When picturing a swindler, a high school classmate pushing a multi-level marketing scheme disguised as an “irresistible opportunity to be your own boss” via DM or George Santos might spring to mind. Your friendly local bartender, on the other hand, probably wouldn’t be the first person you’d think of. But according to a new thread posted on the popular subreddit r/bartenders, scams behind the stick are much more common than one may expect.
The conversation started when user LOUDCO-HD asked: “What kind of scams are fellow ‘tenders pulling at your bar?” Their inspiration: a former employee at their bar who routinely brought their own 30-racks of Bud Light to sell to customers alongside the Bud purchased by the bar. At the end of the night, the bartender would nab the money from “his cans” from the register. With cans priced at $5.50, this scammer made quite a chunk of change, considering he was shifting between eight and 10 cases per month. Eventually, the crook was caught and fired.
Several bartenders jumped into the thread to share their own experiences with grifters at their respective establishments. From get-rich-quick schemes to stealing from fellow employees, here are some of the most egregious scams pulled by bartenders at work, according to Reddit.
The Double Drop
Allegedly a fairly common scam in the hospitality industry, this strategy involves a server or bartender reprinting checks from early in the shift to give to current tables when they’re ready to pay. Because the order was never rung in, instead of owing the house money at the end of the shift the employee simply pockets the entire payment.
User Kingsley-Zissou commented:
“I worked at a dive years ago owned by 2 guys in their 30’s. One of the owners sister, Leeandra, worked the bar on occasion and had this scam where she’d serve tables, but instead of starting new tickets, she’d re-print receipts from earlier in her shift for tables that had similar orders and pocket the cash. She called it ‘Lee’s double drop.’
The funniest part was that her brother knew exactly what she was doing and would just take the money she scammed from her tips at the end of the shift.”
The Gift Card
Gift card scams are one of the most common schemes out there: fraudsters typically trick victims by faking an urgent situation and pushing them to spend hundreds on gift cards to help them. Once the gift card’s information has been passed to the scammer, the cards are then drained of their value, leaving victims high and dry. The strategy described in this thread is slightly different, with one bartender buying a Walmart gift card for $10, using it to pay for his meal at work, and tipping himself $100. With credit card tips paid out in cash daily, the employee walked away with a $100 tip each time, despite the card bouncing later on.
User NotARealJobEnjoyer commented:
“This was actually a server doing this. The way our system works, cards wouldn’t actually get run with the tip until the end of the night after paperwork was done. He was going to Walmart and getting a $10 visa gift card. He would use it to pay for his own food, then tip himself $100. So they were paying his credit tips out in cash, and then the card would bounce later on. He actually got away with this for a few months.”
The Discount Drink Night
Sometimes, scams require a bit of forethought, and this server was thinking hard. On special nights when drinks were priced at just $2, she would pay for 100 mixed drinks, never make them, and pocket the printed tickets for a later date. Then, on the weekend when drinks were back up to their standard $7 price, those drinks would be served and nothing on the books would indicate anything below-board. The server walked away with an extra $500 per week before they were found out.
User Twice_Knightley commented:
“The best one I’ve ever seen was a server who would work 5 nights per week, she would ring in, and pay for 100 vodka crans and rum and cokes on a night where they were $2, keep the tickets, and get them made on the weekends when they were $7.
This kept the alcohol counts in check for the week so nothing seemed off in the numbers, but she would take in an extra $500 every week doing this.
The funny thing was she was only caught when she got sick after buying the drinks and the inventory was WAY over, then when she used the tickets a few weeks later, it was way under by the same amount. This lead to doing nightly counts from managers who saw the over under trend and narrowed it down.”
The Slam Dunk
Also common behind the stick is what user king_of_chardonnay pegged “the slam dunk.” To complete the scam, bartenders avoid ringing in draft beer or well-drink orders when customers pay in cash. Instead, the entire heap of cash gets added to the tip jar. Easy-peasy.
User king_of_chardonnay commented:
“The ‘slam dunk’ was popular with some bartenders I worked with
If someone paid cash for a draft beer or we’ll drink and didn’t need change, they would slam dunk the full thing in the tip jar.”
The Double Dunk
This scheme is similar to the slam dunk, but it instead involves cocktails. When guests at this particular bar ordered a double and paid in cash, this bartender would ring it in as a single and toss the extra money in the tip pool. With a five-dollar price difference between singles and doubles, we can assume this was fairly lucrative for the offending employees.
User avg-bro commented:
“Music venue before going completely cashless… singles were exactly 8.50 and doubles were 13.50. When someone ordered a double and paid cash, he’d punch in a single and put the extra 5 in the tip jar.
I was completely oblivious to it until after the fact but did notice one shift that we raked in a lot of cash with “Bill” on the bar but attributed it to it being a high volume club night where ballers tended to throw extra cash around and some form of old school bartender charm on his end. Multiple bars as well so you’d often work with different people night to night. Not sure how much he was doing it on regular nights but enough to eventually raise suspicion with management when he was bragging too openly about all his cash tips when most people were paying via card.
Cameras everywhere there… so although it was “smart” on his end I don’t think it was hard for management to cross reference what he was pouring verse once he was ringing in once they caught wind.”
The Full Comp
While an item might get comped when something’s wrong with a table’s food or service, it’s not typical for restaurants to offer full compensation for the entire meal. But when the two servers in this user’s story were on the floor, a free meal was the norm: When a table paid in cash, the employees would simply comp the entire bill and pocket the cash for themselves.
User Miteh commented:
“Knew a couple girls who worked for a well known chain where I’m from that honours full compensation on basically any tables that have even the smallest of issues with the food or service. These two were lead servers so they had the discount authority.
Any time there was a table that paid cash they would %100 discount the entire thing and then just pocket the cash.
Over the course of like 2 years doing this every time added up to the tens of thousands”
The Service Charge
In London, some bars and restaurants tack on a 12.5-percent service charge that, according to this user, can be removed upon request from the guest. This scam involved one manager removing the charge from the bill after guests had already paid it and stealing that money for himself. Not only was this ripping off guests, but it was hurting employees, too, as service charges were distributed to staff on paydays.
User PropJoesChair commented:
“In london it’s very common to have an optional 12.5% service charge that is deductable upon request (it’s as scammy as it sounds) that pools and is paid to staff with our cheques.
Only managers could remove the service charge. We had a new manager come in, and one day he got escorted out in handcuffs by police.
He had been removing the service charge on a bunch of sales even though the customers had paid it, then when doing the float at the end of the night he had pocketed what the difference in service charge was. Funded his Coke and gambling addiction for a good while.”
The Free Ride
Honestly, this one’s on management. At this establishment, free drink tickets were handed out for the first month of business — but they weren’t coded for single-use. So, bartenders would hold onto the tickets they received, have guests pay in cash, and then slide the ticket into the register and pocket the cash for themselves.
User rad-dit commented:
“Not my bar, but a place I worked at about 10 years ago.
So, the club was remodeled and reopened. Part of that was giving away free drink tickets for the first month — I think everyone got one when they came in. Well, mgmt was colossally stupid and didn’t make them single-use as a way to save money. So some of the bartenders realized this — and would pocket them. Then, they would take cash from a customer, pocket the cash, and put the free drink ticket in the register instead.
I was working there as a DJ every few weeks, and I remember coming in and realizing I only knew one of the ten bartenders. He told me what happened — he was the one who actually told mgmt what was happening, mostly because he’s in the Army and knew he would be proper fucked if he got charged with something (and yes, mgmt had the bartenders who were running this scam got in legal trouble).”
