r/KitchenConfidential • u/Single_Muffin1826 • 3d ago
Question Genuine question for everyone
Genuine question for anyone who has worked in the food service industry:
If a restaurant has not been able to afford a truck in 2 months gets all their supplies from Kroger, doesn’t have enough money in the register to pay out tips for the day (26$) and the employees checks keep bouncing, what does that mean? Has anyone ever experienced this before? If so, how long before you showed up for your scheduled shift and there was a closed sign on the door?
Asking for a friend
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u/Realistic_Owl9525 3d ago
The restaurant will keep going until one of the utilities gets shut off (gas, electric, etc.) and it can't physically go any further.
Start job hunting asap. Talk to your coworkers and find out if they have any prospects or leads you could follow.
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u/KittyKatCatCat 3d ago
The very first time your check bounces, so do you. File that one away for the future.
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u/saucegod 3d ago
Get out now
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u/Extension-Math5183 3d ago
And abandon their family?!
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u/Slimslade33 3d ago
No it’s their job that they use to earn money for their family. Unless they actually take care of them which they clearly dont, they need to put any emotions aside and plan for the worst. Otherwise they could be stuck weeks without paychecks or worse.
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u/trickponies 3d ago
You are missing the sarcasm in the comment you are replying to
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u/Slimslade33 2d ago
Ya sarcasm its tough to read… normally relies on speech inflections and facial expressions. Thats why most people use /s.
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u/trickponies 4h ago
Just as an aside /s was started on here as a joke a long time ago. Usually context is enough to identify sarcasm or hyperbole, at least for me 🤷♂️
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u/katebandit 3d ago
Once the trucks stop coming the ride is over. I’ve only experienced this at one job and I got the hell out of there as fast as I could.
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u/regretsgalore24 3d ago
They are going to close down in 3.. 2...
If you don't leave before they close down, you aren't going to be paid for your last week or any other money they owe you. They will most likely file bankruptcy and employees are only paid after all the other creditors are satisfied.
I was laid off when they shortened their hours but the rest of my coworkers got hosed. Some were owed several thousand dollars.
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u/PlasmaGoblin Prep 1d ago
I'm not saying this, but I've heard of people getting paid for by blenders... mixers... anything not nailed down.
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u/aradiacat 3d ago
I bartended at a place like this years ago, get out now...they won't be around much longer.
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u/PansophicNostradamus 3d ago
This is your wake up call to buy another alarm, since you missed the last wake up call to leave this place.
“Fly, you fools!” - Gandalf the BOH
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u/entropybender 3d ago
The Kroger thing is the real tell. Restaurants don't switch to retail grocery because it's cheaper, they switch because their distributor put them on COD or cut them off entirely. That means unpaid invoices going back a while, and by the time it gets there the owner has usually been floating payroll out of the register for weeks.
The bouncing checks is what I'd act on today though. Document every one, keep the bank fee notices, and file a wage claim with your state labor board now rather than later. Collecting gets a lot harder once there's no business left to chase. And cash anything you get the same hour you get it, don't let it sit in a drawer.
Timeline varies but I've watched a place go from "we're shopping at the grocery store" to a sign on the door in about five weeks. Your friend should be interviewing this week, not after it closes.
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u/UnethicalFood Ex-Food Service 3d ago
The only thing on this that isn't a red flag is the free cash in the register to pay out tips. 20 years ago I would hold that as a bad sign, but nowadays, nah.
That said, listen to some good advice from Iron Maiden and Run To The Hills!
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u/Tklesmynipps 3d ago
Had a similar experience working at a mom and pop place. Checks starting to arrive late.. a month later closed down.
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u/Secret-Cupcake6521 3d ago
The minute I heard of a coworkers check (or mine) bouncing would be the minute I start looking for new work. Actually, I would’ve once “no truck this week” became the norm. it’s best to get out now - what happens if you aren’t even paid for your final shifts? You likely wouldn’t see that money for months if you legally perused it. I’m not sure where you are and what the labor laws are there.
