Bars and restaurants fraudulently altering credit card receipts.

This happened to me once when I left a $1 tip and wrote poor service on the receipt. I called the restaurant to complain, and the manager said he couldn't find the receipt, and he obviously couldn't care less. So, I disputed it with AMEX, and they credited me the $5 with no questions asked. I called the corporate HQ [it was a local chain], and they seemed concerned about the situation, crediting my card and offering me a free meal, but I'd already moved halfway across the country at that point. [And, yes, I called back AMEX so that they'd reverse their credit to me, which I'm assuming they had eaten.]

I eat out all the time. I always fill in the reciept with tip and total and keep my copy.

I always cross reference and I have never had a problem.

But I was at McCormick & Schmick's in LA for happy hour today, so I will check the total charged, THANKS.

I would start leaving cash tips, and writing "NO TIP" in the tip line on the receipt any time I was going to leave a tip small enough to tempt someone to inflate it. While it would be a bit aggravating, it would be easier than having to deal with fraudulent charges.

I always write "CASH" on the tip line if I get crappy service (and leave a buck or two.) Never had a problem.

Only had this happen to me once (that I caught). Went for two beers at a bar and later saw a charge on my card for $30 bucks lol. AMEX refunded no questions asked.

ArbolLoco said: I have called both places and sorted them out... but should I just dispute the whole check the next time and allege fraudulent activity?

Are you kidding? The first thing I would do is dispute the whole check and allege fraudulent activity. I would never waste my time calling the restaurant. The question is, should you start noting down your server's names and contacting the police department?

As far as I know this has never happened to me, but perhaps I don't check my receipts closely enough. I usually just make it so that the bill+tip is an even dollar amount. If the credit card bill shows an even dollar amount in the ballpark of what I recall the bill should be then I assume it is correct. Perhaps I should start doing something more sophisticated, like making the least significant digit a parity check.

jfunk138 said: Technologist said: I had this happen to me ONE time many, many, MANY years ago.... and devised an easy way of finding these on my credit card statement. It costs me a little money, but saves me lots of time reconciling.

Say the bill is $22.57. Add 15% tip ($3.38). Total is $25.95. Add (or subtract) cents until last number equals the sum of the individual numbers to the left of decimal (the 2 and the 5). In this case, I add 2 cents to make the grand total $25.97. When reconciling, I immediately see the 2+5=7, and know that nothing funny happened. Any small dollar tip addition stands out, the only way around "my system" is if the establishment adds an outrageous tip (multiples of 9 dollars).

It isn't foolproof, but it works for me. Oh, the reason I said subtract above is so I don't take the cents above 99, and cause the dollars to increment by 1... it would throw off the system.
Checksums for tips... I love it! I may start doing this as well.

HA! That's awesome. His username is quite apt.

This is very timely. I eat out way too much and this happens far more than one would believe. I notice it happens more when I use dine far (many states) from home.

Last week, I left a 18% tip at a Boulder steak house. When the bill hit my AMEX card, the tip had increased to almost 40%. I called, got a credit correction and a $50 gift certificate.

I now will ONLY leave cash tips as I believe a trend may be happening here.

IMHO

Usorry said: ...If I don't see zeros on my bill, then I know I have a problem.

Then you wouldn't spot extra few [even amount] dollars added.

Why not just cross-check your statement with the receipts?
Always ask for and keep the copy of the receipt.

aeiouy said: You shouldn't withhold a wait staff tip because the food came out cold/an hour late. That is usually a problem with the kitchen not the wait staff. You can't punish the server and the bus boys and the front of house staff for something the kitchen did.

Well you can... but then you might find your credit card receipt altered. Two wrongs certainly don't make a right...

My server's job is to make sure my food arrives as-ordered and at the appropriate temperature. If it is cold when he goes to get it, he should send it back to the kitchen before I ever see it. Same with if it is cooked wrong of the wrong side dishes are on my plate. His only job is to take my order and bring me the food (and drink) I ordered. If he can't do both of those two correctly, he doesn't deserve extra pay above-and-beyond his regular hourly wage.

aeiouy said: You shouldn't withhold a wait staff tip because the food came out cold/an hour late. That is usually a problem with the kitchen not the wait staff. You can't punish the server and the bus boys and the front of house staff for something the kitchen did.

Well you can... but then you might find your credit card receipt altered. Two wrongs certainly don't make a right...

Comments like this always seemed very illogical to me.

If I order a small salad or I order the prime rib, it will take the same number of trips by my server. In fact I might ask for more dressing so the salad might require extra. However, despite the same amount of work server will get 4-5 times the size of a tip. They are riding the coat-tails of the chef/restaurant's reputation for cooking to induce me to order a pricey steak.

You can't have it both ways. If you are collecting your tip as a % of the expensive meal I ordered because of the chef, then you get shorted for bad/incorrect/late food.

If you want your tip to be independent of the food, then I'll just start tipping $5 at every restaurant I am at.

Because if "food doesn't matter" then logically you should tip the same absolute amount for the same service whether you are at Olive Garden or a $200/plate restaurant.

tazzy531 said: jfunk138 said: Technologist said: I had this happen to me ONE time many, many, MANY years ago.... and devised an easy way of finding these on my credit card statement. It costs me a little money, but saves me lots of time reconciling.

