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Server gets $2,000 reward for tracking down customer who left cash

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LONDON, Ont. — It was the scarf left behind at a table that sent the server out the door, chasing after customers about to step into a taxi.

It was the envelope stuffed with $7,000, found at the same table a few minutes later, that floored her.

By then, the taxi was out of sight, so another chase began. For her efforts in getting the money back to the man who had accidentally left it, server Caylin Kenney received the biggest tip of her life. One that left her in tears.

“I was shocked at the time. I’m just starting to get out of debt,” said the King’s University College student who works at an accounting firm and the Tasting Room restaurant as she continues to pay off student loans.

The man, who wishes to remain anonymous, was part of a foursome who dined that day for hours and racked up an $800 bill.

It was late in the evening when the couples finished dinner, and she noticed and returned the scarf, and — after returning to her table — a brown bank envelope — “about an inch thick and all bills in there,” she said. “I was like, ‘Oh my God.’ “

She knew right away it wasn’t a tip. “I like to think I’m pretty good at my job, but … probably not that many hundreds,” she said with a laugh.

She ran outside, but the taxi was gone. So she brought the money to a manager and asked that it be put in the restaurant’s safe.

Recalling that a fellow server had mentioned that one of the foursome was a prominent London, Ont., businessman, she ended up searching for him on the Internet and then via a city police officer she knew. He was found and returned to the restaurant to fetch his money.

And he left a thank you.

A big one: $2,000 for Kenney and $200 for each of the six other servers who were on the floor that night.

“I just about croaked,” said Kenney, who has been waiting tables for 10 years.

“I can’t count the number of phones, purses and clothing that get left behind. You return stuff, you never hear about it again,” she said.

 

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