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FTC head wants investigation into grocery stores over inflated prices
(www.independent.co.uk)
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this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2024
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Can they go after restaurants adding mandatory 20% fees? I don't mind paying more to pay for ethical pay for employees but adding a mandatory 20% free us just lying about menu prices. It should illegal. Just bake the price into the menu prices.
where do you live that tipping is mandatory? or are you talking about something else?
It is essentially a tip, but it's listed on the bottom of the menu as a mandatory service charge. The restaurant keeps the money (it's not split like case tips) and just pay the employees a good wage without them relying on tips.
It's good in theory but it's dishonest pricing.
Yeah, I'd say the same about any "fees" that get tacked on above any advertised prices. The only time it shouldn't be included in an advertised price is when it doesn't scale with number of things purchased. So a % fee would always be included, but flat fees can be separated (like if they had a table charge or something that didn't change based on how much food was ordered).
Online shop "convenience" fees are at the top of my mind for this. Especially because there's even more convenience on the merchant's side due to how websites scale vs brick and mortar shops. They might have to pay large salaries to developers and IT people (emphasis on "might"), but that'll be much less than the leases and staffing costs to open physical stores to serve the same size of market.
Agreed. The only fee I can swallow is mom-and-pop stores and governments charging a small fee for credit card processing.
In the government's case, law only provides for them to charge $X and they must gather $X. They can't make up for the provider fees. Legislation should roll that into consideration moving forward.
Or even better, create a public payment infrastructure that isn't predatory to both merchants and consumers. Finance being a private industry instead of a public service is a part of the problem.
But I agree that that is an example of a good use of fees. "Oh, if you do this thing, it costs more money to service you, so rather than pricing it in for everyone regardless of whether they do it, just charge the difference when it is done."
This is Capitalism 101 my friend. Don't go to those places. They'll kill themselves off or adjust. As an exercise to the student, explain why you have to give such cretinous establishments your money.
As to voluntary tips, funny thing, you only see consumers complaining, never the wait staff. Worked at a payroll firm that serviced several local restaurants and brother, some of those people make bank.
You know what's way, way more effective than the invisible hand of the "free" market? Regulation. Hidden fees at restaurants are almost non-existent here in Australia, and if you ever encounter one, because it's illegal, you can just not pay it, what are they gonna do? And so the business either quickly stops doing it, or they end up with a fine from the ACCC 🤗
Also, as a former cafe employee, let me tell ya, I was much happier being paid a guaranteed wage than relying on tips. Which for morality's sake, is practically another hidden fee.
So not giving such places money is a non-option?
It's called a hidden fee for a reason, it's hidden from you. So, yeah, it's a non-option for first time patrons.
Why are you defending these business? Inb4 you say, I'm not, but the free market will correct this! The "free" market clearly isn't, because we're talking about it right now lol, hidden fees are common place in many places in the US.
And regulation (in Australia, for this issue), clearly IS working, because this is practically unheard of here.
They'd be complaining if people actually treated tips as voluntary. Everyone knows you're breaking the social contract if you don't tip.