Friday, July 15, 2011

What should I do about shady financial practices by my employer?

Currently, I am employed as a server in a local restaurant. Unlike every other restaurant I've ever worked in, this particular one chooses to disperse our credit card tips in our weekly paycheck as opposed to receiving all our tips in cash (credit card included) at the end of every night. This particular part doesn't really bother me because as long as I get all of my money it doesn't matter to me what the form. The problem is with the system used to calculate the tips and transfer them to the paychecks. When I started working there, fellow servers encouraged me to keep thorough records of what I made every night in case there was ever a discrepancy in my check amounts. At first I didn't think much of it but almost every week since I've been there at least one server has had tips missing from their check. They take their individual reports to management, who promises to fix it but some people wait months for this to happen. One server recently told me about a conversation she had with the employee in charge of the payroll who seemed surprised that she kept track of her tips because "alot of people don't" (supposedly said with a grin indicating that the company may be fully aware of these "mistakes"). Also, I recently had my own issue of them accidentally clocking in an employee under my number so that her tips technically went to me for the night and then showed up on my paycheck. They told me that the only thing I could do would be to write her a check for the tips for that night, which makes sense if you don't consider taxes or the fact that those earnings are going to be reported on my income statement. Couldn't they have just withheld the tips from my next paycheck, reimbursed me for the taxes, then credited her on her next check? They've been "cleaning house" lately and I need the job so I don't want to complain to management, but it would be so nice for someone unaffiliated with the company to take a look at their financial practices, I do suspect illegal activity but I could definitely just be seen as a disgruntled employee by anyone in power and I'm not really sure what to do. Any advice is appreciated. Thank you!

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