STAND. COM. REP. NO. 56

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 1009

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2015

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committee on Tourism and International Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 1009 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO SERVICE CHARGES,"

 

begs leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to ensure that hotels either distribute porterage service charges to employees in full or notify customers that service charges are being used for other purposes.

 

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from UNITE HERE Local 5 and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 142.

 

     Your Committee finds that consumers should know whether or not, and to what extent, the money they pay hotels in porterage service charges is being paid to employees.  When a hotel charges service charges to customers, customers may believe that those charges are being paid to employees as tip income; however, this is not necessarily the case, and this information could influence whether or not a consumer chooses to use porterage services.  Therefore, your Committee finds that it should be transparent to consumers how hotels distribute porterage service charges.

 

     Your Committee has amended this measure by making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

 

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Tourism and International Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 1009, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 1009, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Judiciary and Labor.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Tourism and International Affairs,

 

 

 

____________________________

GILBERT KAHELE, Chair