Alright, after talking to a few friends who tend other bars, and reading a few
threads here, I've got a problem on my hands.
Saturday night I worked as solo tender at my regular job. Normally we'd have
several tenders and barbacks, but seeing as I'm in Houston, most people had
evacuated, and we weren't that busy due to Rita, so I was the only one.
At the end of the night, my manager was changing out my tips (I haven't had a
problem with this in the past because I trusted him). Total came to roughly
$150.
Here's the fun part: He took out $40 for himself. I didn't even think about
it at the time, being so mentally exhausted from prepping my house for the
hurricane, but the next day, after I'd gotten some sleep in, I started to
think about it: he's salaried, and he's grifting my tips? What the hell?
I confronted him about it the next night, and his response was that he had
come in early to do setup, some cleaning, etc., and that he felt it was
justified because that was work that I didn't have to do. He also told me
that he wants to continue bartending, even though he's the GM, so he can make
cash every night as well - I can say with 100% confidence that he serves less
than 10% of the drinks that the actual bartenders serve on a given night. If
he serves anything, it's generally one of the owners, of whom we have several
in on any given night.
My question is: how can I get him to stop this? Our tips have been a little
low ever since I started working there, just from guesstimating how much we
SHOULD be making based on sales. Should I confront him again, or should I go
straight to the owners? The GM is a nice guy, and until this, I thought he
was an honest guy. I'm already seeking employment elsewhere, but my town is a
tough one to find work in, and I was actually fairly lucky to land this gig -
but not if the GM is grifting tips.
How should I approach this? I've already confronted him, he tried to justify
it, but it still smells bad to me. This is my income we're talking about, and
the income of close to a dozen other people. Any ideas?