Every week, Mallory and Nicole Cliffe discuss a Prudie letter. This week: the waitress who can’t bring herself to call her awful ex-bosses to get a W-2.
Nicole: Well, to our LW, I think there is a non-zero chance she will find she doesn’t have a W-2 at all.
Mallory: Oh, DO GO ON.
Nicole: Small diner, aggravated to receive SSN, radio silence after blowing past the due date … There’s a real chance they never prepared one. She definitely has to call.
If they have it, they’ll send it.
If they don’t have it, ideally she kept track of her hours and can report them as income, then it’s no longer her problem, since she reported the hours, but the restaurant’s.
Mallory: I would never have thought to keep track of my own hours when I was waiting tables! (Should I have been doing this?)
Nicole: It’s probably fine at this point.
If she can’t get a hold of the managers or just can’t bring herself to call, she should try calling the third-party accountant listed on the pay stubs.
If she doesn’t get a W-2 she’ll be on the hook for the withholdings but they’ll be in bigger trouble than her.
Mallory: It’s never that bad if someone else gets in more trouble than you do!
(The motto of middle siblings everywhere)
Nicole: So true.
