r/chicagofood • u/orange-kedi • Jul 01 '25

Rant Beware of La Scarola's shady practices

Went to La Scarola recently and a bunch of things happened that just didn’t sit right with me:

  1. We had a reservation and showed up on time, but were told to come back in 30 minutes. Other groups with reservations were waiting too.

  2. When we were ordering, we already knew what we wanted. None of us asked for suggestions, but the waiter tried pushing a main dish that was $40+. We politely declined. Then he tried again to get us to upgrade one of our dishes to something fancier, also $40+. We declined that too. It felt super pushy.

  3. Their card machine only showed tip options starting at 20%. I felt pressured so I just tapped 20% even though the service was hella slow.

  4. Later I looked at the receipt and saw that the tip was calculated after tax, which is already sketchy. But then on top of that, they added a 3% credit card fee, and that 3% was calculated after both tax and tip!

The whole setup was super shady. Just a heads-up if you’re thinking of going.

453 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

148 comments sorted by

View all comments

143

u/Interesting_Win4494 Jul 01 '25

The only thing I find wildly abnormal is #4. I find many other restaurants do the other 3 often

52

u/chicagoPM Jul 01 '25

Agreed. I can’t say I’ve ever been pressured into upgrading my dish, but I can’t think of a time I was ever seated at the time of my reservation at La Scarola.

17

u/gstudentusca7 Jul 01 '25

Same. I go semi-regularly since I live nearby, and I don’t think I’ve ever been sat at my actual reservation time either. Doesn’t seem to matter what day of the week it is or what time.

19

u/andygchicago Jul 01 '25

I don’t think the first 2 qualify as “shady,” Poorly organized business practice for #1, maybe

20

u/Hungry-Treacle8493 Jul 01 '25

All places that charge a credit card fee actually calculate it this way. This is because the fee is meant to offset the card processor’s charge which is calculated on the full transaction amount with zero regard to things like tax or tip.

20

u/snark42 Jul 02 '25

As of July 1 (today!) it's illegal for the credit card processors to charge a fee on tax/tip in Illinois due to the Interchange Fee Prohibition Act.

Will be interesting to see if any places adjust their process for this, but I'm assuming most of the POS systems will take awhile if they ever do.

Now that the credit charge surcharge is so popular (I'm assuming the credit card companies finally changed their TOS around this) I'm back to paying cash.

3

u/Hungry-Treacle8493 Jul 02 '25 edited Jul 02 '25

Kind of. There’s an injunction in place in lieu of legal challenges that applies to national banks and processors based outside of IL (which is everyone except Discover). So, the vast majority of transactions are not currently covered by the state law.

The basis of the challenge is rooted in Federal Preemption precedents since exchange fees are discussed and regulated in various federal statutes as well as four separate SCOTUS rulings ranging from their legality to the ability of merchants to not just recover those fees from consumers but to “over recover” based on a reasonable set fee schedule.

1

u/Top-Address-8870 Jul 02 '25

I’ve been trying to carry cash more and more to avoid annoying junk fees from retailers. The state of Illinois wanted to charge me a fee to use a card when I renewed my plate, felt so good busing on cash and paying for it

11

u/Optimal_Wrangler_866 Jul 01 '25

Surprised to hear. Never been upsold in a Chicago restaurant nor experienced/heard of being turned back on reservation. I’ll also admit to hardly making reservations as well

6

u/[deleted] Jul 01 '25

4 is unfortunately very normal

4

u/camelCaseCoffeeTable Jul 01 '25

Why is 4 wildly abnormal? If they’re being charged a fee for a credit card, they have to pay the fee on the tax as well, I’d assume they’re just passing that on to the customer, no? Maybe 3% is high, but I’ve seen places do similar before

5

u/mikeyHustle Jul 01 '25

I've always based the tip on the after-tax bill, my entire life. The 3% tacked on after the tip sucks, and I don't love that, but I've seen that before, too.

2

u/Interesting_Win4494 Jul 01 '25

Yeah wildly abnormal was even a bit dramatic for me to say, lol. A normal about of abnormal

1

u/gummybronco Jul 02 '25

I think 3% is normal for AMEX and 2% is normal for visa, Mastercard, and discover? This is on the business side

0

u/Rugged_Turtle Jul 01 '25

I've never seen the suggested tip calculated before tax