Toast Tipping Suggestions are One Thing but Charging Customers to Use Their Service is a Tipping Point

 

The original thesis of technology use in restaurants was to save restaurant employees time thus saving the restaurant money. When Toast came along with it, was a ‘automatic’ tipping charge added to the bill in most cases it started 18 percent.  For those of us in the industry we thought nothing of it as most of us tip well above that as a professional courtesy.

The team at Foodservice Solutions® consists like most companies of workers in their 20’s, 30’s, 40’s, and some as old as our Grocerant Guru® who has worked in the industry as long as the other have been on earth. All however thought the minimum was a bit high for beginning workers buying a fast-food meal.

Steven Johnson Foodservice Solutions® senior expert contends that Toast is near a tipping point where the cost of the service becomes a greater annoyance than benefit for the retail outlet or the consumer.

In case you did not know, Toast is adding a new consumer-facing $0.99-cent surcharge to all online orders, without giving restaurants the option to opt out of the new fee, in an unpopular move that has caused restaurant operators to post letters and tweets of protest on social media. The Boston Globe, reported that the fee will be added to all online orders over $10 and will be beta-tested with a small group of restaurants before being rolled out nationwide on July 10.

Now according to a mockup of Toast’s interface, the .99-cent fee will not show up separately and will be instead part of a combined line called “taxes & fees” that already regularly shows up when customers place online orders. Unless consumers expand the “taxes and fees” subsection, they won’t see the new “order processing fee,” which, according to Toast, is intended to “help fund product investments” like SEO menus, customization, and chargeback coverage.

However, if President Biden passes what has become known as the Junk Fee Protection Act, hidden fees like this one from Toast or others from ticket-selling websites could be under fire. NOTE: The team at Foodservice Solutions® that includes all workers of all ages support the JUNK FEE PROTECTION ACT.

Talk about double talk, here is want they are quoted as saying about the new fee; “As we innovate, we remain committed to keeping restaurant digital ordering costs low and protecting restaurant bottom lines from third-party commission fees,”]. “We also take any changes to our pricing model at Toast very seriously. That is why to help fund ongoing innovation in restaurant technology, we are updating our pricing model to add a nominal $0.99 fee paid by guests on orders $10 and over on Toast online ordering channels. This change helps fund product investments and continued innovation in support of helping restaurants maintain the direct relationship with their guests.”

Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing ideas look more like yesterday than tomorrow? Interested in learning how our Grocerant Guru® can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation, and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit: us on our social media sites by clicking one of the following links: Facebook,  LinkedIn, or Twitter