% of your credit card tips.

• This can't even be legal. If a business has rising costs they can increase their prices, not steal from employees. I can't imagine this change sticking.

• Brilliant idea - have them strike, I'm sure it would take Parasole oh, about 7 minutes to fill their positions in this economy!

• Uh-oh Parasole, Mason's not coming in to your restaurants - better close the doors of all of your restaurants!

• Way to screw over the "little guy" Parasole.  Your servers should organize a Strike!

• I will never set foot in any of your restaurants again!

• Wow Greg V, you must really hate servers.   Don't worry, we probably hate you too.  Most servers ARE going to college or have degrees.  Have you seen the job market lately?  Of course I guess we could all go get "Real Jobs" but then when you take your mistress out to lunch where would you go?  

• It's also perfectly legal for servers to give very generous portions, substitute steaks for toast, and forget to charge patrons for all of their drinks. Incompentent, perhaps, but what do you expect for minimum wage and a portion of gratuities?

• Oh Jennifer, those poor victim servers! We all have choices in life and choosing to have student loan debt and get a good job and pay off that debt just doesn't make sense to you? Hope you never have to see a doctor, use a lawyer, want your kids to be taught by teachers with advanced degrees, etc! Your logic is flawed; I never said serving wasn't a "real job," you did. Just as the rest of us Americans make choices, nobody pointed a gun at their head and told them to be servers for the rest of their lives, it's called free will! :-)

• "They're"   <- corrected for you by a server.  :-)   Have a nice day!

• If you're leaving at $20 tip, you've got a total bill that is in excess of $100 ($133 if a 15% tip). Wouldn't it be smarter business to raise your prices 2%, so that $133 bill becomes $136 instead of angering your employees who you rely on to provide high levels of service AND creating a PR mess?

• So Phil Roberts posts at CP as "The dude."  INteresting, but not all that surprising.  Oh, and Sean Olsen schooled poor (actually, rich) Phil.

• So the tips servers get don't count as income? Factor min wage with tips and most servers are making between $15-$25 an hour. Again, I don't agree with this policy but stop saying "poor" servers. Not saying they are wealthy but if they are waiting tables and pulling less than $125 a day they need to find a new restaurant to work at or are horrible servers...

• I do not agree with what Parasole is doing here but to all the posters who say that Parasole is a terrible place to work, show me a local restaurant group that offers a benefit package that includes health care package and 401k matching? As a former employee who could take the time to nitpick about minor injustices, I choose not to. Look at the bigger picture. So you got fired for drinking at work or stealing a few dollars, that is self inflicted injustice and you basically fired yourselves. They aren't my favorite place I have worked but they did take pretty good care of me and my family for a long time.

• There are other restaurants in TC area that are doing the exact same thing. I used to work at Naviya's Thai Brasserie in Linden Hills. They actually took 3 or 3.5% from the servers' total credit card sale .. yep .. total credit card sale and not the credit card tip. Outrageous!

• This is just wrong.  If I was working for this restaurant, server or not, I would walk out. These people work their butts off for minimum wage and a lot of them below minimum wage because they get tips, and now some restaurant wants to take more away from them.  Boo!! Bad company, walk out, make them close and lose money!

• They are not the only restaurants in the Twin Cities to do this, and certainly not the first. I know the servers at Pyscho Suzi's have been loosing out on $$ for a long time. Tip in cash people and tip 20%!

• I have never heard of this tax deduction on cc swipe fees. I don't believe it exisits.

• Atta boy Kip.............screw the employees and pad your own pockets.  You're despicable. 

• Why are you guys still talking about this?

• You guys really need to include a dateline in your copy. The average visitor steered here by an external link has *no* clue where the story takes place.

• I am sure the higher-ups in Parasole's corporate office are hurting. Perhaps they are going to get a smaller bonus and won't be able to afford the luxury items they are accustomed to. Besides, they make the rules, why would they take a pay reduction when they can make the hard working people that make their salaries and bonuses a reality pay? 

• Great advice, Greg. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps and assume tens of thousands of dollars of student loan debt so that you can graduate and then! Compete with others for the serving job you left behind, since that's what you're going to find available in this economy. That model of "improving" yourself has clearly worked so well for everyone! Shame on YOU, Greg, for telling servers that they don't have a "real" job. Here's a clue, since you are so obviously clueless : anyone who gets up every day, goes to work, and does their best job at whatever it is may be that they're paid to do has a REAL job.

