I’m working
all week at the office that I retired from a couple of years ago, replacing the
person who replaced me so he can take a much-needed vacation (and going
somewhere warm!). Since there are lots of nice eating places in the
neighborhood, I plan to get takeout all week. (There’s usually no time to take
an actual lunch hour.) But I had a bizarre experience today.
I went to a
Mexican place nearby. It has restaurant seating in the back and a takeout
counter in the front. I ordered three tacos. The young man rang it up and said
it would be $10.72. I gave him $21. He rummaged in his cash drawer, then walked
away, and I assumed he was looking for a $10 bill. Indeed, he came back shortly
and handed me the $10 bill – and that was all. I felt a little confused and
went to sit down while waiting for my order.
When it
arrived, the bill clearly said: $10.72. I looked at it and then at him.
“Didn’t you
say it would be $10.72?” I asked.
He smiled.
“We don’t usually do coins.”
What? Is
the restaurant just arbitrarily deciding that a $10.72 lunch is actually going
to cost me $11?
“Well, I do,” I said.
He went off
and brought me back a quarter. Was I going to quibble over three cents? Some
stores really don’t do pennies anymore. If something costs $10.96, and you pay
$11, you’ll get a nickel back, and if it costs $10.93, and you pay $11, you’ll
get a nickel back. Okay, I can deal with that.
I started
to leave, but stopped and told the restaurant hostess what had happened. Was
this a restaurant policy? I wondered. She looked puzzled and said she didn’t
know anything about it, and it didn’t sound right. And she would speak to
someone about.
As I write
this up, I wonder whether the restaurant was keeping the change, or whether the
takeout countermen were treating the change like an involuntary tip. There was
no tip jar; while many takeout places now have such things, perhaps this
restaurant forbade that. Personally, I think establishments should pay their
workers a living wage and tips banned. In revolutionary Russia tipping was
considered insulting, a holdover from czarist times when tips were given
servants as a form of noblesse oblige. Who can say what one person can “afford”
and what another can’t? A sticky question.
