Chipotle Caught Cheating Customers? Restaurant Rounds Off Checks, Gets Rid Of Pennies

Pennies: Who needs them? That seemed to be Chipotle’s motto up until last week when the burrito chain was caught cheating its customers out of pennies.

The Huffington Post reports that Chipotle was rounding off bills so that they wouldn’t have to deal with pennies.

Accordingto the Star-Ledger’s Karen Price Mueller who investigated the strange money practice, Chipotle didn’t always round checks up to the nearest nickel. In its busiest markets, the fast food chain would round checks up or down depending on the final price of the bill. Still, some customers were confused as to why they had too much, or too little, change in their pockets.

The idea, according to spokesman Chris Arnold, is to limit the amount of cash transactions to make sure that lines keep moving. Arnold said that Chipotle wasn’t invested in some penny pinching scheme and hasn’t turned any sort of profit from the pennies.

The company did, however, recognize that the practice could anger some people. But Chipotle isn’t ready to re-instate the penny. Instead, the restaurant will no longer round checks up to the nearest nickel. Instead, people will be given up to 4 cents in savings every time they eat at Chipotle.

What do you think of Chipotle’s “no penny rule?” Do you think the penny will slowly find its way out of circulation?