• You do realize the restaurant you work for is paying a % of your credit card tips, right? In this case Parasole isn't making money, they simply aren't losing money by paying that % for their servers anymore. :)

• I couldn't agree with you more and it begins with Gregory Platt. This is so biased, misleading, and full of half truths that it isn't even funny! I wonder what those servers "already making minimum wage" made last year including tips...working a part time job? Companies pay a % of every transaction paid with a credit card. I have a feeling Parasole may even pay more then 2%the especially on certain cards, but let's use 2%...if you leave a $20 tip on a credit card, the restaurant only gets $19.60 of that money and is paying the other $.40 themselves. That may not seem like a lot until you start adding up the numbers, I bet it is costing Parasole tens of thousands of dollars per restaurant only per year.

• Minimum wage my @SS! The "poor workers" can choose a different career if they don't want minimum wage!

• Nope, they won't disclose this to the customer, just as the hundreds of other restaurants who have this policy don't disclose it! Maybe they should have you sign a hundred pages of disclosures to you before you are allowed to order off the menu just so that YOU know what's going on in their business - well that would be ridiculous; you're just there to eat right? Right, it ISN'T your business!

• You don't have to agree to it - it's a legal practice by the restaurant. By choosing server as a profession you "agree" to basically gambling on your income; whether people are generous that night or not, whether you get the hours you want, etc. If you want a steady income, do what the majority of Americans do - go to college, get a degree, then you can get a real job!

• Opening 2 new restaurants in less than a year in a bad economy - really looks like they are going down in flames!

• It's hilarious how misinformed most of you commenting here really are. First of all, Kip Clayton is not the only "big wig" of Parasole - SHAME on CityPages for not digging deeper into the issue! For those of you "brilliant" people who want to boycott Parasole - go right ahead, maybe Applebee's microwave cooking is more your style anyways! This credit card policy is in place in many restaurant concepts in CA, NY, IL and more - places like Crave, Champps and many more - boycott them too and when all restaurants go to this policy you can go to the local grocery store and make your own dinners (gasp!). Servers choose their profession just as anyone else, if they think it's unfair they are more than capable of going to college, getting a degree, and changing careers. Stop the irrational emotional responses to an issue many of you do not even understand!

• I work for a small, "mom and pop" restaurant who isn't taking out credit card companies' latest move to make more money on their tipped employees. This should be against the law. why isn't it? Obviously you've never worked in a restaurant Jason, or you'd be singing a different tune! There are other solutions.

• Actually they ARE pocketing the money. Restaraunts, like any business, are able to use the cc % charge as a tax deduction at the end of the year. Do u think that deduction goes back to the servers? The answer is: no,they don't! so yes it is very much stealing. Even worse the customer isn't even aware this is happening so is unknowningly paying a tip intended for the server who it isn't even going to. and it is very much illegal for a company to take tips from any employee

• Changing how you pay a tip will not change the issue. Employees have the freedom to go elsewhere. It is too bad we have been accustomed to think it is okay for us as patrons to be responsible to pay the servers for the restaurant in the first place. Why should they only pay minimum wage?

• If you can think a credit card company is providing a service.. it's amazing you can't realize a union is providing a service.  I've worked for a union - they defend your rights, they fight for a fair wage - this is their job.   A credit card company is far from anything I would consider moral - for the most part they are incorporated scam artists.  Everyone with any sense these days knows that if you want to keep good credit, throw the credit card application in the garbage where it belongs.  They're only good if you never use them..  "Hey, sir, would you like $100 at 19.2% interest?"  "Ohh, why yes - what a deal!"  They're as bad as "Pay Day Loans" or for that matter instant lottery tickets - they provide a Dis-service to humanity.

• Yes, so a crooked employer can stay in business and continue to screw over more employees.

