When Emily Bauer received a $2,000 tip as a server at a San Antonio restaurant last week, it seemed like it was too good to be true. That's because it was.
The ordeal started on November 28 when Bauer told a couple dining at Red Hook Seafood and Bar that service was slow because the restaurant was busy. The man at the table told her he understood since he previously owned restaurants.
The man canceled his table's orders and asked Bauer to bring him the check for whatever was delivered. He left the server the $2,000 tip on a $69 bill with "Merry Christmas! Keep working hard!" written on it, KENS 5 reported.
When Bauer tried to run the man's Visa credit card it was rejected. Restaurant managers tried running the card and even called their bank and had no luck charging the card.
It was first reported that the restaurant couldn't process the bill because the tip was larger than $500 so Bauer won't get a cent of the $2,000.
It wasn't the restaurant or Bauer's fault because the real problem was the credit card.
"So turns out that the guy who left me the tip, his credit card was fraud," Bauer wrote in an social media post shared by the restaurant.
The man called the restaurant to see if Bauer got the tip. When the restaurant told him no and that he could return to the store with another form of payment, he hung up and the restaurant was unable to get his contact info.
Not only did the customer skip out on the generous tip, but also his $69 bill.
Since the story first came out, Red Hook has been threatened and accused of withholding the $2,000 out of greed. Restaurant owner John Cheng decided to make good on the tip wrote Bauer a check for $2,069.
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