The Combatants!
- Alois Bell, a pastor at Truth in the World Deliverance Ministries Church. Uncharitable, vengeful, arrogant and cheap, she complained about an autotip of 18% added to her Applebee’s check that was triggered by the size of her group. The bill was small, but the group was large. Crossing out the tip amount and replacing it with nada, she scrawled, insufferably, on the bill, “I give 10% to God, why do you get 18?”, thus stiffing the waiter whom the party later said had rendered impeccable service. She also scrawled “pastor” by the bill amount, thus presuming a clergy discount that didn’t (and shouldn’t) exist. After a waitress colleague of the un-tipped waiter posted the bill on Reddit to inspire some well-earned web-shaming, Bell complained to Applebee’s management, successfully getting the waitress fired.
Verdict: Contemptible jerk. She abused her position to claim a discount that she wasn’t entitled to, and punished an innocent server by withholding a fair tip. [This may not be so; see UPDATE at the end] Then she set out to take vengeance on the young woman for exposing her despicable conduct. So much for showing the other cheek. Bell’s conduct was as far from the teachings of Christianity as one can get, at least at an Applebee’s.
- Chelsea Welch, the now ex-Applebee’s waitress. She posted the obnoxious bill and scrawled comments online, whereupon the pastor was identified by her handwriting, and perhaps her jerkish personality.
Verdict: Unethical conduct, though provoked. Her colleague was wronged by the cheap pastor, but she forgot she wasn’t free to do as an Applebee’s employee what she might choose to do as a private individual. Applebee’s can’t have its customers worrying about whether real or perceived slights to restaurant staff will land them on various websites to be mocked and vilified. Her actions were irresponsible and a violation of her duties as an employee, even though her anger was certainly justified. And her method of retribution was excessive and unethical too.
Clearly, the pastor is the villain here, although Applebee’s had no choice other than to fire Welch. What she did can’t be condoned or tolerated. Bell, however, is a disgrace. She told has been quoted as saying, “My heart is really broken, I’ve brought embarrassment to my church and ministry,” and that has been termed “an apology” by the site that broke the story, “The Smoking Gun.” That’s not an apology; she’s regretting the consequences of her actions. She owes a real apology to the original waiter (we don’t know his name) and to Welch, whom she vindictively got fired from her job. Welch, in that case, though she might choke on it, would owe an apology to Bell, who should be able to behave like an ass in Applebees without being made into a web-super villain by a waitress. Welch also ought to apologize to Applebee’s. In fact, there is a lot of repair work needed here:
…If I were Welch, I’d apologize to Applebee’s now, and Bell if she ever showed any genuine contrition in the matter. I wouldn’t hold my breath.
…If I were Bell, I’d apologize to Welch for getting her fired, and personally ask Applebee’s to give Welch another chance—and pay the original waiter at least the 18% tip he was owed in the first place. [ See UPDATE below]
...I were Applebee’s, I’d ban Bell from the restaurant for life. But I wouldn’t re-hire Welch. I would also spell out in my employees manual why web-shaming customers is a no-no. And it may owe Bell about 7 bucks.
…If I were in charge of the Truth in the World Deliverance Ministries Church, I’d consider getting rid of Bell and find someone who actually practices what she preaches.
And if I were The Smoking Gun, I’d look up what “apology” means.
UPDATE: Now it appears that the pastor left a tip in cash, and only complained about it on the slip. And that Applebee’s charged her credit card with the tip anyway, meaning that it owes her money. If true, this makes Bell far less of a villain, and also makes her complaint to the restaurant more justifiable. It also makes Welch’s conduct look reckless and unfair, further justifying her dismissal.
__________________________________
Pointer: Lianne Best
Sources: The Smoking Gun 1,Yahoo! 1, Yahoo 2
Graphic: The Smoking Gun 2,
Ethics Alarms 
My pastor gave a sermon about behavior like this about six months ago. Apparently, people have been making business cards to give out as a “tip” to the waitstaff at restaurants that tell them that God loves them. He felt he needed to give a sermon on it because he heard that people were giving these out INSTEAD of tips. He explained to them that if they wanted to leave those on the table, it should have a VERY GOOD MONETARY TIP as well or please don’t tell people that you are a Christian because you are giving us all a bad name.