• I disagree.  The restaurant industry is really hard to predict sometimes.  There were times when I worked at one of the nicest restaurants in this city where we had to wait and get our tips another day...or the following week...because they only keep so much cash in house, and if the company only gets one delivery of cash per week (as was the case), or in the case of the place I work now, some nights are so busy and you get multiple customers using $50 or $100 bills, you can run out of cash pretty quickly.  I have waited around for cash on MANY occasions, and there were other times where I was broke, expected to go work and make some cash so I could pay bills, and then the restaurant didn't have any cash to tip out the servers.  It sucks.

• So now the servers will make 0% of $0 in sales...  Way to get back at Parasole!  It's been said a hundred times- pay with your card (restaurant pays swipe fee as they rightly should) and then pay the server in cash for their tip.  Problem solved...  A pain, but solved...

• That's against their merchant agreement and if Visa/MC/Discover/Amex find out about it they will lose their ability to process credit cards.

• There were multiple suggestions to still go to these restaurants so servers don't lose their jobs and tip in cash.  Not only am I going to tip in cash, I have 3 cards.  I'm going to ask the server to split the bill on all my cards so hopefully the restaurant gets hit with 3 swipe fees!  Then I will tip the server cash for putting up with my 3 cards.  What a greedy corporation!

• I feel that is part of OWNING the business.  I did not agree to having the credit card service,  being a server.

• What arrogance on the part of Parasole. Their restaurants are over-rated, and over-priced. What an insult to their servers, who are the ambassadors for these restaurants. Dumb.

• It surprises me to no end that people don't know this goes on.  I don't care to carry cash but I'll usually try to have enough to cover a tip, or for small shops, the entire purchase. It's a simple habit to get into!  Buy a pizza on the card?  Hand the driver a few bucks in cash.

• REALLY!!!

• Most transaction fees are significantly higher than 2%.  The business has to cover the 3+% fee every time you use plastic whether or not you leave a tip.  Parasole is passing *part* of the fee they currently pay *on the tip* onto the server.

• If Parasole disappeared their business would just go to other restaurants in the Twin Cities. There would be no net loss.

• Nothing in that law makes this illegal.  Think of it like this: If the tips were removed from the total bill and run up separately at the end of the night the waitstaff would have to pay the full merchant bank fee. This is not tip pooling or forced tipouts.

• What if you're a restaurant group that does 50,000,000 a year in sales with a high average ticket and 90% of it is credit cards? Not such a small number. Also consider this restaurant group employs several thousand people that keep the money here? We would want to keep that business here rather than see it close up shop thus leaving many without a job, right? 2% isn't that much when broken down to individual.

• It all depends on the card type. If I'm using a corporate card the cost is much more than 2%. It all evens out in the wash.

• It would be 2% of the charged tip. Any cash tips are 100% the employees. Keep in mind that MN is one of a small handful of states that doesn't have a tip credit. This means that every time minimum wage increases, servers get a raise. Guess who won't get a raise? The folks working back of house, i.e. the cooks. Parasole, or any other operator who chooses to charge the discount (credit card processing fee) on charged tips would not be making a profit on the charge back to the server. If a server receives charged tips, they are receiving 100% of the tip but the restaurant has to pay the credit card processor fees on that tip. If you don't like this, than support a tip credit in MN.

• I've worked in the restaurant business for 20 years and am now a head chef. Parasole is by far the worst company I have worked for. It was a long time ago but it looks like they haven't changed. Hopefully the dining public will start to realize how horrible they are to their employees. They can't go down in flames soon enough

• I wish Parasole did not resort to this, but their CEO may only have himself to blame for rising credit-card fees if he supported Republicans in past elections. There are responsible elected officials trying to reign in these ridiculous credit-card fees - the Dodd-Frank banking-reform bill passed a Democratic-controlled Congress in 2009, and was signed by President Obama, receiving little if any Republican support. This bill places limits on credit-card fees, and requires accountability within an industry that has basically done whatever it wants for far too long (and we see where that got us). However, attempts to fund and enforce the law have met a roadblock. You'll never guess who. Those "freedom-loving" Tea Party Bachmann-style Republicans would be the correct answer. I guess ignoring foolish debate audiences as they boo American gay soldiers, yet cheer the death of the uninsured does not satiate their desire to crush the incomes of working stiffs.  

• Glad I left when I did!

• Was that amuse bouche, or amuse douche?  Pretty restos, ma ma grub, and now bitter servers. 

• Shill.

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