What is a Tip?

A tip is an additional payment made to an employee, particularly in workplaces such as hotels and restaurants, as an expression of satisfaction with the service provided, beyond the service charge.

Law No. 6698 on the Personal Data Protection ("Law") stipulates its purpose in Article 1 titled "Purpose" as follows: “The purpose of this Law is to protect fundamental rights and freedoms of persons, particularly the right to privacy, with respect to processing of personal data and to set forth obligations, principles and procedures which shall be binding upon natural or legal persons who process personal data.” This provision regulates how personal data will be processed. Personal data is defined as "any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person" in subparagraph d of Article 3 of the Law. Personal data are divided into special and general categories. In Article 6 of the Law titled "Conditions for processing of Special categories of personal data", special categories of personal data are defined as follows: "Personal data relating to the race, ethnic origin, political opinion, philosophical belief, religion, religious sect or other belief, appearance, membership to associations, foundations or trade-unions, data concerning health, sexual life, criminal convictions and security measures, and the biometric and genetic data are deemed to be special categories of personal data."

The Labour Law (“Law”) stipulates the circumstances in which immediate termination for just cause may be applied for both the employee and the employer. The cases where the employer may terminate the employment contract immediately for just cause are listed in Article 25 of the Labour Law. In this provision titled "Employer's rightful immediate termination for just cause", termination of the employment contract due to absenteeism is also regulated. Article 2 of the Law includes the phrase "For immoral, dishonorable or malicious conduct or other similar behavior" and lists these situations in the following. Subparagraph g of the paragraph reads as follows: "The employee's absence from work for two consecutive working days or twice in a month on the working day after any holiday, or three working days in a month, without permission from the employer or without a justified reason." and thus recognizes the right of immediate termination for just cause in the event of unexcused absenteeism of the employee. Accordingly, the employee must have failed to fulfil this obligation on a day on which employee is obliged to work. Absenteeism should not be based on situations such as taking leave from the employer or being on report. In the decision of the 7th Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court with file no 2013/21856 and decision no 2014/4456;