Deposits, Payment Methods and Horror Stories with Chef Matt Collins

This week I speak with chef Matt Collins about payment methods and deposits, with a side or horror stories. Whether you work in the food industry or not, if you receive payment for your services, you won't want to miss this.

We cover various options for payment methods, including cash, check, Venmo, Zelle, Paypal and Square. We talk deposits: when to request them and how much to ask for. Additionally, we discuss fees and gratuity. Tune in to gain valuable insights and practical tips on handling payments.

MATT COLLINS

Matt Collins on Instagram
Chef Collins Events - Private Dinners

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Transcript

Unknown: 0:00

Today I'm talking to posits payment methods and horror stories with Chef Matt Collins, whether you're someone who works in the food business or not, if you take money for your services, stick around, because you're gonna want to hear this. I'm Chris spear. And you're listening to Chefs Without Restaurants, the show where I speak with culinary entrepreneurs and people working in the food and beverage industry outside of a traditional restaurant setting. As most of you know, I work as a personal chef. For my business. I currently accept cash check Zell Venmo, and sometimes PayPal as a payment method. This weekend, I had an issue with a customer payment through Zell that's already been on the show twice, you might have heard him before. He's someone I talked to frequently, often bouncing ideas and thoughts off of him. When I had this issue, I sent Matt a message joking that we should do a show about it. I know he's had issues with Venmo and checks. So we thought, why not talk about it. When I started this podcast, it was because I wanted to bring real value to those who are new business owners, or maybe looking to start one. This is a topic that I see come up a lot in personal chef forums, and people ask me all the time about payment methods. I keep the intro short, because we're going to really dig into it on the show. But we talked about different options for payment methods. We also talked about deposits, how, when and how much. We're going to talk about fees, gratuity, and paying by cash. And due to the nature of the conversation, we're gonna get into some horror stories, which I think you'll find amusing. Overall, Matt's a mildly funny guy, and we try to keep it light. As always, if you go to chefs without restaurants.org, you can find links to everything, including our private Facebook group, and you'll be able to add yourself to our database so you can hopefully get some gig leads. If you have any questions, comments or feedback on this episode. I'd love to hear from you. My DMS are always open on Instagram at Chefs Without Restaurants or you can shoot me an email at chefs without restaurants@gmail.com. This week's episode will be right up after a word from this week's sponsor, the United States personal chef Association. Are you a personal chef looking for support and growth opportunities? Look no further than the United States personal chef association with nearly 1000 members across the US and Canada. You SPCA provides liability insurance certification lead generation and more. Consumers can trust that their meal experience is insured and supported by us SPCA. And now for a limited time, save $75 on new membership and get your premiere listing on hire chef by using the code tax break 2023 at OU spca.com That's capital T capital B. Plus, if you have products or services to sell chefs and their clients showcase your business on hire chef and USPTA websites with our great introductory packages. To learn more about membership advertising or partnership opportunities call Angela at 1-800-995-2138. Extension 705

Chris Spear: 2:53

or email a PR a th er at us pca.com Hey Matt, welcome to the show. Thanks for coming back. I guess this is like your third time. So you're probably my most appearing guest at this point. You did the regular episode you did a what is the chef or what is a chef mini episode and now we're back to talking about payment methods today, which I guess at its core, maybe sounds like a dry topic, but I think we'll keep it fun, right?

Matt Collins: 3:20

Yeah, I'm pretty fun. I'm excited for my jacket. Kind of like SNL gonna have the three timers club jacket on Chefs Without Restaurants.

Chris Spear: 3:28

You're gonna be the Steve Martin of the Chefs Without Restaurants podcast, Alec. Alec bald, I think those two go back and forth. Yeah.

Matt Collins: 3:36

But people like Steve Martin, not everyone likes Alec Baldwin. So that's why I'm him. It's not everyone likes me.

