Tips and the minimum wage

From 1 October, at the same time as the rise in the National Minimum Wage, the use of tips by employers to make up minimum wage payments to staff was outlawed. The TUC and unions, who campaigned hard to change the law, have hailed the move as a “real success”.

Business secretary Lord Mandelson called the change “a basic issue of fairness”. Unite joint general secretary Tony Woodley said: “Unite is proud that the government has heeded the concerns of waiting staff in their long-running campaign to close the loophole in the minimum wage regulations.”

BIS, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, has launched a Code of Best Practice on service charges and tips, to aid transparency. Unite wants all hospitality establishments to sign up to the Code and to its own Fair Tips Charter. The Code can be found at: www.berr.gov.uk/files/file52948.pdf and Unite’s charter is available at www.fairtips.org.