Workers at a chain of restaurants spun out of London celebrity haunt the Ivy say they are losing out after the company cut their share of the service charge paid by diners when the legal minimum wage rose in April.
The Ivy Collection, which operates nearly 40 restaurants in the UK and Ireland, pays all waiters, chefs, some managers and support staff in its outlets the legal minimum wage of 10.42 for over-23s plus an hourly “commission” rate graded to their position and location.
Workers get the same hourly commission no matter how much is collected from the service charge during their working hours, under a system first revealed by the Guardian in 2017.
Cash tips paid by diners on top of the service charge, which are legally seen to be owned directly by staff, are allocated separately, as are those made via credit card.
Some Ivy staff claimed April’s change to their service charge allocation had wiped out any benefit they should have seen from the increase in the minimum wage. It came even as the restaurant business, controlled by billionaire restaurateur and fashion tycoon Richard Caring via his Troia (UK) Restaurants group, increased its menu prices.
It is not clear what happens to any excess service charge after the set commission to workers has been paid, but the Unite union estimated in 2017 that ordinary waiting and kitchen staff could be receiving less than half of the service charge under the Ivy Collection’s pay system.
It’s likely the group’s system will have to...
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