Chris Spear: 3:41

I don't always like you either. It's kind of like the Star Wars. I don't like you either. Anyway, we're already off track here. So for the audience, we wanted to talk about payment methods. You know, Matt's a personal chef, I'm a personal chef. He and I actually talk off camera a lot about, you know, when you should take a deposit how much what your payment methods are. But this started because this weekend, I had a situation. So I've always said I take cash cheque. Zell and Venmo. I can do PayPal, I don't mind because it's an easy way to take credit card processing. But they charge a fee, which I don't like. So anyway, I had these guests at a dinner there was nine people. Now shame on me because I let them all pay separately and we'll get into this. I do feel like one person should be paying you but it comes time to settle up. And all these guests, you know their couples, so like four of them want to pay Venmo and you know, a couple want to pay Zell or whatever, which is usually fine. So you know, they send me the money. One woman with the Zell it doesn't go through. It's not showing on my phone. But I've had this issue before and I said you know, don't worry about it. I'm sure it'll go through. Guess what it didn't. It's two days later. Now I come home it's still not in my bank. I don't know where this money is. But here's the problem. I don't know who this woman is. She's not the person who booked the party. She's a guest of the hostess, right? So I call Xcel. And here's what they tell me. You don't have a valid account. And I'm like, What do you mean, I don't have a valid account, I have an account. So here's how the cell works. It goes directly into your bank. But what they don't tell you is it doesn't actually go to your bank account number, it's tied to your debit card. So you know, like credit cards and debit cards do there's an expiration. So I guess my debit card expired, and my bank sent me a new one, no big deal. I didn't update it in the Zell app. So when this woman went to pay, Zell does not flag and say this is not valid, can't go through, they accept the process. I think I've got my money, I leave the party. And then I find out later, guess what, I didn't have a valid debit card on file. So they refuse the charge. But at the time of service, when I'm at this party, the woman was not told this. So she thinks it goes through, I am not told this. So I think it goes through. And now I have to hope that this is a good person. And she is actually going to send me the money she owes me. But guess what, I also have to figure out how to get a hold of her. So now I have to email the hostess and say, hey, you know how we said the woman who's gonna pay us out? And I thought it'd be okay, guess what it's not, can you reach out to your friend and tell her she needs to send me 250 bucks, which is just a pain in the ass. So this is a long way of me saying, I think I need to work on some processes here. And I know Matt has had some issues with some of these things as well. So we wanted to talk about this a little bit today, because I want to bring value to my listeners. And I thought this would be more interesting than just doing a solo show. So Matt and I are gonna hash it out a little bit over payment methods. What do you think, Matt?

Matt Collins: 6:35

Right, we literally had to bite my tongue hearing that you allow people, multiple people to pay.

Chris Spear: 6:42

And this is not my first time I've done this and had an issue. So yes. So yeah, getting getting into that you really need to have one person making payment, right? If you are doing a dinner party with 10 people, and it's five couples, how do you handle that?

Matt Collins: 6:55

Not one person, the only time I'll take a second payment if someone else maybe wants to leave a tip. And then I've had an issue where someone said, Hey, I forgot to leave a tip, can I leave a tip in front of my staff? And then they're like, you know, set it up via square, and then they just never paid it. So I had to like, take screenshots and show my staff and like, yeah, they actually just never paid it. So it's like, because then it people think I'm, you know, taking like 100 bucks out of their pocket, or something. And so it just put me in this like weird, like, Curb Your Enthusiasm situation of like, you know, I'm in over like, you know, not that it's the end of the world. It's a little bit of money. But you know, it just, you know, I have people who I rely on and if they think I'm stealing money from them, that's not cool.

Chris Spear: 7:35

Yeah. Matt Collins is cancelled, because he's stealing tips. Yeah,

Matt Collins: 7:39

I mean, well, I don't know honestly, how many chefs has that happened to

Chris Spear: 7:43

quite a

Matt Collins: 7:43

few recently, most of them, you know, and I'm almost like, who has it? I guess it's how you run a restaurant. So we can't be the Chefs Without Restaurants doing the things the Chefs Without Restaurants are doing. But

