Solution to tip controversy near

The intense campaign that the United Federation of Food Workers of Nicaragua (FUTATSCON), an IUF affiliate, has been conducting to maintain the 10-percent “voluntary tip” in hotel, restaurant and related establishment bills seems to have had a positive impact on both government and private business authorities.

In this sense, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega’s decision last October 5 to release a communication calling on government bodies and the general public to “postpone the application of the provisions concerning tips and the listing of prices in dollars in menus until publication of the Regulation for Law 842,” takes on significant weight.
 
At the same time, the parties involved are busy working towards a swift tripartite consensus on the text that will regulate tips, allowing workers to continue enjoying what represents a key and essential part of their wages.

“The pressure we have put on the issue of voluntary tipping is yielding its first results, and we congratulate President Ortega for his decision and for having closely followed the debate underway in the country,” Marcial Cabrera, FUTATSCON general secretary, said.

The union leader emphasized the need to guarantee a right gained by the sector’s workers several decades ago, while at the same time underlining that it is urgent that tips be either managed or controlled by workers themselves and not by establishment owners.

These demands were unanimously approved and ratified by FUTATSCON‘s Fourth Extraordinary Congress held in Managua on September 29.

“Many hotel and restaurant owners have been managing tip pools arbitrarily and at their own discretion, substantially reducing the amount of money that workers receive,” Cabrera explained.

Within the coming days, the general secretary of FUTATSCON expects all three parties to have completed and approved the text of the Regulation of Law No. 842, which will directly benefit over 30,000 workers in the sector.