{"id":425076,"date":"2024-05-07T00:01:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-07T07:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/calmatters.org\/?p=425076"},"modified":"2024-05-06T16:15:30","modified_gmt":"2024-05-06T23:15:30","slug":"california-restaurants-ban-junk-fees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calmatters.org\/_es\/commentary\/2024\/05\/california-restaurants-ban-junk-fees\/","title":{"rendered":"Los restaurantes de California no deber\u00edan sorprenderse de que se les aplique la ley que proh\u00edbe las 'tarifas basura'"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last Friday,\u00a0a friend and I met at a chain restaurant in Sacramento for our customary weekly lunch. Both of us ordered $16 plates of Mexican food. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the bill came, it totaled a bit over $36, including taxes and a $1.28 \u201csurcharge.\u201d We gave the server $45 before leaving, assuming that the extra cash would cover her tip.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I mention the somewhat mysterious surcharge because, just a few days earlier, California Attorney General Rob Bonta\u2019s office declared that a nueva ley estatal<\/a> outlawing extraneous fees\u00a0attached to bills for services or goods also includes restaurants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSB 478 applies to restaurants, just like it applies to businesses across California,\u201d a Department of Justice spokesperson dijo al San Francisco Chronicle<\/a>. \u201cThe law is about making sure consumers know what they are going to pay and requires that the posted price include the full amount that a consumer must pay for that good or service.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was something of a shock to restaurateurs because when the bill was making its way through the Legislature last year, they inferred from the discussions that restaurants would be exempt<\/a>. That assumption meant that restaurants were not among the business groups opposing the measure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Chronicle’s reporting generated a sharp reaction from restaurant operators, many of whom have added fees to their bills to cover rising costs, particularly for wages, without raising their basic menu prices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt feels like the state lit the fuse to this bomb and is standing back to see what happens,\u201d Tim Stannard of Bacchus Management Group, which operates multiple Bay Area restaurants, told the newspaper. \u201cIt is terrifying. We can\u2019t pay the wages we\u2019re paying now unless we dramatically increase prices and hope guests actually come in and pay those prices.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\t\n\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\t\tLeer siguiente<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\tEconom\u00eda<\/a>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

Los legisladores intentan tomar medidas en\u00e9rgicas contra las tarifas ocultas<\/a><\/h3>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tby<\/span> Grace Gedye<\/a><\/span>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/article>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t<\/div>\n\t\n\n\n

On Monday, the Employment Policy Institute, a national organization that tracks minimum wages and other employment issues from a business standpoint, denounced Bonta\u2019s declaration<\/a>, saying it would exacerbate a decline already evident in California\u2019s restaurant industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cService charges have been increasingly common tools aimed at keeping restaurants afloat and able to pay the higher minimum wages, amid rapidly rising state and local minimum wage requirements,\u201d the organization said in a statement. \u201cSince the state began annual wage hikes up to $16.50 per hour starting in 2017, and localities raised wages even higher, California restaurants have suffered significant losses. Now this tool will be taken away from restaurants, causing further damage to the industry and its employees.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bonta and a coalition of consumer groups sponsored SB 478 after President Joe Biden vowed to eliminate what he calls \u201cjunk fees\u201d<\/a> that have proliferated in multiple industries. Two Democratic senators, Nancy Skinner<\/a> of Oakland and Bill Dodd<\/a> of Napa, carried the measure, which gained final approval last September and will take effect on July 1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBait-and-switch advertising to hide fees is a significant problem facing consumers that appears to be proliferating in more and more sectors of the economy\u201d the bill authors said while it was pending. \u201cHiding required fees is nothing more than a deceptive way of hiding the true price of a good or service.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Restaurants and other businesses could \u2013 and should \u2013 be upfront by posting prices that reflect what it costs them to operate. Some are arguing, instead, that to attract customers they must mislead them with lowball prices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s bait-and-switch and SB 478 rightly prohibits it. Parenthetically, the Legislature should practice what it preaches by reversing its recent tendency toward secretive<\/a>, hide-the-pea decision-making.<\/p>\n\n\n\t\n\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\t\tComentario<\/a>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

California alguna vez lider\u00f3 la transparencia gubernamental. Descendi\u00f3 al secreto y la opacidad.<\/a><\/h3>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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