Chris Spear: 7:55

But I do think this is more common, especially in like younger parties. Like I see, you know, I do a lot of bachelorette parties. And it's a dozen single girls, and they all want to be like Venmo. When you at the table. Sometimes I found that that does work out if you're talking about tips, because it offsets the chance that if there's one bad tip or because I've had a party of let's say 10, where the host is the one who doesn't want a tip. So you've got $1,000 dinner, and they don't tip so you don't get let's say 200 bucks. But at least when you've got 10 people, if you've got one who doesn't tip, but nine others do, you know, I'm playing the odds there, I'm playing the odds, but

Matt Collins: 8:31

you lost the tip on this last part because you lost 250. And then there's like, sometimes there's individual processing fees for each transaction, too. So you're rising fees and just general confusion at the end of the year doing your taxes. Oh, for this party, it was blah, blah, blah, then you have to recalculate how much you lost in fees.

Chris Spear: 8:49

I haven't paid any fees most. I mean, we'll get into the fees, things most of them are just a transaction percentage. Venmo gives you the option when you pay someone it says is this for goods or service. I think in like three years of doing business, only two people have flagged it as a service where I did get assessed the fee, and everyone else just pays me and I haven't had to pay which is why I love using Venmo and Zelle because 99% of the time I'm not assessed any kind of fee on that which is sweet. You know, when people pay via PayPal, I'm getting whacked with this, you know, I'm losing like 30 $40 on a one transaction fee and yes, there's a cost of doing business. But if I could skate through without paying that, you know 40 $50 And I do want to be clear this woman did pay for the party. They all went 100% tipped went above and beyond. I did make my money. I don't know if they're listening. They probably aren't. But it was a great party. We had lots of fun. They did pay me well and everyone tipped and it worked out but there was the off chance that maybe I wouldn't get tipped or wouldn't get paid for this party at least for one person.

Matt Collins: 9:56

Ah, I totally spaced on what I wanted to say because I checked arranged like four times?

Chris Spear: 10:02

Well, I think one of the big things is like going back to it is, if you're doing a party, you need to have one person coordinate. Like if all these people are paying their own way, they need to give whoever's the hostess needs to collect that money, and then pay you out of their account. So if we're buying or selling,

Matt Collins: 10:18

have a maximum, how many times you can split a check. So I think, you know, I mean, I don't have the verbiage on my website, but maybe I should add it, I haven't had that as many issues as what you're having. But I've had some times where it's, you know, I'm gonna pay X percentage and so on. So it's gonna pay the balance, because you know, I've had people's parents pay for parties, you know, another family member, split it with, you know, brother and sister paying for a parents anniversary. And then a lot of weird stuff, as long as you know, people are clear with what's happening, hey, I'm paying the deposit. And then you know, another ex, another person, next week's gonna pay the remainder of the balance before the event, because that's like a policy I have is, if you're not at the event, the party has the event has to be paid for beforehand. You know, it can be the week of the balance, but you just can't not be there and then me go hunt you down. Like I'm not debt collector. I'm not the Punisher. I'm not a, you know, Boba Fett? No, you're Mr. Star Wars. So that's like a whole crazy thing. When I first started the business, I did a pop up. And then my first public, I have my first private event. I literally gotten an email beef while at my first ever private event about someone who didn't like the verbiage of my deposit form, and was like, Well, do you take Zell and I was like, I've never used it, you can try sending it over. And then, you know, that was like the beginning of the meal, like the hors d'oeuvres, first course. You know, I had a minute sent, sent that email. And then later by the entree, I'm like, she's like, You got it. And I'm like, I didn't get it. And then I was literally had to call the person step outside and was like, Yo, you need to call your bank call Bank of America called Zell, I don't have it, I can't send it back. And if I don't have a deposit, then you know, your your dinner in 910 days isn't going to happen. Because I'm not going to buy food. And it was right when I started the business, I had very little money. It wasn't like, I was like, Oh, I can go buy all this food. And I needed that money to buy the food. Like, I just bought all my plates, my website, and, you know, like, whatever napkins glassware, so where I was, the last thing I needed to do was to spend a couple of $100 on food, and not ever get paid or go into the Zell void.