Now, I will say that I am aggravated by the automatic 18% tip. That last time that was applied to my bill, I went to dinner with 9 other people at Santa Fe Steakhouse. They couldn’t seat us at 1 table and spread us out at 3 tables over the restaurant. The waitress complained throughout dinner that the manager wouldn’t let her go home even though she had a fever and felt awful. She coughed in our food all night. The food was cold, the service was horrifying (but my wife’s friend wanted to go there for her birthday). They then added an 18% gratuity because we were a “large” group. I complained that we might have wanted to be a large group, but we were now 3 small groups by their doing. I demanded to speak to a manager and was refused. I went to the bar and demanded to speak to a manager and they refused and they threatened to call the police if the full bill with 18% gratuity wasn’t paid. With six employees of the restaurant now threatening to have me arrested if I didn’t pay the full amount, I realized that I was in a no-win situation and I paid it. I wonder what would have happened if I had written something rash on the receipt, left cash, and walked out? Would I have been on TSG?
Oh, and I called Santa Fe Steakhouse’s corporate office to complain and all I got was the “We are sorry but we aim to please, I’m sure the service will be better next time.”
I think that Pastor Bell should get fired the same way she got the waitress fired for her “lapse in judgement”. After all…..”Do unto others as you would have done unto you.” Therefore, Pastor Bell should get fired for her lapse since she not only had one lapse in judgement but two !!! First she failed to tip the staff….then when she was called out on it became vengeful and tried to get ALL of the staff fired. Where is the charity there. Stop hiding behind religion and take the consequences for your actions !!!!
But it’s not “Get done unto you what you did to others”, you know.
That is technically a corruption of “do unto others as you would have done unto you” into “do to someone as that someone did to another”…that’s not Golden Rule, that’s revenge.
Not quite the same thing. The waitress didn’t get fired because the Pastor didn’t tip. The waitress got fired because she publicized the act and trashed the Pastor essentially as a representative of Applebees.
Jack laid it out properly that the only way the Pastor can truly make amends is by a sincere apology to the waitress, paying the tip owed, and bending over backwards to convince Applebee’s to re-hire the former waitress.
She can’t be fired really because the church she is pastor of is HER church. There are 15 members in total. So technically the 10% she gives to “God” is really to herself, and a tax writeoff.
Yeah, I guessed that might be the case. Of course, her congregation could walk, leaving her with a church of one, a very cheap, very un-Christian pastor.
What if the waitress had redacted the name of the pastor?
Does it really matter? Are you going to go back in time and change it all if it does? What is done is done, all parties need to learn something from it and move on.
It might make a difference for the next waiter or waitress (is waitron still a word anyone uses? I heard it was a gender-neutral word for that, but I’ve only heard it a few years ago) who wants to illuminate bad behavior without necessarily causing that person harm.
It is still theft of a private document from the restaurant and from the customer.
Is it not theft to refuse to pay part of your bill? I believe when customers can’t, or won’t, pay bills at restaurants the police are called and the customers are charged with theft.
Why do we condemn people for standing up against abuse? If you have to step outside of the current rules in order to do so, you’re doing what’s good and right.
As demonstrated tips are not legally part of a bill regardless of how ‘mandatory’ the restaurant makes them. So no, not paying a tip does not equate to theft.
It does equate to ingratitude.
But let’s stipulate that is is theft:
The waitress’s action (being actual theft) is a tit for tat response, behaving outside her authority to rectify a ‘crime’ by committing a crime. Had it been theft, the restaurant would have been legally right to sue the customer, then the customer could counter-sue the restaurant for public defamation.
See how messy things get when a person behaves outside authority?
But not paying a tip isn’t a crime, it is just assholery. So the waitress’s behavior is completely unjustifiable and completely outside authority.
First mention yet that this was vengeance, or tit-for-tat. I intentionally didn’t mention that, (though I gave a big hint in the title) and over a hundred comments later, you’re the first one to mention it. to which I say,
“ARRGGGGGGHHHH!!!!”
