Day 124 - 10 May 95 - Page 20


     
     1        A.  They were asked not it receive tips.
     2
     3   Q.   But if they did get tips, what was the requirement?
     4        A.  Well, in some cases they kept the tips; some of the
     5        kids kept the tips, and in other cases some of the kids
     6        turned in the tips.
     7
     8   Q.   Were they expected to turn in the tips?
     9        A.  But our direction was to not receive tips.  Tips were
    10        unnecessary.
    11
    12   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I think another way of putting what
    13        Mr. Morris is putting is, suppose a crew member did accept
    14        a tip, did not voluntarily turn it in, and it came to the
    15        notice of someone higher up that they had kept a nickel or
    16        something like that, did the Company have a policy on what
    17        to do then?
    18        A.  To be perfectly frank, my experience was the employees
    19        kept the tips.  They were told not to receive the tips.  If
    20        they received them they kept it.  They were asked if they
    21        did receive it to put it in the till, but I never, from
    22        personal experience, asked them to, you know, give it to
    23        the Company.  Now, did that occur?  Of course it did.
    24
    25   MR. MORRIS:  So some people might have been disciplined for
    26        breaking Company policy?
    27        A.  That is probably true, some people might have been.
    28        But I think, as McDonald's became a little more widely
    29        known, the giving of tips was minimal.  We are really
    30        talking about an issue from my perspective that was,
    31        amounted to, was an inconsequence amount.  If you waited
    32        on, in a typical restaurant, 1500 customers if two or three
    33        customers gave a tip, that was a lot.  So -----
    34
    35   Q.   What I am saying, the requirement was they should have put
    36        the money in the till?
    37        A.  That is right.  During the transition period of
    38        car-hops and table-service restaurants, you know, there was
    39        a propensity to want to give tips, but I would say that the
    40        number of customers that did that dropped off dramatically
    41        as more and more McDonald's type establishments were
    42        developed.
    43
    44   Q.   So the Company policy was, effectively, not only paying low
    45        wages or minimum wages, but to prevent staff from
    46        supplementing their low income with the traditional
    47        tipping, and, on top of that, the policy was they should
    48        put it into the till so the Company made the addition,
    49        rather than the staff who had earned it?
    50        A.  That is a real stretch, Mr. Morris. 
    51 
    52   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  That is just one way of expressing it.  It is 
    53        comment really.
    54
    55   MR. MORRIS:  You can deny it.
    56
    57   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  That is the way you can put it to me.
    58
    59   THE WITNESS:  At the time, you know, I am speaking to you of my
    60        first-hand knowledge of the policy on tipping, so when

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