Redditors fed up with ‘BS’ surcharges call out more than 200 LA restaurants for extra fees
Users on Reddit are fed up with surreptitious surcharges at restaurants — and have begun crowdsourcing a list of Los Angeles eateries that tack on additional fees.
So many responses poured in that the list was compiled into a public Google spreadsheet that has nearly 250 entries in a subreddit called r/LosAngeles.
In Pasadena, Agnes Restaurant & Eatery adds a “4% Healthy LA” fee to all dine-in checks to help pay for workers’ health and wellness benefits.
The Redditors’ spreadsheet even includes a photo of a receipt from the restaurant, which notes that the 4% surcharge “is not gratuity” and can be removed upon request.
The spreadsheet notes other restaurants’ reasons for their respective surcharges, which range from add-ons to subsidize employees’ healthcare benefits to a “kitchen appreciation fee.”
Another photo of a receipt from The Albright, a seafood spot on the Santa Monica pier, shows that an obscure 10% fee was added to the Redditer’s check, though there’s no reasoning behind it.
Sunset Boulevard’s All Day Baby added a 3% “kitchen love” tax to its bill, the spreadsheet showed, linking to a review on Yelp that described it as a “shameful money grab by management.”
Among the most shocking of surcharges was Speranza’s unexplained 18% to 20% to its checks.
“Staff was very vague in what it was for just that it was not tip,” the Redditer said of Speranza.
Xuntos, a tapas bar in Santa Monica that opened last month, also reportedly adds a “non-negotiable, non-discretionary, non-removable” 20% service charge.
Other eateries utilize add-ons to encourage customers to pay using cash.
Vino Wine & Tapas Room in Encino, for example, adds on a 3.8% fee for card transactions — and automatically applies a 20% tip for bills over $200 — while the menu at Oceanview Cafe in Manhattan Beach says that its prices reflect a “4% cash discount.”
And two other restaurants included in the spreadsheet — the Ruby Fruit and Perch — charge security fees of 4% and 4.5%, respectively, to ensure the safety of guests and staff.
Hodori Koren Cuisine, meanwhile, reportedly adds a $1 surcharge for each item ordered to-go.
For in-house diners, French restaurant République, meanwhile, charges a hefty corkage fee of $75, the sheet showed, while Rustic Canyon in Santa Monica will pop bottles for $40.
At Yang’s Kitchen in Alhambra, customers should expect a 1% “Zero Footprint Restore the Planet fee,” which the eatery says it uses to build healthy soil and carbon farming.
Diners — who are also facing headwinds from inflation — are fed up with the surcharges, especially when it isn’t going directly into waitstaff’s pockets, the r/LosAngeles subreddit showed.
“I’m sick of going to restaurants where there is a service charge that isn’t a gratuity and just goes to the owners. It’s misleading when your bill ends up 3% to 18% more from this bulls–t charge that should be baked into the prices or go to the servers,” a user by the name of PinkandSparkly wrote.
“Going to Europe was a breath of fresh air in this regard. Restaurants don’t have any of these bullshit surcharges, no tipping and tax is included. The price you see is the price you pay,” one commenter said.
Others called the fees a “predatory practice” and bashed restaurants for forcing diners to pay extra fees under the guise that the funds will be used for employee’s health insurance.
‘They try to use health insurance to trick you into thinking this money actually goes to health insurance, but again this money belongs to the restaurant and they can do whatever they want with it,” another wrote.
“I knew it was BS and even though we enjoyed the food haven’t been back. Health care costs are a fixed monthly expense for an employer. They are not a percentage of sales. So anything over what the fixed cost is is pocketed by the owners. F–k that,” another said of health insurance-related fees.
