Branch launches TipCalc to automate restaurant tip payouts

Branch launched TipCalc on May 6 to automate tip pooling and cashless tip payouts for restaurants, pushing a payroll task that often lives in spreadsheets into software tied to real-time point-of-sale data. The system is built to calculate distributions at the close of each night, including weekends and holidays, and to cut down on the late-night scramble that can slow a closing manager and delay workers’ money.

Employers that administer a tip pool must fully distribute collected tips at the regular payday for the workweek. Under the federal tip-credit system, employers also have to pay tipped workers at least $2.13 an hour in direct wages, while total cash wages and tips must reach the $7.25 federal minimum wage. Valid pools are limited to employees who customarily and regularly receive tips, which makes accurate job coding and recordkeeping part of compliance, not optional paperwork.

TipCalc is designed around those pressure points. It integrates with leading POS systems, pulls check and labor data in real time, and lets operators set tip rules by revenue center and job code. The platform can flag unusually large tips for manager review before payout is finalized. It eliminates the need for pre-funding or cash handling and can pay workers through a Branch account or debit card.

The company is pitching that approach to operators already using its payments infrastructure. Branch also showed TipCalc at the National Restaurant Association Show in Chicago from May 16 to 19.

The Labor Department finalized a tipped-employee rule in 2020 allowing employers that do not take a tip credit to include cooks and dishwashers in nontraditional tip pools. A federal appeals court struck down the Biden-era 80/20 limits in 2024, and in 2025 the department said front-of-house oyster shuckers could be treated as customarily and regularly tipped employees depending on the facts.