An Arkansas waitress was fired from her job after she refused to split a generous $4,000 tip with the restaurant’s staff and management.
Ryan Brandt, who worked for Oven And Tap in Bentonville, Arkansas told local news outlet 5NEWS that she was one of two waitresses who received a generous tip of $2,200 in cash after they waited on a party of more than 40 people.
“I was definitely just shocked and overwhelmed with gratitude in that moment as soon as I realized what he was saying,” Ryan told the outlet. She said that 20 minutes later she was told by Oven And Tap management that she could only keep 20 percent of the tip, and that she would have to split it with the rest of the staff.
“To turn right back around and find out that I wasn’t keeping it was kind of disheartening because we don’t tip share in any way,” Brandt said. The head of the large party–a man named Grant Wise who had messaged the restaurant ahead of time to ask about their tipping policy–learned of the snafu after he had messaged Brandt and her co-worker. He then asked the restaurant to return the gratuity to their servers in full.
The restaurant agreed to return the money, but a few days later fired Brandt over the phone. “It was devastating, I borrowed a significant amount for student loans,” Brandt said in an interview with another local news station Fox59. “Most of them were turned off because of the pandemic but they’re turning back on in January and that’s a harsh reality,” said Brandt.
The restaurant said in a lengthy statement to 5NEWS that “the server who was terminated was not let go because she chose to keep the tip money,” and added that tip sharing is a common industry practice they follow as a company. The other server who worked with Brandt to wait on the large party is still employed at Oven and Tap.
