Service Charge

About Our 20% Service Charge

At the beginning of 2021, Tria implemented a 20% pre-discount service charge that is added to each guest's check. Most Tria guests have been positive or neutral regarding this change, but the system raises legitimate questions.

Why did we do this? Since the pandemic, millions of workers have left the restaurant industry, and this has caused a much-needed reset. Low pay, poor working conditions, and increasingly rude customers (not at Tria, of course!) have caused many restaurant workers to reconsider their careers. We responded to the staffing crisis by creating The Tria Promise, our 19-point collection of benefits and practices to help make Tria one of the best independent restaurant companies to work for in Philadelphia.

Part of the Tria Promise is the 20% Service Charge for our front-of-house team, along with minimum wages throughout the company ranging from $15 to $20 per hour. We intend for our team to make a living wage. The service charge and increased minimum wages make all the difference when business is slow due to inclement weather or pandemic-related dining restrictions.

We embraced the service charge also because the practice of tipping is increasingly being linked to racism, sexism, harassment, and exploitation. The United States is one of the few countries in which gratuities make up the majority of restaurant servers’ wages.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

  • Our service scores on Yelp, Google and OpenTable have stayed the same or improved since we implemented the service charge – and our scores are high. Customer service provided by any company or individual is the result of many factors. In fact, there is evidence that service quality and tip amount may have no direct correlation. Most other jobs, including those that involve customer service, do not allow employees’ wages to be determined so arbitrarily. If we receive poor service at a store or doctor’s office, we don’t get to pay less. Most of us would cringe at the notion that our pay should be determined by our customers/students/clients/patients based on every single transaction.

  • We’re not perfect. If you receive poor service, please speak to the manager and we will remove the service charge. But if the service is bad enough to get to this point, we would prefer to be given the opportunity earlier to make things right.

  • Many of our guests leave an additional gratuity on top of the service charge. This is optional, of course, but the team appreciates it!

  • Because of human psychology. If Tria were to raise prices by 20%, many of us would consider Tria to be a poor value. To think otherwise would require mentally subtracting 20% from each menu item’s price. Bundling the cost of service into the price of a restaurant meal is an uphill battle – restaurants that have experimented with this approach seem not to have fared well.

  • The service charge eliminates the need thinking about the tip and negotiating the tip with your friends. Who wants to solve math problems after enjoying a relaxing meal?

    For Tria to put our guests first, we need to put our team first; without a great team, there is no Tria. We predict that tipping will eventually be replaced by a more equitable solution, and we have decided to act sooner rather than wait.