Should residents tip the whole team this holiday season, or the staff members they know? If your community uses TippingLink, you don't have to pick one answer. TippingLink can be set up so residents tip staff individually, give to a tip pool, or do both.
That turns one big decision into three smaller ones: which staff each option covers, which moments each one is for, and how the pool pays out. Settle them before the holidays, and your team starts the season with a plan.
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How a Tip Pool and Individual Tipping Work in TippingLink
With individual tipping, residents pick the staff member, choose the amount, and can add a personal message. Building staff receive 100% of their tips when they transfer them to their bank account, with no fees. Staff can see who tipped them and how much, and they can send a thank-you note back.
A tip pool is a single shared fund that residents tip instead of tipping individual staff. Residents see one “tip the team” option with a name your property chooses, like TippingLink's own example, “The Waterstreet Towers Holiday Fund.” Each pool has a closure date, which is the date it stops collecting tips. The pool is then distributed to the team using the disbursement plan your property sets up.
Your property's Security Officer sets up the pool and submits the disbursement plan, and other staff and residents don't have access to those settings. Make the three decisions below before that setup starts, so the Security Officer is entering a plan instead of inventing one.
Decision 1: Which Staff Go in the Pool
Start with who residents already know. If some of your staff work overnight shifts or behind the scenes, a pool gives residents a way to thank them without knowing them by name. Staff who work with residents every day can stay available for individual tips, so residents with a direct relationship can still thank that person personally.
If your staff already split holiday money a certain way, you don't have to start over. With a TippingLink payout, you set each staff member's percentage of the pool yourself, so you can match the split your team uses today.
One caution before you finalize who's in and who's out. The U.S. Department of Labor's fact sheet on tipped employees says the Fair Labor Standards Act “prohibits employers from keeping any portion of employees' tips for any purpose, whether directly or through a tip pool,” and it limits which tips managers and supervisors can keep. We're not lawyers, and whether those rules apply to resident holiday tips at your property is a question for your management company's HR team or counsel. Ask before anyone in a management or supervisory role gets a percentage, and check any union contract that covers your staff.
Decision 2: Which Moments Each Option Covers
Because a tip pool has a closure date, it fits a defined window like the holidays. You can name the fund for the season and close it on the date you choose.
Individual tipping has no closure date in TippingLink's setup. Use it for the moments that fall outside your pool's window, such as a staff member who helped with a move-in.
When you set the closure date, leave room for the payout. Transfers out to staff bank accounts take business days to process, and holidays aren't business days.
Decision 3: How the Tip Pool Pays Out
The closure date sets when the pool stops collecting. The disbursement method sets how the money reaches staff, and TippingLink gives you two options. The right one depends on whether your office wants to handle the split or hand it off.
Single payout to property
The whole pool goes to the property's bank account via ACH, and your property handles the split to staff. During setup, you enter the payout recipient's name and email.
This fits communities that already distribute holiday money their own way and want to keep it. The trade-off is that your office takes on the distribution.
Payout from TippingLink
Here, you assign a percentage of the pool to each staff member, and the percentages must total 100%. TippingLink handles the disbursement, and each person receives their share directly in their TippingLink profile, without the funds passing through the property. Each person withdraws on their own, and you can list the email addresses that should receive disbursement confirmation notifications.
This method fits communities that want TippingLink to handle the split. It does ask something of staff: each person in the pool needs their own email address (shared addresses like a maintenance inbox can't be added), and staff can withdraw once they set up their profile in TippingLink.
This setup is also where the two options meet. You choose whether residents can tip only the pool (Fund only) or the pool and individual staff members (Fund and employees).
|
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Single payout to property |
Payout from TippingLink |
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Where the money goes |
The property's bank account, by ACH transfer |
Each staff member's TippingLink profile |
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Who splits it |
Your property |
TippingLink, using the percentages you set |
|
What staff need |
Set by your property's own distribution process |
Their own email address and completed their TippingLink profile to withdraw |
|
Best fit |
Communities with their own way of distributing holiday money |
Communities that want TippingLink to handle the split |
Neither choice is locked in. Your Security Officer can edit the pool's name, closure date, and disbursement method, and on TippingLink payouts, the confirmation emails and each staff member's percentage. After the closure date, the disbursement history shows the details of each payout.
Tell Residents What Each Option Means for Them
Once the plan is set, residents need to know what it means for them before they give. For individual tips, management is not shown individual tip details for specific staff members. For pools, TippingLink's language is direct: “If your property uses a tip pool to collect tips and disburse them to staff members, management may have visibility into who contributed, tip amounts, and disbursements to staff members.”
Put that in your resident announcement. BuildingLink's Help Site adds that “Information about contributions to the tip pool may be shared with the property on request,” and that line sets expectations up front. If your property offers both options, residents who would rather thank one person directly can tip that staff member individually.
The announcement should cover costs, too. A tip to the pool carries the same TippingLink fee as an individual tip, and fees are clearly displayed at checkout before payment. There's no cost to the property to use tip pooling, and the TippingLink Terms and Conditions cover the details. Residents pay by credit card or ACH bank transfer, and every tip includes the resident's full name and unit number.
To see the experience from the resident side, read how holiday tipping works without the cash.
Set It Up Before Residents Start Asking
Work through setup in this order:
1. Write down the three decisions: who's in the pool, what window it covers, and which disbursement method it uses.
2. Have your Security Officer create the pool with its name, closure date, and disbursement plan.
3. Get staff set up. Each staff member needs their own email address, and staff can withdraw tips once they finish setting up their profile.
4. Let residents know. If your community uses BuildingLink, the TippingLink widget on your Manager Dashboard lets you download a resident flyer and open a customizable invite email template. You can also create a custom staff list flyer, and both flyers include QR codes that take residents to your TippingLink site.
5. When residents ask how much to give, point them to our guide on how much to tip your doorman instead of setting a number yourself.
The tip pool is one piece of the season. The Condo Manager's Holiday Playbook covers package management, staff tipping, resident events, and year-end budgets.
Get Your Tip Pool Ready at TippingLink
In BuildingLink communities, residents automatically have access to TippingLink through the resident portal and resident app once you've set up your employees. Communities that don't use BuildingLink can use TippingLink, too.
To set up a tip pool, individual tipping, or both before the holidays, get started with TippingLink.