Waitress claims restaurant took almost £700 of tips and charged staff for mistakes

A waitress has resigned for her job after claims that the restaurant “deducted £650 of her tips” and charged staff for mistakes.

Emma Smith shared her payslips from Albert’s in Didsbury on Facebook along with her resignation letter and screenshots of Facebook posts supposedly from manager Wendy Unsworth.

https://www.facebook.com/dancingblonde222/posts/10160360748410304

The payslips appeared to show a total of £657.07 deducted to ‘House Didsbury’ while screenshots of messages in the restaurant workers Facebook group supposedly posted by manager Unsworth show her telling staff “you will be charged” for “all errors that cost the business money”.

In her post, Smith called the deductions “unfair and frankly illegal” adding that “human error does happen”.

Smith also claimed that she was made to carry out roles outside of her remit claiming staff “do this for the tips” commenting: “If I wanted a bar floor or pass job I would have applied for one. People should be doing the role they applied for and are hired to do.”

Smith went on to claim staff were made to “tip out” on tables that hadn’t given a tip, before finishing by saying: “I have lost complete faith in what I thought was a fabulous restaurant and a great place to work and so no longer want to be a part of this greedy company.”

Catering Today have contacted Albert’s for comment but at the time of writing have received no formal response.

In 2015 the restaurant’s owners Elle R Leisure made a statement admitting that staff did not receive all tips, claiming the money taken was used for ‘staff welfare items’.