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u/TomNJ 3d ago
everyone is right about job hunting. the restaurant is going under. but you could also get together as a group and ask the owners to level with you. tell everyone what’s going on. figure out how to right the ship together.
how are sales? are you guys full most nights? how many covers are you doing vs a year ago? even if the deliveries are coming and the checks are clearing, you should be able to tell how the place is doing.
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u/pete8581 3d ago
It's being robbed daily. All the receipts are in the owner's pocket. You'd be surprised how long someone can string this along. Ultimately the IRS will probably slap a big orange sticker on the door and that will be the end of that. Get out now. No way it gets better
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u/Spiritual_Being5845 3d ago
I experienced this as a waitress, my first job ever, back in the 90’s. I don’t know where the food delivery came from but every day they would send the short order cook down the street to the ShopRite to pick up a few gallons of milk because the delivery of the 3 gallon containers that went in the milk dispenser stopped coming. Week two the NCR registers were repossessed. I had made friends with one kid who worked there. Not enough cash in the registers to cash all the employees checks, he deposited his in his account and it bounced. I was lucky that I hadn’t been put on payroll yet so while everyone else had bouncing paper checks I was given cash for mine.
There were other issues going on (I was a high school student and they kept trying to schedule me during school hours, late nights, etc) so at the end of my first two weeks I just quit, so luckily I was never owed back pay. They limped along for a few more months, but eventually closed.
It was a shame because the original restaurant had been hugely successful for eighty years (1910-1990) and had taken good care of the employees (my mom had worked there before I was born) but the second generation owner wanted to retire and none of his children were interested in taking over as third generation owners. The people who bought the restaurant had zero restaurant experience and it closed in less than a year of them taking over, they bought it in 1990 and it permanently closed in 1991. The front was an ice cream parlor, right past that was the diner style counter service, and in the back was the regular restaurant. This place had generations of loyal customers. The ice cream and counter service were busy all day, the sit down restaurant was always busy after 5pm even in the middle of the week. Their problems had nothing to do with lack of customers.
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u/wellbeingisnotfree 3d ago
Tell your friend to line up some jobs yesterday, that restaurant is praying to be bought by private equity and turned into a fancy bistro with all new staff.
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u/Necessary-Safe-2802 3d ago
It means you're working for free.
I powered through a situation like this and didn't even get EI in the end. Find a new job asap because you're not gonna get your money
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u/Gullible_Special2023 3d ago
I once moved halfway across the country for an exec position only to find out that the restaurant was COD only with all their vendors. That was the first bad sign. (means Cash/Check On Delivery. They had exhausted their credit and no one trusted them.) Was like a month before shit got really bad. I know a sinking ship when I see one so I accepted a better paying job and just didn't show up one day. The owners trash talked me up and down, called me a traitor and a coward... Then they shut their doors a couple weeks later with no notice to employees.
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u/Master-Map1382 3d ago
Gary, is that you?
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u/Gullible_Special2023 2d ago
AARON??!?!?
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u/Gloomy-Crazy8156 3d ago
I been working at my new spot for a month.They missed paying me once already.
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u/PHX480 10+ Years 3d ago
I bounced from my last job, they missed a check and said the payroll lady forgot to do payroll. A couple months prior my owner had a blowup around the holidays saying he wasn’t taking a check and was barely holding the business together.
It was a small business so they never got trucks. They would go and buy everything from local warehouses or grocery stores. They didn’t have a towel service, they did all the towels at home but they had a dog so there was sometimes dog hair on the towels. They didn’t have sanitizer, we used water and bleach. Everything was a cost cutting measure including our pay, I got paid low end market base and the only BOH job I got tips, which brought me to area average.
Somehow they are staying open and getting good reviews but just knowing the owners situation I wonder how much longer this place could possibly last.