I thought it was understood and glaringly obvious, not needing a mention. I hadn’t expected so many people to actually think the waitress behaved properly.
This really ties into my comment from another post where I mention Americans in general no longer think rationally, but think emotionally.
You betcha. Depressing, isn’t it?
Your Welch became Wright. Freudian slip that.
Wright. We’ve beaten this one to death, I think.
The actions of Alois Bell in this matter go way beyond being impolite. She calls herself a Christain. No Christian with the proper moral compass would have done what she did. This sactamoniuos individual should be barred from interaction with people for life.
Ms. Bell attempted to inflict pain with the written word and then cried fowel when the tables were turned upon her. It sound like she received exactly what she deserved.
John C.
San Ramon, CA
And pastors like this is why I find born again Christians to be a bunch of jackasses.
There are people with bad behavior sprinkled into every category – every religion, every career, every race… this pastor’s behavior doesn’t represent Christianity in any way – but people are imperfect, Bill. So, whether this offends you or not, that’s why we all need Jesus!
Yes, because one pastor is immediately expanded to be plural and therefore in your eye a blanket condemnation of ‘born again’ Christians.
This is just bigotry on your part.
I’m certain a proportional amount of atheist leaders, buddhist leaders, muslim leaders, jewish leaders, alcoholic anonymous leaders, leaders of democrat party, leaders of the republican party, leaders of chess clubs, leaders of the local book clubs, union leaders, leaders of the military, leaders of basketball teams and various other group leaders also stiff people on tips.
Guess that means adherents to those groups are all ‘jack-asses’ also.
Or is it just that Christianity enshrines concepts of charity in its ethos and Christianity is the in thing to bash these days?
It’s those Christians who are deniers of being born again who are irredeemable Eeyores. (Seriously, that “pastor” needs to go into lay status.)
How about “hide” status?
I was looking at “lay” as a need, while “hide” is an “ought.”
Imagine if people assumed all Muslims to be terrorists because of the acts of Mohammed Atta.
Bill some people who claim to be Christians are not. This is not how a real Christian acts.
Mohammed Atta was not a real Muslim then, since real Muslims do not fly airplanes into skyscrapers.
No true Scotsman fallacy.
The reason Christianity is an easy target is it makes a solid claim that people ought to live lives according to a certain ‘code’. That ‘code’ isn’t easy and so you find most Christians don’t measure up to their own standards, while inside the same ‘code’ is claimed to already have an out if you can’t live up to the code, but that you ought to anyway… this mystery is an easy (and currently in vogue) thing to target.
You do realize that this is tgt’s favorite fallacy to call people on, giving more credence to my theory that you and tgt are really one and the same, and like debating with yourself.
Well now that’s just Confirmation Bias on your part!
I’ve said it once, whereas I do not know how many times TGT has invoked it.
Now, I will continue with a 1000 word exposition on your misuse of the word “credence” according to the 5th definition down in the Merriam Webster blah blah blah….
I thought his most favorite was accusing people of “Strawmen” followed closely by accusations of “Begging the Question”.
Begging the question is a close second. I’m still not convinced…
Well, I donno how to convince you otherwise.
But if he is me, he must have dashing good looks.
Jack, I think Wright needs to apologize whether Bell shows any contrition or not. If I realize that I have done something wrong, my apology ought not to be conditional on whether the other party came to the same conclusion, and acted on it. If Bell can’t practice what she preaches, then she is indeed a sorry excuse for a pastor, but that’s all the more reason for Wright to do the correct thing, and set an example.
I saw the Yahoo piece about the note Ms. Bell wrote on her receipt, her embarrassment over the publicity she received, and the subsequent termination of Chelsea Welch. Let’s be honest about what happened: Ms. Bell acted in an unbecoming and unsavory manner. She was embarrassed by the press that she received and took it out on another person. Chelsea Welch may have made Ms. Bell’s actions known to everyone who reads the Yahoo homepage but Chelsea Welch had nothing to do with Ms. Bell’s embarrassment over Ms. Bell’s own actions.
