FOR RESTAURANT & BAR OWNERS RUNNING A MANDATORY TIP POOL

A tip pool has two federal rules, not one.

Managers and supervisors can never receive tip-pool money — that rule does not care whether you take a tip credit. Back-of-house staff can only be pooled if you take no tip credit at all. On the roster loaded below, a shift manager and the dishwashers are both in the pool while a tip credit is taken, which puts $4,710.40 of back wages at risk over four weeks.

Put your own roster and your own wages in. Everything runs in this browser; nothing is uploaded.

This calculator vs. deciding tip-pool eligibility in a staff meeting — the rule a verbal policy is most likely to get backwards.

Can managers be in a tip pool? — the flat 2018 federal prohibition, on its own, and the myth that breaks it most often.

Your tip credit

Unchecked means you pay full minimum wage or more in cash to every tipped role — several states (CA, NV, WA, OR, MT, AK, MN, and others) require this regardless of what you'd prefer.

The federal maximum tip credit is $5.12/hour (full minimum wage $7.25 minus the federal tipped cash wage floor $2.13). This tool ships no wage table — enter what your own pay stubs actually reflect.

Roster

One row per role. Category decides eligibility: front-of-house is always eligible, back-of-house only with no tip credit taken, and a manager or supervisor is never eligible. Leave a row's name blank to skip it.

Role Category In pool? Hrs/wk Headcount

This roster is saved automatically to this browser, so it is still here on your next visit — "Clear the example" erases both the fields and the saved copy. "Copy a link" puts every field into the URL after the #, which is never sent to a server or logged anywhere.

Role by role

Role Category In pool? Eligible?

Press "Check the pool" and every role fills in.

Back-wage exposure if this pool is found non-compliant

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Press "Check the pool" to see the split.

Common questions

Can I ever put a manager or shift lead in the tip pool?

No, never, regardless of whether you take a tip credit. Congress amended the FLSA in 2018 (Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018, amending 29 U.S.C. 203(m)) to say an employer may not keep tips received by its employees for any purpose, including allowing managers or supervisors to keep any portion of them. That rule does not bend for a manager who also waits tables during a rush — if their job is classified as a manager or supervisor, tip-pool money reaching them is a violation on its own, separate from the back-of-house rule below.

Can dishwashers or cooks be in the tip pool?

Only if you take no tip credit at all — pay the full minimum wage in cash to your tipped staff. The Department of Labor's 2021 rule (29 CFR 531.54) calls this a nontraditional tip pool, and it is the one case federal law allows back-of-house staff to share in tips. The moment you take a tip credit, the older, narrower rule applies: the pool is limited to employees who customarily and regularly receive tips — front-of-house only.

What happens if my tip pool does not comply?

If you take a tip credit and the pool is later found invalid, DOL and the courts that have ruled on this treat the tip credit as forfeited for every front-of-house employee it was taken against, for the whole period the pool ran — not just for the employee wrongly included. On the worked example below, 230 hours a week of front-of-house time at a $5.12 tip credit is $1,177.60 a week, and $4,710.40 across the four weeks entered. That is back wages owed, and liquidated damages can double it.

What counts as a tip credit?

The gap between the full minimum wage and the lower cash wage you actually pay a tipped employee, which federal law lets you close with the tips they keep — up to $5.12 an hour under the federal floor. Several states (California, Nevada, Washington, Oregon, Montana, Alaska, Minnesota, and others) do not allow a tip credit at all, so if your state is one of those, the tip credit taken is $0 and back-of-house staff can be pooled regardless of what this calculator's federal-only exposure figure shows. This calculator ships no rate table — enter the tip credit your own pay stubs actually reflect.

Is any of this uploaded?

No. There is no account and the page makes no network requests — it runs entirely in your browser. Your roster, wages, and the figures worked out from them are never sent anywhere and never appear in a usage count. The optional counter records only which features were used and the day, stored on your own device, and it switches itself off for browsers sending Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control.

Can I save this roster or send it to someone else?

Yes. Your roster is saved to this browser automatically, so it is still here on your next visit. The copy-link button puts the same figures into the page's own address after the #, which is never sent to a server or logged anywhere, so sending it to a manager or bookkeeper uploads nothing.

Is this legal advice?

No. It is arithmetic and a rule lookup against the roster you type, using the federal FLSA rule as of the Department of Labor's 2021 final rule. It does not check state law — several states set stricter tip-pooling or tip-credit rules of their own — and it makes no determination about your specific restaurant's classification of any role. Verify every role's classification and every figure against DOL Fact Sheet #15, your state's wage-hour agency, and a qualified employment attorney before you rely on it.