Say the bill is $22.57. Add 15% tip ($3.38). Total is $25.95. Add (or subtract) cents until last number equals the sum of the individual numbers to the left of decimal (the 2 and the 5). In this case, I add 2 cents to make the grand total $25.97. When reconciling, I immediately see the 2+5=7, and know that nothing funny happened. Any small dollar tip addition stands out, the only way around "my system" is if the establishment adds an outrageous tip (multiples of 9 dollars).

It isn't foolproof, but it works for me. Oh, the reason I said subtract above is so I don't take the cents above 99, and cause the dollars to increment by 1... it would throw off the system.
Checksums for tips... I love it! I may start doing this as well.

HA! That's awesome. His username is quite apt.So what do you do when the check-sum fails? If you don't save the receipt you can't really figure out what the overcharge was.

aeiouy said: You shouldn't withhold a wait staff tip because the food came out cold/an hour late. That is usually a problem with the kitchen not the wait staff. You can't punish the server and the bus boys and the front of house staff for something the kitchen did.

Well you can... but then you might find your credit card receipt altered. Two wrongs certainly don't make a right...100% agree. This problem probably affects people more often who tip badly.

I used to eat out with a friend for lunch once in a while. We always split the check between our credit cards, then after like 5 times doing this we realized they charged each of our cards the entire amount. I think servers just know people don't pay much attention in this area. I will be on high alert for my next 20 meals and see if I am getting screwed.

gatzdon said: makeinu said: ....The first thing I would do is dispute the whole check and allege fraudulent activity. .....

The only way to dispute the entire amount is to claim you never authorized the restaurant to charge your credit card. That is just as fraudulent as the restaurant manipulating the tip amount. When you file a dispute, you are supposed to provide the details about your dispute which would be that the amount charged does not equal the amount you authorized.

The downside of being honest is that for the small amount, the credit card company doesn't investigate and just issues a credit. The Restaurant never gets penalized from the credit card (although I always wondered if this exact issue was a contributing factor in why Hooter's can no longer accept Discover Card).

If the amount is incorrect then how am I to know whether or not the charge corresponds to one I authorized? Many businesses process credit cards in batch. Perhaps the charge I authorized is going to show up on the next statement and the one appearing on my current statement is fraudulent. I don't know and it's not my responsibility to know. My responsibility is to report unauthorized charges appearing on my statement and if the transaction does not match any of my signed receipts then it was not authorized.

DavidScubadiver said: I used to eat out with a friend for lunch once in a while. We always split the check between our credit cards, then after like 5 times doing this we realized they charged each of our cards the entire amount. I think servers just know people don't pay much attention in this area. I will be on high alert for my next 20 meals and see if I am getting screwed.
I guess this is why bills and receipts should be checked over, no matter where you are. I know I check all mine.

If you record your financial transactions, this should easily flush out during reconciliation. I use Quicken, and have never had a mismatch on dining charges.

The key is to actually RECORD transactions, not download them from the CC web site, like some lazy people do.

I am lucky this has never happened to me yet. Maybe I just tip well. Or if I get crappy service... I bring it to the manager right away and I settle it there before I leave.

I was in a chain restaurant a few days ago and me and my wife each ordered an entree which included salads. Well while my wife was eating... a fly landed on an onion of hers and she showed it to the waitress (she didn't say it landed after the fact but that doesnt really matter). Manager immediately came over and offered to make it right for us. We weren't even really complaining about it. He said he would take that off the bill or we could get some free deserts. I wanted desert anyways (tiramisu) so I just asked for some deserts. Entrees were fine.

I left my standard 20% at the end anyways because it really wasn't the waitress fault. But again I have always found if I get cold food or have issues with service I usually just point it out to a manager and have had good results almost every time. Beats the hell out of servers forging tips and I am sure they wouldn't dare forge a tip on a bill after it was alerted to a manager.

But again this works better in restaurants than say happy hour bars.

It happened to me once at Applebees. The waiter changes the tip from $1 to $4 and changed the total amount too. I never went to Applebees after that, they are the most rascist restaurant I have ever seen and not just one branch, I have dined in them all across the country. I don't know what's the deal with them or it is probably just my bad luck !

samiam68 said: If you record your financial transactions, this should easily flush out during reconciliation. I use Quicken, and have never had a mismatch on dining charges.

The key is to actually RECORD transactions, not download them from the CC web site, like some lazy people do. I do the same and have been doing so since the first version of Quicken in those ancient years of DOS!

I have only found one incorrect tip and I got it corrected by the restaurant as it's one that I eat at frequently.

I'm hoping that they had a "talk" with the server on that one as they did about the waiter who came barreling out of the stall in the washroom and out the door without washing whom I also reported to the manager that night.

Gee...maybe he's the one who added to the tip...

Why bother with Quicken if you only download the information?? I keep the receipts until I reconcile the statement and then only keep those that might be needed for a warranty claim and shred the others. It takes some time to record them but in the days before Quicken when they'd send you the carbon copy of the charge with the statement I always reconciled those before paying the bill.