A cafe owner has defended holiday surcharges after an outraged Aussie questioned why customers should be charged more money at the checkout.
Estelle Landy took to social media to express her anger about extra holiday charges after realising how much more she had to pay for a single meal.
‘Can anyone please explain why the f**k we pay a public holiday surcharge,’ Ms Landy said.
‘Like, why are we paying extra for businesses to pay staff, they could just not be open? I just paid $18 for a quarter-chicken and chips. It’s usually $14.’
Social media users were divided with many siding with Ms Landy while others defended cafes.
‘Because the business needs to pay their staff double what they usually would? This is like common sense I fear,’ said one.
‘As if the business isn’t profiting from the surcharge,’ another said.
‘Yeah ok, you pay a bit more in wages, but what about the additional funds collected throughout the day from the surcharge?’
Dan Dick, who owns three cafes in Melbourne, warned business owners would be forced to close their store if they didn’t tack on a surcharge
Dan Dick, who owns three cafes in Melbourne, warned business owners would be forced to close their store if they didn’t tack on a surcharge.
‘If businesses don’t deem it worth it financially to be open on those days, then they’re just going to close,’ he said.
‘So what are you going to do on a day off when nothing’s open because it’s not profitable to run?
‘I think everyone’s just got to understand that it’s the necessary cost of being able to visit your favourite venues on days that they’re essentially running at a loss.’
‘It’s also not up to the staff to determine the pricing model,’ Mr Dick added.
‘If anyone’s got any queries about the way we run our pricing, then please, by all means, have a conversation with me, the owner who makes the decisions, but staff in every store that offers these things aren’t making this decision.’
Mr Dick said his staff were entitled to double time and a day in lieu if they worked on public holidays.
‘It’s not feasible for businesses to absorb that,’ he told Yahoo Finance.
Ruby Rule says public holiday surcharges aren’t much help in covering the increased wages of her staff
Surcharges, typically between 10 to 15 per cent, are added to help businesses shoulder the cost of higher wages.
Mr Dick closes two of his three cafes on Christmas Day because it’s just not worth it.
He warned that if Aussies wanted to flout surcharges, they will find that nothing is open during their time off.
Ruby Rule, who owns three cafes in Queensland, recently revealed on social media that public holiday surcharges aren’t much help in covering the increased wages of her staff.
‘We brought in $4,705 and of that money and of that money $719 was a surcharge,’ she said after keeping her cafes open on one holiday.
‘Because of the public holiday the wages across my three venues came out at $3,500.’
On a regular day, the wages would have come out as $1,800, she added, which was about $1700 less than the public holiday.
‘That $700 extra we got in the public holiday surcharge doesn’t actually cover even the majority of the extra money we have to pay.
‘This is to show that business owners do not add the surcharge so they can make more money. It’s purely to try and offset some of that cost.’