Chris Spear: 12:41

Yeah, I feel like the Zell void is real. And this makes me think that I did have a customer a couple days ago who said they're going to send a deposit via Zell and now that I think about it, I haven't seen that. And I probably need to reach out to her and say, Hey, did you actually forget and not send it? Or did you send it and not realize that it was going to the Zell void, and I didn't have a valid account. So that's the kind of stuff that like, can easily slip by you, right? And then I could see getting into an argument, like at dinner when I present like, the cheque, and she says, there's $100 deposit. And now I have to, like, figure out what happened to that $100 deposit?

Matt Collins: 13:15

Well, not to just like, totally dump on on Venmo as well, because that's another thing where you were saying you didn't have any fees, and based on whatnot, like, right when PayPal took over Venmo for me, they instantly like messaged me, because I don't know if your name is your business name, I made a business account separate in so that way people don't see like my partner paying me rent or friends paying me whatever, whenever I want to send money. I just cuz everyone adds you, you know what I mean? So I use my personal for like a year. And I was like, well, it's weird, because all these people are adding this account. You know, every client would add it. And then it's just like, they're seeing all my stuff. It's just made me uncomfortable. So I made the business one. And then once that switch over cam, they were like, We don't care if you're paying your staff, like we're gonna hit you with a fee, it doesn't matter. So it didn't matter, friends or family or anything anymore. And then I was like, okay, whatever, I can work that in. And then I had a cancellation happen. And they instantly you want the money out of my account. And I was like, my policy isn't you get every single dollar back. They canceled on a holiday weekend. In under 48 hours. I had purchases I made. I had to reimburse my staff. And so I had to fight with Venmo. And it took about a week to get the money back. And then I just was like, why am I going to pay fees if my money is not protected?

Chris Spear: 14:37

So how did that work? Like the customer reached out to them and said like it

Matt Collins: 14:43

essentially was like fraud, but they never followed up with me. So they just didn't say anything. So I noticed like, I don't know, a couple days after the event was supposed to happen that the money was taken out of my bank account. And it was a good chunk of change and it is maybe like$1,800 So whatever it was 1500 so you kind of notice, my Daddy Warbucks. So you kind of notice what do grand comes out of your, your, you know, your checking. And so I reached out and you know, the spute, I had to screenshot emails, you know, explaining how much money I was gonna give her back, etc, showing all that, and then they, they took care of it. But it was, it was quite nerve racking. And that was like a hard decision, because I still get people who want to pay Venmo and if they're in a hard spot, they're in their own home, you know, I'm not going to tell them, you know, fuck off, you know, I'll take it, I just haven't send it to my personal and hope that it doesn't get flagged, and I'd much rather lose. You know, I mean, 4% on fees, if Venmo decides to take the fees, then, you know, not get paid the balance or or upset. A customer doesn't listen, which is it is what it is, you know?

Chris Spear: 15:54

Yeah. And one of the things I've, you know, most of the time, or much of the time people are drinking at these parties. So when you get into these multiple people hands in the pot, I've had a number of scenarios where you've got, you know, five couples, and the wife says, husband, okay, you know, send him 200 bucks or whatever. And he's like, half drunk and whatever. And he doesn't put in the right name, thank God. Now there's like a scan a QR code. And they sometimes need your phone number to validate because one time I was at a party, and the people had like, no Wi Fi, no reception in their house. And I gave them my name. And they said, they sent me the money. And I kept saying it wasn't there. And they're like, no, no, like, we just, there's no Wi Fi, like, I'm sure when you get home, it'll be fine. And like two days go by and I still didn't have the money. It turns out, they sent it to the wrong person. Even though in all my emails, I'm saying like, here's my Venmo. They said, I mean, if you looked at the avatar, the guy looked like an 18 year old Filipino guy in his profile picture, like at the gym, no one knows. They think that that's what you look like, I am an 18 year old Filipino guy. But you know, like, clearly but everyone was they're having drinks. They're like, Oh crispy, or send a min mom, like I'm not crispy or on Venmo. That's not my Venmo it's Chris dashboard, dash six, if anyone wants to send me any money,