A Pastor should live what they preach. Ms. Bell had the opportunity to exercise humility in the face of her “lapse of judgment” and show the church and the world that being a Christian is a constant test of one’s own humanity and who you are in the face of your humanity says a lot about who you are as a Christian.
She really is a very poor representative of your church, the Christian spirit, and God. Servers are paid minimum wage for a job that is very stressful and physically demanding. I am appalled the behavior she displayed when she wrote the note, and by her action of complaining to the restaurant chain; resulting in the termination of a person’s employment.
I am not typically one to advocate an eye for an eye but in this case I think the proper response from your church would be to terminate Ms. Bell. At a minimum, Ms. Bell should retract her complaint to Applebee’s, apologize to the woman who was fired, and request that Applebee’s re-hire Chelsea Welch.
Amen
Is it Wright or is it Welch? Or perhaps she has a Wright to be Welched?
Yes, I welched on my duty to get her name wright, which was Welch, not Wright, and thus it wasn’t wright to say Wright when the wright name to say was Welch, not Wright. Wright?
First, just a head’s up- you wrote Welch, and then identified the server’s last name as Wright. I disagree, I think this is a wake up call that you CANNOT have an expectation that you can have bad behavior and that it is not going to get seen, at whatever level. The pastor’s actions, not the people people’s response, are what has made her a web “super villain”. Your logic behind your ethics is that we should save someone from their own consequences. Not so. Especially not in this case- as the pastor has clearly made a choice to sign as “pastor” on the receipt, and with this role comes the intrinsic responsibility of not only ethical behavior, but also serving as a public figure in the community. It just so happens, nowadays, community has expanded to include a (few million?) outraged web-based members.
Thanks, Anne…i just wrote a mea culpa, I have no idea why I mixed the names, but it’s fixed.
It has nothing to do with the pastor. The duty of the waitress was to her employer, not to be a vigilante jerk-exposer. In no business anywhere can you embarrass a customer or client and expect to keep your job. Never.
And how is it different from that ethics hero Michael Garcia?
I was waiting for that! The key is that the customer in the Gracia case was abusing another customer, and a child (we established that if the family had not witnessed or was no aware of the comments, then Garcia should have been fired too). Stiffing a server just isn’t provocation, from the establishment’s view, to do anything. Also the internet is millions of people, and vast negative exposure to Applebee’s
Dang it. One minute ahead.
HA! Beat you on that one!
And your terminology is way better. For some reason I couldn’t think of something other than aggressor and invented “aggressed”
The Michael Garcia ‘adjudication’ was loosely although questionably an interdiction between an aggressing customer and an ‘aggressed’ customer (although this was demonstrated not to have occurred, that is how Garcia interpreted it)
The Chelsea Welch ‘adjudication’ was based on an interaction between the customer and a representative of the company (te waitress herself).
I think Bell’s congregation should contemplate if she is the type of spiritual leader they want to follow.
Please check the facts of your story. The waitress fired “Chelsea” was NOT the waitress who served the Pastor. She was a co-worker of the male server who received the receipt. Chelsea took a picture of the receipt and posted it as a joke. She was subsequently fired. The Pastor (Alois Bell) needs to be ashamed of herself, not only for her remarks on the receipt, but also for her request that all parties involved be fired. Shame on her.
Thanks, you’re welch…I mean right. I fixed it.
I find that Applebees’s could have dealt with this situation in a more proffessional manner. By firing this employee it will have great repercussion’s for their company than they think. This petty thing has gone viral and will impact the company in a serious way. I personally will never eat at an Applebee’s ever again and hope many others will do the same. For the employee that was fired you will find a better more professional company to work for that will stand behind their employees rather than fire them because of someone absuing their assumed position as a clergy for the church.
Thanks
Would you feel the same way if the waiter who was stiffed yelled at the customer or called her an asshole? I don’t see any difference. You can’t do something negative to the customer of an establishment you work for and expect to stay employed.
Applebee’s didn’t fire Welch because someone abused their clergy status.
Applebee’s fired Welch because Welch smeared a customer’s name on the internet essentially as a representative of the company.
