Most Whitman students don’t steal food from Reid but most of them could. The problem is that it is far too easy to do so. Of course, students shouldn’t steal from Reid, but it also shouldn’t be so easy for them. Luckily, two simple changes would make it much harder for students to steal without unduly inconveniencing the majority of students who pay for their meals.
The biggest problem with the way Reid handles food payment is that there is no coherent system for when customers pay for their meals. Since meals at Reid are made-to-order, most customers will receive a receipt before they get their food. Customers have the choice of paying immediately with their receipt or waiting to pay when their food is ready.
The upshot is that most of the time there is no way to tell whether a customer leaving the food court has paid, unless one has been watching them closely. Students who leave with a plate without paying might have already paid before their meal was ready; students with receipts who walk past the cashier might pay when the pick up their order.
This payment system is so easy to circumvent that I know friends who have accidentally taken food out of Reid without paying. Stealing from Reid requires so little effort that sometimes it doesn’t even require the intention to steal.
The way Bon Appetit uses receipts makes this problem worse. Right now receipts only designate that a student has ordered a meal, not that they have paid for one. Other than catching someone in the act, there is no easy way to verify that a customer has not paid for their meal. On the flip side, customers who have paid cannot verify this fact.
A comprehensive solution to these problems might require a remodel of Reid or a new payment system. But both of these problems can be significantly alleviated by some simple changes in policy that would make payment at Reid more consistent and accountable.
To begin with, Bon Appetit should only allow customers to pay when they bring out food. It would be visually obvious who should be paying because customers carrying food couldn’t have already paid with their receipts.
An objection to this plan is that students couldn’t bring food back into the food court without risking being charged a second time when they left. A student who had paid for a pizza but forgotten to add red pepper flakes to it would be out of luck if the cashier did not remember them. Remember that students have no way of proving that they have paid under the current system.
This is where the receipts come in. All Bon Appetit needs to do is provide customers with a record that they have paid, an actual receipt for example. This could be done by printing separate receipts or it could be done more simply by stamping the receipts of students when they pay. Bon Appetit would no longer need to worry about whether students had paid just as students would not need to worry about proving their purchase.
Even with these changes there would be loopholes and customers would still steal from Reid. But these changes would make it more difficult and discourage theft by convenience.
Why should students care so much about whether or not customers steal food from Reid? Because while I believe that most students do not steal, and so do not benefit from Reid’s lax policies, we may be indirectly hurt by those who do. Anyone who has been hassled for taking more than one piece of fruit out a dining hall knows the frustration of being wrongly treated like a thief.
Making it harder to steal from Reid would not only help Bon Appetit save money but could also benefit students who do pay. If Bon Appetit could cut down on outright theft, then it could also ease up on the fruit restrictions I just mentioned. They might even be able to reduce their prices for students, though this may be asking for a bit too much.
In any case, these changes at Reid would allow for more trust between Bon Appetit and students. I think most students do not want to cheat Bon Appetit and feel resentful when they are treated like suspects. These changes would provide proof of our good intentions.
