Duke may have its share of ties to country clubs, but student reports that service at the Washington Duke Inn and Golf Club has been less than clubby have spurred administrators and student leaders to question some of the Washington Duke restaurant's policies.
Members of the Duke University Student Dining Advisory Committee will vote Monday on the issue of eliminating the 19 percent automatic gratuity for students paying with food points at the Fairview Restaurant, which joined the ranks of campus vendors accepting points last spring.
Following the publication of three letters in The Chronicle in which students expressed dissatisfaction with the automatic tipping policy at the inn, DUSDAC met with Washington Duke's General Manager Don De Feo and Food and Beverage Director Don Ball to discuss the future of the points program at the inn's four-star restaurant. De Feo and Ball also met Friday with Director of Dining Services Jim Wulforst.
"We have asked [DUSDAC] to look at the program because we want to make sure that there's an objective view of how we're managing the program," De Feo said.
While there has been no mention of the program being aborted entirely, there has been ample discussion on whether an automatic 19 percent gratuity is appropriate, Wulforst said.
"It was probably a 50-50 split amongst folks in the room," Wulforst said of last Monday's discussion of the automatic gratuity. "Some were saying that the Washington Duke provides a great experience so the 19 percent is fine. The other half said we should be doing what we're doing in The Oak Room, letting students decide what the tip should be."
When the Inn started accepting food points last February, they decided to test a mandatory service charge because employees at the Fairview Restaurant receive minimum wages. In contrast, Oak Room employees received premium wages, lessening the importance of the gratuity in employees' earnings, Wulforst said.
Once DUSDAC reaches a decision Monday, the group will contact the inn with a recommendation either to continue the program as is or to waive the mandatory tip, at least on a trial basis. Wulforst noted that although DUSDAC can provide only a recommendation, and not a mandate, the recommendation will carry significant weight.
"If DUSDAC decides to waive the tip and Washington Duke says they won't do it, I'm going to have to stick by my committee," Wulforst said.
Discussions on the automatic tipping policy arose last week when a number of students submitted letters to The Chronicle decrying Fairview's "horrendous" service coupled with an automatic and unadvertised tip.
Addressing three students' complaints that they received poor service but were still expected to pay the 19 percent gratuity, Ball said the incidents were relatively isolated but that they should have been handled differently at the time.
"Every guest has a right to dispute, amend or refuse to include a gratuity," Ball said. "There's no doubt in my mind that the experiences that were shared in the [letters] last week were inappropriately handled by an international intern who served as supervisor those two evenings."
Ball added that the inn has attempted to correspond with the students who submitted complaints in order to make amends.
One of last week's complaints, submitted by junior Lauren Hasson, held that the restaurant's tipping policy is misleading. She said the problem is not the inclusion of an automatic gratuity, but that the tip is included as a subtotal on a receipt that also provides space for an additional tip.
"That's deceptive right there. You might expect that from Joe Blow's diner, but not a place where I'm paying for a $50 meal," she said.
Ball said the blank "tip" line was not meant to trick customers into tipping twice. "It's a bit of a misconception because the point of sale system automatically adds that line to every single check," he said.
Hasson said she was also concerned that the Washington Duke does not automatically notify students of the added gratuity - a concern highlighted in a letter to The Chronicle from sophomore Dmitri Mirovitski and freshman Marisa Bossen.
"If Dmitri hadn't asked for a receipt, we never would have had any idea [there was an automatic 19 percent gratuity]," Bossen said. "It's pretty much unauthorized because we didn't have to sign anything and they don't even let you know what you're paying for."
Wulforst said the automatic gratuity is not part of students' dining contracts - as the inn's manager on duty told Mirovitski and Bossen - but was supposed to be made known to students through advertising.
Ball said he was not worried that business will drop off following last week's negative publicity.
"What's important to note is we have served literally thousands of meals on this program since its inception with little or no disappointment," he said. "While we accept responsibility for the mistakes that were made, I think by and large the majority have been very pleased with the program."
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