For the answer to this one, we turned to our favorite Las Vegas cocktail waitress, the inimitable Cocktail Dollie, a veteran of the trade and a goldmine of useful information (and candid observations). Dollie says:
The only reason for this is to prevent stealing. A bartender is supposed to give and tear a receipt for every transaction. If a receipt isn't torn, an employee (possibly the same bartender) could save the receipts until a customer requests one. In the meantime, he could just keep pretending to ring up drinks and pocket the money. I won't go into the details of how this can be done ... but it's very easy, in any system.
However, just because a bartender doesn't give a receipt doesn't necessarily mean he's stealing. It could mean he's just lazy, or he forgot, or it's really busy and he rings everything up on one receipt. These are all bad reasons for not giving you a receipt and are against policy, but it doesn't automatically equate with a thieving bartender. Also, the tearing thing is usually the rule, but not every bartender does it.
For a cocktail waitress's take on Las Vegas, life, and how to treat your cocktail waitress, visit Dollie's new blog (which also has links to her old website, which has all kinds of cool stuff on it). Warning: Dollie doesn't mince her words, so don't visit if you’re easily offended or have no sense of humor.