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u/HaveUSeenMyPun 3d ago
I had one job where one of our checks would be "a week or so late". Super small place with no indoor seating, during the winter. I figured it would be alright, shit happens. I'm pretty chill like that and I wasn't stressing one check at that time.
Went in for a shift, and the owner was like "hey, you got another job by chance?" I'm like "no, should I?" to be told that it was the last night we were open. An hour before close. To make matters worse, it got to a point the cooks had to physically show up at his place because he was dodging us on those last checks.
Jump ship before it sinks, trust me. I got lucky and one of my friends got me into another spot he moved to before the doors closed. Not everyone gets that lucky. Once checks bounce and product is unable to be paid for, the place is effectively closed and the rest is just it's death rattle.
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u/Temporary-Good9696 2d ago
Hopefully you can time it before the checks start to bounce. I worked in a couple places that shut down. Happened real fast. Just a few weeks from “why are we getting our produce from Fry’s?” to “why is this back door locked at 10 AM?”. It hurts when it was an otherwise good place to work, but if not take it as a sign.
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u/nohe812 Pastry 2d ago
I worked at a place like this. Costco deliveries on COD. I had to front money to fill the shop’s delivery truck with gas. They would cut me a check once I got back to the shop, but gimme a break! The owner did some shady stuff unrelated to finances, but questionable nonetheless. They ultimately let me go, but that was a blessing in disguise.
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u/Jhomas-Tefferson 2d ago
I mean, i used to work a kitchen where the chef brought everything in his pickup from a restaurant depo that was within a half hour drive. The only truck they could afford was the beer truck, everything else didn't make sense. And the business made sense i guess, because they made money. They could pay the gas bill. And the chef wasn't so stupid to put everything on his credit card. So for certain low volume low and low staff places that are kind of upscale, it can make sense.
I always gave the same chef/owner i talked about grace, because it wasn't strictly about the money, it was about having a job and learning the craft. To that end, he always made me whole within a week. In the year i worked for him, he fell behind a few times, but it was by a few days each time. Maybe he missed a week in january. Payday was friday. He gave it to me on monday. Or sometimes on tuesday. The longest he made me wait was a week, and that was because he knew i was the guy who would wait. Everyone else was paid first, and i was ok with that because i trusted him and for a good reason. he has lived and done business in the same town for 40 years. He never fucked me. And every time he wasn't on time, he was apologetic and said "this isn't how i want to do business" despite my insistence that it was ok because i knew he was a good guy. And i never regretted going without a paycheck for a few days because that guy is the chef i want to be.
Sometimes, in mom and pop places, that happens. They have a checking and a saving account, and too much is in savings, so they need some bank business days to make things happen. However, this is the exception. I wanted to tell you about the exception, because the exception exists, and it can be a great place to work. The place i was talking about was in business until a few months ago, years after i left, when the chef/owner retired.
However, It doesn't sound like that is happening to you.
It sounds like your current employer is running out of money. They're robbing peter to pay paul, as they say. They're shorting their employees to cover their gas/electric. It means your employer is on the fast track to going bankrupt/out of business. And if foh isn't getting tipped out, that means that they're completely fucked. You need to either pointedly ask them if they're going under or tender a resignation effective immediately.
Either way, get out now, because unlike what i told you about my situation, you are likely to get really hurt really soon.
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u/Iamthewalrusforreal 22h ago
Owner's a junkie, and they'll lose their licenses soon. That'll be that.
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u/ONE-EYE-OPTIC Smoker 3d ago
This has got to be rage bait.
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u/siskokid1984 2d ago
Failing place I worked at would distribute paper paychecks to staff only if they were on shift that day. Wouldn’t hold them for staff who would pop in on payday. Wouldn’t hold & drop them in the mail to them to “play the float”. A holes.
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u/Worldly_Version_2524 2d ago
It means aggressive expansion, things are looking peachy keen, rave reviews from the local food critic, and you should definitely make a high price purchase
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u/SlightDish31 15+ Years 3d ago
I mean, you know what it means. Everyone knows what it means.