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🇺🇸 United States · HR & staff

Tip Pooling Policy + Tip Credit Notice

Restaurant tip pool distribution policy plus the FLSA §3(m) tip-credit notice required before an employer may claim a tip credit toward minimum wage.

All templates
Country
🇺🇸 United States
Category
HR & staff
Language of the text
EN
Version
1

⚠️ This is a blank template, not legal advice: check the wording with a lawyer and adapt it to your jurisdiction and your case.

Document

TIP POOLING POLICY AND TIP CREDIT NOTICE Establishment name — effective Policy effective date

PART A — TIP POOLING POLICY

1. PARTICIPATION 1.1. The tip pool includes the following roles: Tip pool participants. 1.2. Distribution formula: Distribution formula. 1.3. Pooled tips are distributed with each paycheck (Pay frequency) and are reported as wages on the employee's pay statement.

2. PROHIBITION ON MANAGER AND OWNER PARTICIPATION 2.1. Under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, § 3(m), managers, supervisors, and owners may never keep any portion of employee tips or participate in a tip pool, even if they perform some tipped duties. Violations may result in repayment of tips plus liquidated damages and civil money penalties. 2.2. Where a tip credit is NOT taken, the tip pool may include back-of-house employees (e.g. cooks, dishwashers). Where a tip credit IS taken, the pool is limited to employees who customarily and regularly receive tips.

PART B — TIP CREDIT NOTICE (FLSA § 3(m)(2)(A))

3. NOTICE 3.1. Tip credit taken by employer: Tip credit taken?. 3.2. If a tip credit is taken: the cash wage paid directly by Establishment name is Cash wage paid to tipped employees per hour; the additional amount claimed as a tip credit toward minimum wage is Tip credit amount claimed per hour. The tip credit claimed may not exceed the amount of tips actually received. 3.3. All tips received by an employee are the property of that employee, except for a valid tip pool described above. The employee has the right to retain all tips received, subject only to that valid pooling arrangement. 3.4. This notice must be provided before a tip credit is taken; providing it orally is legally sufficient but a signed written notice is the only reliably provable form in a wage dispute. 3.5. ⚠️ Minimum cash wage and tip-credit eligibility vary significantly by state; several states (including California, Washington, Oregon, Minnesota, Montana, Alaska, and Nevada) do not permit a tip credit at all. Verify current requirements for the Establishment name state before relying on this notice.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT I, Employee name (for notice acknowledgment), acknowledge that I have received and understand this Tip Pooling Policy and Tip Credit Notice.

Employee signature ______________ / Employee name (for notice acknowledgment) / Date: Acknowledgment date

— — — ⚠️ This is a boilerplate template, not legal advice. Employment, consumer-protection, and business law in the United States vary significantly by state (and sometimes by city) — have this document reviewed and adapted by a licensed attorney in your state before use. Official government forms (Form I-9, Form W-4, Form W-9, Form 1099-NEC, etc.) are not included here and must be obtained directly from the IRS/USCIS in their official, unmodified form.

Fields of the document

Fields that belong to a switched-off clause are dimmed — they are not asked for.

  • Establishment nametextrequiredautomatic
  • Policy effective datedaterequired
  • Tip credit taken?choicerequired

    Tip credit is prohibited entirely in several states (CA, WA, OR, MN, MT, AK, NV, and others) — select "No" in those states

  • Cash wage paid to tipped employeesamountrequired

    Federal minimum is $2.13/hour if a tip credit is taken; must equal the full state minimum wage where tip credit is not allowed

  • Tip credit amount claimedamountoptional

    Difference between the cash wage and the full applicable minimum wage

  • Tip pool participantslong textrequired

    Roles included — if a tip credit is taken, limited to employees who customarily and regularly receive tips

  • Distribution formulalong textrequired
  • Pay frequencychoicerequired
  • Employee name (for notice acknowledgment)textrequiredautomatic
  • Acknowledgment datedaterequired

In Cenaly this template fills itself in

2 of 10 fields are taken from the company, employee or counterparty record, the questionnaire can be dictated to the AI, and the finished document comes with a number, a PDF and an acknowledgement record.