How to track cash tips

The best way to track cash tips is to record them the moment your shift ends, before the cash blends into your wallet and the number blurs. Note the amount, the hours you worked, and any tip-out, and do it every shift. A habit that takes 30 seconds beats a shoebox of receipts you try to add up in April.

Why cash tips are the hard ones

Card tips are recorded for you: they hit your paycheck and usually have tax withheld. Cash tips leave no trail unless you make one. That creates two problems. You lose sight of what you actually earn per hour, and you risk under-reporting income, which can bite you on a loan application or an audit.

A system that sticks

• Log at clock-out. Tie it to something you already do every shift so you never forget.
• Record cash and card separately. You want to see the split, and your taxes treat them differently.
• Include hours and tip-out. Without those, you cannot know your true hourly.
• Keep it in one place. A single running record you can export beats notes scattered across apps.

What to do with the numbers

Once you track consistently, three things get easier: you know your real hourly and can compare shifts and sections, you can set aside the right amount for taxes on your cash tips, and you have a clean record to export at year end. See how much to save for taxes on tips.

The 30-second version

Tipfolio was built for exactly this: open it after your shift, type your cash, card, and hours, and it stores everything and shows your take-home instantly. No account, no spreadsheet.