Starbucks (SBUX) is world renowned in the coffee and drinks industry, but has been under scrutiny for a while with the company opposing its employees because some workers have wanted to unionize.
Starbucks decided to offer financial education for its non-union employees as a benefit back in September. Whether a Starbucks is run as corporate or a licensee location, much of the same rules and regulations apply when it comes to working with its employees, union or not.
"As we reinvent the future of Starbucks, together with our partners, we knew we had an opportunity to further support the financial well-being of our partners and their families," Ron Crawford, senior vice president of Total Rewards at Starbucks said in a statement.
Employees have worked hard to try and make their jobs better in every aspect they could, believing that a union would be part of the answer. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz has been against unions in the past, but not for the reasons you might think. Schultz feels that as a company Starbucks is already doing 'good' by its employees with decent pay and benefits.
The Customer Knows Best
Most might believe that a corporation does what’s best for the corporation, and an employee does what is best for the employee, but that doesn’t always seem to be the case. Some Starbucks employees may not fully understand the job at hand. It’s come to light via TikTok that with the new Point of Sale (POS) system rolling out across Starbucks, some baristas are feeling some undue stress in their jobs.
When a customer places an order and then pays for it is not problem. But when the new POS system asks for a tip, baristas are feeling awkward about needing to explain to the customer how to tip or decline tipping for their order.
It’s not so much receiving a tip, but more the explaining the new POS that asks if a customer wants to tip or not. This creates an awkward situation in the barista’s mind that its uncomfortable to be tipped for their job. Tips can actually really make a difference in someone’s pay on a job. Considering how fast orders can be processed at Starbucks, and that one order is easily $8-$10, at 20% tip, and serving up to 20 customers an hour, that can easily be an extra $30 on top of an hourly wage of $12-$15.
Understanding Sales 101
Addressing this issue head on is TikTok user @yassimodo stating, "First of all, my loves, that's fireable. You can't touch the screen at all. It was in the training. Second of all, all you have to do is this. This is what I say: 'It's gonna ask if you want to leave a tip. It's totally up to you, but you have to make a selection for the card to go through.' Plain and simple."
While the feeling on one side may be awkward, the understanding of tipping goes back a long way, so long ago in fact it’s hard to determine when, where and why it started. However, it started, the word ‘Tip’ may come from the phrase, “To Insure Promptness.” Usually, a tip comes after the order and service have taken place, and if a customer was satisfied with their service and order, a tip would be more applicable. The tip is a payment to the service industry and not asking for a tip or taking that ability away from the customer really only hurts the barista and their team.
Understanding that someone might feel awkward asking for a tip is one thing, but that's a problem anyone taking payments needs to deal with.