Matt Collins: 17:05

I was just gonna make that joke that you should say it so people can send you some money. I remember that knowing you. And it was a wacky name. And that's like branding, which is something to think about from like a business owner standpoint, if you have a demo, that's like, not really your name, like I have a very common name, like, my personal demo isn't Matt Collins? Because there's no, I'd have to have so many numbers after I just looked like a twitter bot. Because it's just like a common common name. And so that's like, one of the things to or why do you want to hyphenate things and dashes like when you want it to like streamline across all your platforms and, and if you can't get that one, maybe it's like a red flag of like, I don't want people accidentally paying the wrong person just because they got my business name before me. Because, you know, a lot of people, you know, I see in the groups and stuff, they have names that are kind of like, you know, quirky things like the, the, you know, like an animal Senate or something like the cilantro Raven and stuff. And like, someone else might have that name for whatever else you need. I mean, they have like, these cute names, like the wilted onion, and, you know, all this, like, you know, you know, like,

Chris Spear: 18:14

nice thinking on the spot. They're

Matt Collins: 18:16

mangoes and porridge, I don't know, they have these like names. And it says something that proprietarily someone else can also have for whatever other purpose. And you know, just because they think it's cute, or it's from like a movie reference or something. And so it's just, it's just kind of something to think about, you know, and like, it's not a great thing. That's why I hate Twitter, because it's like, I It's my name, my business name is too long to do on Twitter. So I just don't like it.

Chris Spear: 18:43

My two I'm perfect little bites on almost every platform, except I have to be like PRF. CTLITL bites on Twitter. And it's annoying.

Matt Collins: 18:51

That's your stock names. When you go public. It is for you RFT bytes stuck.

Chris Spear: 18:58

So what options are you accepting? Like when you talk to customers about how they can pay you? What do you tell them upfront?

Matt Collins: 19:04

Yeah, so it's i It's on my website. And I emailed over them too. And I always say it on the phone that if you want to pay the deposit, it's a check in the mail, or processing through square which credit card which people can link Cash App to that and all their stuff. And that's on their hands. So I don't have to have a Cash App. And also squares Great. I'm not paid by square I just don't have been using for years and they've never talked to me and for lack of a better term. Family Show I guess or not. We're all adults. Now. You can use the F word on the show. Oh, yeah, you're gonna lose that monetization. You can get one fn to make it PG 13 Okay. We're out. Oh, no, go go edit that out. bleep it out. But square square has all these update settings to where they send reminders. So I've had people who will tell me, Hey, I'm gonna pay after Friday after my check clears I'll pay the deposit and I'm again no worries. You're just gonna get emails until it happens. It's not me it's part of the system. And I just let them know sometimes I feel bad. I'm like, oh, man, this person got like, one email a day, the last week, because they haven't paid and I don't want to be a dork, but at least it's not me doing it. It's like an automated thing. And then it reminds people to and because I've had people that I've left because they were drunk. And they're like, I want to pay via credit card and I send them over the invoice. And you know, it's the only people I trust, but sometimes it takes a couple days from the pay it but every whatever, 48 hours, squares like a unpaid invoice and it emails me to as well that they saw it.

Chris Spear: 20:35

So you're okay, leaving without having all your money? It depends

Matt Collins: 20:39

on the person. And it depends on the amount of money and how other things like if they're if they live in close proximity to me,

Chris Spear: 20:48

like I can come to your house and knock on your door saying I want my $2 it doesn't

Matt Collins: 20:53

happen often. I don't want this new thing to happen. We're now I said online, that I'm not a total hard ass. I'm normally kind of a weirdo normally kind of like hanging out in the kitchen like sipping on a glass of wine or some of the weight and you're still here. You're still here, the movies over go home. And I'm like, Yeah, well you owe me X amount of money, can we settle up, or I'll send a text to the host.

