Self-checkout machines charge you extra to support employee benefits. When did the machines become an employee? And when did we have to pay mandatory surcharges when we buy meals at the airport from one on the way to our flight?
Mandatory tipping of people is bad enough, mandatory tipping of machines seems to be where we’re headed. You’ll face a surcharge to cover… their health care costs? I guess that’s what they’re calling maintenance these days.
I was in Newark airport last week and bought dinner at the Shore Points markets.
It was a self-service checkout, but I was charged a 3% employee benefit and retention fee.
- Employee benefit surcharges are being added while employees are being replaced by self-checkout
- Customers pay extra for the benefits of employees who aren’t serving them. This is like airport self-checkout machines imposing mandatory tipping as part of the checkout process.
I’m at Newark Airport being asked to tip on a self checkout transaction- how much should I tip? pic.twitter.com/hoIXIIOVRv
— Anna Tong (@annatonger) May 23, 2023
- And prices are fraudulent – all prices are posted for 2.9% less than items really cost.
I first ran into restaurant surcharges at the San Francisco airport years ago. Businesses with more than 20 employees have to either provide employee health benefits or pay into a fund for uninsured residents that do not qualify for Medicare or Medi-Cal. It’s a cost of doing business that’s required in the jurisdiction so it should be part of the price and it comes across as sneaky, almost fraudulent when imposed as a surcharge.
Philadelphia airport last year decided to allow all concessions to charge passengers more than posted prices. The 3% surcharge is because the airport has price caps (15% above street pricing), so vendors can’ raise prices. The airport didn’t want to relax that. So they pretend the surcharge isn’t a price increase. By the way, the 3% ’employee wage and benefit offset’ doesn’t go to employees, it goes straight to concessionaires.
In Washington, DC the voter-approved Initiative 82 eliminated the ‘tip credit’ that allowed restaurants to pay $5.35 an hour. Restaurants have responded by adding surcharges. One way I’ve heard restaurant owners and managers there explain why they are doing this is that they want customers to see that amount as a surcharge and have the opportunity to offset with lower tips (!).
Remember that wages are part of costs, not price. The Department of Transportation spent years on a rulemaking over what they viewed as insufficient disclosure of optional fees charged by airlines. Where are they on mandatory fees charged with purchases at airports?
Newark Airport
Note that I enhanced the quality of the original Newark airport receipt.
Gary, that 3% is not a tip; it is indeed a tax, and you can chose to not purchase anything, if you’re so opposed. Remember, ‘let the free market decide…’ Hmm…
For all those who voted for the current administration to get rid of agency oversight, enjoy the fruits of your labor. This will only get worse for consumers.
TheJetsFan…sorry…the Federal Trade Commission outlawed this action during the Biden administration. Report the restaurant to the FTC and ask for a chargeback to the credit card.
Wait till no tax on tips passes…you’ll see way more of these “tip” requests everywhere
Airport businesses are generally some of the places I least want to give my business to but at times it cannot be helped. Most of the time I feel that I am being overcharged. Airports in other countries sometime seem better about how much they charge. Fortunately PNH now has a working water filling station so I no longer have to buy overpriced water at a shop.
@TheJetsFan — Bingo! Now, so long as the courts and the media remain independent, we, the people, can still clean up this mess, as long as it takes, hold bad actors and grifters accountable, and recover. Or, we just give up and move to Europe. No American football there, though. Eh…
Just hit the SkipTip or Zero dollar. It’s not that hard. Before I travel I go through a list of what I need so I’m not paying an airport store a rip off amount for something like toothpaste and therefore will not be asked to tip either the clerk or the non human software.
Tipping culture is out of control and I’m getting tired of being bullied or guilted into paying for things that don’t deserve gratuity of for service levels that come up short.
I get the arguments on both sides but I really do think we should just pay people a living wage.
@Parker – what is a “living wage” and what position qualifies? You can’t just implement a $20 or $30 minimum wage (thank you idiot LA for the recent action regarding hotel workers) and not expect consequences. Also, a job should be paid in proportion to the value it gives a business. That is why entry level jobs don’t pay as much. If you suddenly decide everyone gets a “living wage” and you peg that at, for example $20 an hour, then you have people with an 8th grade education flipping burgers making about as much as entry level wages for teachers and police in many places. That just doesn’t work. Also, if people think tariffs will increase cost (at most it is a one time adjustment instead of continued inflation and even the Fed has called the impact transitory) jacking up all wages will immediately flow through the economy with higher prices, higher wages for other positions as skilled workers with a college degree will expect more than unskilled workers and then it will compound over the years.
At least I’m retired, financially set (and have my kids and grandkids covered) so I’ll be fine anyway but this focus on telling business how much they have to pay their workers must end or the US will face major economic issues in the coming years.
they have the same thing at JFK saw it back in February
Any published price of an item, be it a sticker, an advertisement or whatever, should be the total price including any taxes. It would be required to actually have truth in advertising.
Amazing that there was no sales tax added to the expensive food and absurd 3%
You are being silly to say that the 3% Employee Benefit and Retention fee is just for the check out machine. Of course there are other employees for the shop beyond just the check-out person or machine. That being said, they should just raise all the prices by 3% and top the BS fees.
Just another of numerous reasons to avoid EWR, and JFK and LGA for that matter.
@jns, that would be a total change to retail pricing in the U.S., but I’m all for it. People from other countries marvel (not in a good way) at the fact that the prices U.S. merchants list on their goods are not and long haven’t been inclusive of taxes. And now they aren’t inclusive of all kinds of garbage fees either. It’s fraud.
Tipping is not the only thing out of control. I hate checkouts, even self serve kiosks, that ask you to round up your purchase for the store’s favored charity. Even the gas station near my home now asks if you want to donate to charity while you are pumping gas at the self service! And why should tips be tax free? As a salaried employee, none of my income is tax free. If that law passes, my average tip will decline, because each tip dollar will be worth more to the recipient.
I’ll make sure not to fly in or out of these airports.
Out of control the surcharge and tipping thing.Should be illegal
Now they have vending machines that ask you to tip them
I became friendly with one at one airport she dispensed me a cold drink
Suzie the drink robot 😉