Just saw this blog because of the Pastor v. Waitress and I love it! That said, I think the Wright owes an apology to Applebees but not to the pastor. If you poke the bear you have to be willing hear the roar. Also I much prefer to live in a world where such egregious bad behavior of a person who claims themselves a religious leader not be swept under the rug. If an apology be owed to the pastor it may be for electronically sharing her signature…but not sharing the note itself.
The problem is that Applebee’s is harmed by the publicity and subsequent cutsomer relations, and this is something an employee must never do. I bet any restaurant would fire her.
I checked the “church” and was not surprised. It was exactly what I was expecting.
“Do what I tell you, but don’t do what I do”. In other words: A bunch of hypocrites using the name of who gave not 18%, but His life, to save someone like this “pastor”.
God have mercy!!!!!!
Sorry, everyone, for the Welch/Wright brain fart. I have no idea why Chelsea morphed from Welch, her real name, to “Wright” mid-paragraph. I must have met someone named Chelsea Wright once. It’s fixed now. Sorry for the confusion.
Applebee’s did the best action for the situation, Welch should’ve been fired.
Welch should not apologize because 1. Welch isn’t sorry, 2. Welch won’t get their job back either way, 3. Subjectively, Bell doesn’t deserve an apology. Welch should apologize to Applebee’s but who cares.
Bell should (technically) apologize for obvious reasons to the waiter, to Welch, to Applebee’s, and to her congregation. Bell shouldn’t apologize because there is no point in pretending a faux apology will make a difference! Let’s not further fill the world with [brown piles that come from cows] from a pastor who doesn’t practice what she preaches!
Time for a nacho summit. Server asks forgiveness and gives apology. Compassionate, embarrassed, Christian minister graciously accepts apology, asks for forgiveness for being insensitive to all hardworking servers. Hugs. Applebees brings the two together with free food. Rehires worker. Workers organize unions in the food industry to negate this kind of powerlessness. All happy as respected, empowered people and not victims. Creation is happy. Good karma circulates easily.
Additional note on the malice of the Pastor:
The pastor’s 10% she gives to God is 10% of her paycheck, whilst the 18% she gives to the waitress is 18% of the bill… Clearly a paltry sum compared to the allotment from a paycheck. So which ought to be complained about?
Several menus I’ve seen and several waiters I’ve had have always indicated from the initiation of sevice that large groups will get the tip automatically billed, that it is part of the company’s “payment terms”.
I can’t be sure if Applebee’s does or not, but imagine it does. The pastor’s group and the pastor herself should have known that the bill would automatically include a tip line-item.
It is a stretch or maybe it isn’t. But this parallels a verbal contract in which the menu is a list of goods and services provided and the menu and waitress clarify terms of payment (which would include the group tip policy).
It could be argued, again on a stretch, depending on te waitress’s level of authority, that the waitress was not authorized to modify the contract on behalf of Applebee’s and that the pastor (as a member of the verbal contract) was in breach of the terms of payment. She could’ve brought a manager over to interact with the pastor at that point.
So not only was the pastor just being spiteful, she was also violating terms and conditions she agreed to when she placed an order of food.
Shame on Applebees! what ever happened to your constitutional right of freedom of speech. those clergy members have no right to hide from their obligation. i will never go to Applebees again. may both the management and the pastor burn in Hell!
Uh no. You may have freedom of speech, but Applebee’s also has a right to protect its image. The waitress’s freedoms were not abridged, but she certainly learned the effects of irresponsible use of that freedom in the marketplace.
1) Applebee’s was absolutely proper in its handling of Welch. As I said, I think it should ban the pastor.
2. Freedom of Speech is fine. It never has applied to non-government entities. Employees in private companies don’t have a right to free speech as far as their work is concerned. Why is this so hard a concept to grasp?
Tex and Jack, you two had a tie, this time, above. Good prompt replies, both!
Chelsea didn’t disclose the customer’s name, did she?
She just posted the upper part of the receipt.
The only people who would have recognized the customer were the customer herself, Reverend Bell, and anyone in her party to whom Bell bellyached about the tip policy.
The part of the receipt that showed Bell’s name seems to have sprung up later. And I agree it should never have.
Apparently others recognized Bell’s handwriting and, I’m guessing, her characteristic jerk quotient.