Snarky Customer Refuses To Leave Waiter Tip — Shortly Thereafter She Mistakenly Leaves Envelope With Her Life Savings Inside

Feb 10, 2021 by apost team

Most, especially those with experience, will agree that working in the service industry is hard. Many restaurants pay their wait staff a very low hourly wage, so they rely on tips to make a living. Consequently, people understand and are willing to leave good tips when the service is adequate or better. Some, however, feel that paying for their food is more than enough, and the servers do not require anything extra. Or, when they don't like something about the restaurant, they might not leave a tip at all.

That was exactly what retired social worker Karen Vinacour did back in May of 2019. After eating at Patsy's Pizzeria in New York City, Vinacour left a snarky note on the check and didn't tip. But what goes around comes around. And it turns out that when Vinacour left, she forgot her life savings in an envelope — a check worth nearly $424,000.

Tipping is also a cultural practice that isn't readily accepted everywhere. In fact, in places like Japan, offering a tip for service is considered insulting. Additionally, many Europeans only leave their leftover change from their bill as a tip.

This can be frustrating for United States servers, but what's worse is when people simply do not tip out of spite. It does happen, and servers simply must accept it at times. Can you imagine?

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Armando Markaj, who had been working at Patsy's Pizzeria in East Harlem for over 10 years, was accustomed to the fact that some people simply do not leave tips. So, when a woman came in, seemed to enjoy her lunch and didn't tip him, it was not terribly surprising. What was surprising is why she decided not to tip him. Was it because of poor service? No. Was the food bad? Again, no. Then, what could it be?

Vinacour asked Armando why there were not many pictures of women on the wall, as PIX 11 News reports. Armando wasn't completely sure of the answer but offered that he guessed that women ate less pizza than men. Apparently, this answer wasn't tip-worthy regardless of how good her lunch was.

Obviously, this was upsetting to Armando, but he didn't let it bother him and moved on. As he was cleaning up her table, he found an envelope. What he chose to do with that envelope would reveal his true character.

Once Vinacour realized the envelope was missing, she likely became frantic. She must have started retracing her steps to try to locate it. She even called Patsy's to see if they had found it. They had not, but since she had called the wrong location, they wouldn't find it, would they? Vinacour, a retired social worker, became distraught. She called her bank, who informed her that replacing the check, valued at approximately $424,000, would take about three months, according to NBC New York.

Vinacour, who was interviewed in the video, did not remember taking the check out in the restaurant at all. She had the check on her because she was moving her life's savings to a different bank. 

Armando found the check and immediately turned it in to the owner of Patsy's. He could have easily tossed the check into the garbage after Vinacour refused to tip him. However, Armando was better than that. Adem Brija, Patsy's owner, did not want to be responsible for the mass sum of money, and so he and his father put the check where it was safe, according to NBC New York. Then, they began trying to locate Vinacour using Google and other means. After five days, it seemed they could not find her.

Finally, they were able to find her with the help of The New York Daily News. Vinacour returned to Patsy's in tears and admitted to not tipping the waiter. She tried to offer him money at that time, but he refused.

“You know what? I did it for the sake of myself. So, I was like, ‘I’m not taking the tip now.'” Armando told reporters.

Vinacour says that Armando didn't have to save the check for her. She says he could have thrown it away because they had been mean to him. She calls him an "amazing man" for what he did.

Vinacour, who was so impressed by the handling of her lost check, vowed to return to Patsy's often and will definitely be tipping Armando from now on.

In over 90 years of being in business, Patsy's has never had a customer leave behind something so valuable. We can only imagine! It seems Vinacour was planning on using this money to purchase a home. So, she was so grateful the check was returned.

"I'm so grateful that the insult that we gave him did not prevent him from doing the right thing," Vinacour told ABC 7 News.

While Armando seems satisfied with Vinacour’s response, many viewers sounded off in the below video’s comments to criticize the social workers’ actions.

“I love how she tries to tip the guy once he gives her the check back,” one highly rated comment read. “Just a PSA folks, if you don’t enough to tip a server- go eat at freaking McDonalds or any other of the many places where they don’t depend financially on tips Servers make less than minimum wage most cases.”

Another user had even stronger words for Vinacour, calling her a “sociopath.”

“The pizza looks delicious. The crust looks really, really good. Waiter is a good guy, obviously he is honest,” the commenter wrote. “Sorry, but people like this lady, who don't leave tips, are self absorbed, entitled, sociopaths.”

Regardless of whether these commenters are justified in their anger is up for debate, but it remains a fact that service workers depend on tips to make a living. According to a 2018 policy and data brief from the National Employment Law Project (NELP), "Waiters and bartenders earn more in tips than they do from what employers pay them as an hourly base wage.” Consequently, the NELP explains that nearly 60 percent of wait staff’s earnings come from tips, which means that service workers likely depend on them to pay for essentials like rent and utilities.

In light of tipping’s importance, one YouTube commenter succinctly summed up her tipping philosophy, writing, “...if you’ve got money to go out to eat, you better have a good tip to go with it or stay home and make your own food.”

What do you think? Could you forgive and befriend someone who refused to tip you for a seemingly petty reason? Share this video with all your service-industry friends and family to see what they think! We'd love to hear your thoughts below.