Chris Spear: 21:13

Because going back to the Wi Fi issue, like and reception issue. I do lots and like cabins and on the mountains and whatever. And like I was doing a dinner one time and these people you know, out by the fire, and they're trying to Venmo me and it won't go through and I just had to leave like hoping he'd pay me tomorrow. And I wasn't worried. But I did have someone helping me that night. And she was like, she has her own business. And she's like, Oh, hell no, like I am not leaving property until I'm paid in full. There's no way I would get in that car and leave without knowing that I had the money. But this

Matt Collins: 21:41

goes here like Airbnb rental things and you know, the town's you know, if you're going out into the woods, you know, I mean, like, if I'm going to town in the Poconos, or somewhere weird or out in the woods, where my phone doesn't work, I'm gonna recommend that it's paid in cash before I get there. I'm like, Hey, I don't know if the credit card process is gonna work. I don't know. You know, but you know, typically I hook up to the Wi Fi, if that's the case. But you know, you never know, because sometimes it's a rental verbo or something, or maybe the Wi Fi is down, where it's just like he's got to have a backup plan. And that's like, we're, you know, I'll take Hey, just give me a check. Because I don't think people are generally gonna commit the fraud. You know, you have you have a check. I had a huge, huge multi day event paid by cheque, and the person cancelled the check. Wow, why

Chris Spear: 22:28

was that?

Matt Collins: 22:29

Um, what I think it was, is that there wasn't there. There are secondary fridges in their garage where I was supposed to sort of the food broke. And so I told them, and they're like, they had so much alcohol and smelters in their fridge in the kitchen that they had nowhere to put it. And so it got trashed the leftovers and I don't normally provide leftovers. I normally do a seated dinner. But this was like a family style thing. So I saved the stuff. But you know, things sat out for a while it was a hot summer day temperature zone. So I think they were just bitter, that they didn't have leftovers.

Chris Spear: 23:04

So they ate the whole meal, everyone got fed. It was multiple

Matt Collins: 23:07

meals, it was a malt. It was a three day event of breakfast, lunch and dinner for about a dozen ladies. So it was a good sum of money. And then for whatever reason, some either the client or the clients assistant, they canceled the check, saying they did it wasn't signed. But then I just called them up. It was like, Hey, you're gonna have to literally pay me today, like via credit card. This is insane. But they did some weird thing acting like I wouldn't notice that, you know, $4,000 wasn't in my, my checking. So it came out and then I got I got hit with a fee from the bank from the cheque being cancelled. Because it was as if I stole their checkbook and wrote the check I get, I'm not really sure with some legality thing. And so I had a fee from Bank of America for either 50 or $100 that I tacked on, and was like, Yeah, I'm not paying that, like you canceled the check. Like it because my balance and my deposit are the same number. If there's no changes, if you don't change, so it's the exact same number. So you know, like you it's no confusion. It's not like that's why a lot of people do like smaller dollar fees. But I never really understood like, Oh, hey, so $200 to hold the date. That what is that? $200 If it's a couple $1,000 party,

Chris Spear: 24:19

it's like skin in the game though. Like, I feel like people won't duck out because, you know, I've just noticed, and I want to get into deposits. So I'll make this quick but like, I never charged the deposit. If you listen to my old podcast I talked about like never having a deposit. And then maybe a year and a half ago I just started to have a lot of cancellations like not like we weren't even necessarily having the menu but it would be like the process of like you want this date. It's you know, the last Saturday of this month. Okay, cool. Then I send you a menu and we go back and forth and then you like ghost me and then all of a sudden like I follow up you're like oh, we decide to go in another direction like that had never happened to me and like I had like eight years of that never happening and then I had like three of them in the span of two Few months, I was like, well, just something like people, like people return their carts to all the because of a quarter like, that's how cheap people are and how little it takes to get them invested. And I was just like, if they just gave me 100 bucks just to say like, here we go, it's 100 bucks, and you will 100% be out of that 100 bucks, if you cancel, that's been enough to keep people in line and to not cancel on me.

Matt Collins: 25:23

I think you just have to, like, not let people know that, you know, you have a soft hold for about a week until the deposit. I just followed up with somebody today and was like, hey, you know how that menu look for you? And they said, You know, I was busy? And I said, No, no worries. And I sent them a couple of options back. That, to me is pretty standard. But I have to keep tabs on. I have like a whole section on my, my calendar and my notebook of like, these are the people and I write the date that I sent them the menu, and then what I'm supposed to fall back up, if I don't hear from them, cross them off. And then you know, I have people who follow up in that week span for that date, like somebody else. And I just got to tell them like, you know, hey, I'll know within 48 hours or whatever. And then I know we apply a little bit of pressure.

