The United States Department of Labor is leading a lawsuit against two noteworthy Houston area restaurants, alleging they unlawfully restricted tips belonging to employees.
The Department of Labor filed a lawsuit on July 19 against Tejas Chocolate & Barbecue, Tejas Burger Joint and the owner of the restaurants, Scott Moore, after a year-long Wage and Hour Division investigation.
The investigation found that the restaurant employees allegedly participated in a mandatory, non-traditional tip pool. Between 2021 and 2023, the restaurants only paid a portion of the collected tips to employees and kept the remaining tips to pay for business expenses, “such as condiments and to-go packaging,” according to court documents.
The allegations put the restaurants in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act, stating tips are the property of the employees who earn them, according to the Department of Labor.
The department lawsuit is seeking back wages and an equal amount of lost tips in liquidated damages for current and former employees of the restaurants.
“The owner and operator of Tejas Chocolate & Barbecue and Tejas Burger Joint willfully deprived employees of all their hard-earned tips and used their money to illegally benefit their business,” Betty Campbell, a Dallas-based regional wage and hour administrator said in a statement.
“When it comes to workers’ tips, the law is crystal clear: tips are the property of the workers who earn them,” she said.
On Thursday, court documents did not list a defense attorney for Tejas Chocolate LLC, Tejas Dragon Companies LLC and Moore.
Moore, who could not be reached for comment on Thursday, said in a social media post that the restaurants do not have waiters on staff, and do not have an employee working on a tip credit basis.
“Our lowest hourly rate, by far, exceeds minimum wage,” Moore wrote.
“When the day comes that I can freely tell our story I will tell it loudly,” he wrote.
Tejas Chocolate LLC was founded in 2011 and operates restaurants in the north Houston area.
“The operator of these businesses directly violated the law, denying employees all the tips left by their customers to recognize their good service,” John Rainwater, regional solicitor of labor said in a statement.