Chris Spear: 26:07

What is your amount that you're asking for a deposit?

Matt Collins: 26:10

I do 50% of the invoice so that way, because I do different courses and different sized parties, and then I have different, you know, what are their travel, whatever. I just like people to agree 100% what they're paying for. Because if you take a deposit, and someone's expectations of what the dinner is going to cost is completely different. Then what are they going to want to do with that deposit? If they don't want to move forward with the event? Why you have the deposit, because you held the date,

Chris Spear: 26:38

I don't take a deposit until we've talked numbers like you know, like, they know, they know straight out like how much the dinner is going to be before I take a deposit as well. Yeah,

Matt Collins: 26:47

but there's a lot of variables, you know, I mean, if someone wants to, you know, add something premium to it, or someone wants to add it on their course, or someone wants to do the main family style. I have to charge more for that, because it's a lot more portions. And so I have to tack on that. And so there is that fluctuation, and I just like it to be completely agreed upon. Before there's a deposit so that way, there's just zero confusion. You know, I had someone recently who went over all the pricing, they couldn't hear me well on the phone, they were walking their dog. They live in a neighborhood where you know, cars are driving by like a you know, more urban North Jersey neighborhood. And then we went over stuff for about a week and thought

Chris Spear: 27:26

you said $30 ahead, didn't you say $30 ahead,

Matt Collins: 27:29

well wasn't even like that. They were fine with the menu costs. It was just my staffing, my my my booking and travel, and it was all things I said on the phone. And I mentioned the story that sometimes when people get the bill, they freak out. So I was like, you know, just make, I just wanted to let you know, because I thought I was a little long winded. They might have just got bored of listening. But we laughed about it. And then four days later, I send the bill and they're like, well, there's like $600 in fees. Because there was a staffer travel and the$150 booking fee. That's all on the website. And I was like we went over this. And so I apologize, I said we could cut back the menu, but they were just so like, offended that there was additional fees that they just didn't want to do. And I turned away three other dinners for that day. And that week span, because I thought they were a lot because we had such a good conversation on the phone that I was like, you know, in the referral. And so I was like, this person's doing this shit. Like, I don't want to muddy the waters and and hold people on and piss them off. Because some of the other people call me we're also like regular people. I do business regularly. But I didn't want to put them in a weird situation if I didn't think the person was going to cancel.

Chris Spear: 28:32

Yeah, people are weird. I mean, just this week, like, I don't know, for some reason I had Friday open. I had someone reach out to me like last week and say they wanted a dinner this week. I was like, Yeah, I've got like, I talked to him on the phone. And she was all excited about how her daughter loves food and cooking. And she's like, Yeah, we you know, that sounds great. Send me a menu. I was like, I'll get it to you in a couple hours. And like I stopped everything I was doing, like made a menu sent it. And then nothing. And this was like last Thursday didn't hear anything. And then like yesterday, she sends an email was like, it doesn't sound like our schedules are gonna align and our family will be in town. But it's like, I just talked to you like three days ago. And you said Friday. Like, it's not like I had something else cooking but just like that, like people don't think about things like that. Like it's a Friday night. You're new to being ghosted.

Matt Collins: 29:19

I get that all the time where I'll follow people like a week later, and like, oh, yeah, we're just not doing it. And I'm like, why didn't you just say something when you knew because normally if we're on the phone, we're talking we're, you know, I'm saying you got you got the poll, you got to a week have a soft toll. I'll follow up with you. I'm telling you, I'm going to follow up, you know, I'm going to reach out so I when you just when you decide I didn't say we're not doing it and open it back up for the next person in the queue, because otherwise I'm leading someone else on it, hey, I'll get back to you in 48 hours. And then they're not even you know, making other plans or they're nervous or they're looking at other people that do the event or the dinner. I don't know that's like a whole other thing. thing to the deposit were just like, like parsing like human behavior. But I think the point of the deposit is having a number that makes people not want to cancel. Like my deposit was refundable, you know, within a certain timeframe, up until, you know, maybe a year after COVID started because it just got too out of hand. Because it was just so much rescheduling that I was like, I can't have, you know, 60 days a year scheduled then cancelled. There's only so many Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays that people want.

Chris Spear: 30:31

But I do feel a lot of chefs, not myself particularly are specifically don't want to take that because they're hoping they're gonna get cash and maybe all that doesn't get reported, you know, when you're taking a deposit check for $1,500 That has to be deposited. That's one thing, but if someone slips you $1,500 Cash, maybe they did, maybe they didn't. And just saying that, like, I know that that's probably something that nobody wants to talk about. But I know that that's something that happens. People love getting paid in cash.

Matt Collins: 31:03

But that's an unpopular I have an unpopular opinion of that as I want to claim everything I do for my business so I can keep track year to year. No one's making enough money that buy every single dinner you do like I do 100 a year if I didn't claim$100 of every dinner I did at the end of the year. What is that? That $10,000? If I did that, well, what am I buying with that a new car, then? Wouldn't I like I'm like asking you to be audited. You know that you can even buy a new car for 10 grand. But I'm just saying like, what what is the point of that you're not like living outside your means you're not like buying a house with it. Like, you're just doing all this work

Chris Spear: 31:44

and Breaking Bad. You don't have like a stash of cash like in your heating ducts. You just

Matt Collins: 31:49

asked him to get audited. And then like I have like a manila envelope of receipts. And then I have like an Excel of all my spending, why would I want to have to go through that with an auditor I pay somebody a good chunk of change to do my taxes and to look over everything? Why am I going to send them fake numbers, and then keep my real numbers. So make sure I know how my business is growing. I'm doing air quotes, because it's such a stupid thing.

Chris Spear: 32:13

You have a little notepad under your bed.

Matt Collins: 32:15

I'm just saying. No, it's just like weird. I actually have it right here.

Unknown: 32:20

Oh, nice. There you go. And I have little

Matt Collins: 32:23

up and down arrows and the year before, because I tally up what I do each month and I compare it to the year before. And then I know if I if I want to spend more on advertising if I want to work more on that. But I just think cash isn't that crazy. Like I don't want to go on some like conservative podcasts thing where it's like the government wants you to Venmo everything. So they can tell you when you can't and can't spend money. But I just think cash cash is a nice option because it makes people feel more comfortable. People like being able to hand you cash so that way you can tip your staff in cash so that way they feel like or they want to give your staff cash themselves and shake their hand or pat them on the shoulder and say thank you and have that human element to it. Because that's like an old school thing. You go to a restaurant, you really like your server or your bartender you feel good giving them a tip. And a lot of times that's like a guest at the event who didn't have to pay for the dinner and they just want to say thank you. They don't want to feel like a like a bum.

Chris Spear: 33:20

I love it when they put it in your chef pocket and then like tap your chest. Oh my God ever have that happen? Like just slide it in that Chef pocket and just like tap you like There you go. The last

Matt Collins: 33:29

time it happened. I felt like a stripper and I felt disgusting.

Chris Spear: 33:32

Have you ever been asked if you're a stripper when you show up to do a bachelorette party? Like you showed me like, are you really a chef and I'm like I can be whatever you want for the right price.

Matt Collins: 33:40

I just had this conversation because I did a bachelorette party on Sunday. And the joke came about and I said it happens once in a while but I think I've moved past the drunk Santa shirtless wearing only apron promo photos from two years ago. I don't get as many comments anymore. I have to do a new shoot.

Chris Spear: 33:59

Well, thanks, Matt for coming on the show. And I know we'll have you back real soon. Have a good one. As always is Chris with the Chefs Without Restaurants podcast. Thanks for listening and have a great week. Go to chefs without restaurants.org To find our Facebook group, mailing list and check database. The community is free to join. You'll get gig opportunities, advice on building and growing your business and you'll never miss an episode of our podcast. Have a great week.