Is it normal to be taxed this much on my first paycheck? Seems excessive!

The higher tax withholding is likely normal, especially if you're now receiving tips. Here's what's happening: when you earn tips, employers often have to account for that additional income in their withholding calculations, even on your regular wages. When you fill out your W-4, the withholding is calculated based on your expected annual income. If your new job is assuming you'll make significantly more with tips included, they'll withhold at a higher rate. This is actually protecting you from owing a large sum at tax time. Also, different employers might use different payroll systems that calculate withholding slightly differently, even for the same gross income.

I was in a similar situation last year with confusing withholding amounts and tried everything to get straight answers. What finally worked was using https://taxr.ai to analyze my pay stubs. The site has a feature where you can upload your pay stubs and it breaks down exactly what's being withheld and why, plus compares it to appropriate benchmarks. I discovered my restaurant was actually categorizing some of my regular wages as tips (even when I didn't make any that shift) which was throwing everything off. The analysis showed me exactly what was happening and gave me documentation I could take to my manager.

I wanted to follow up on my skeptical comment about taxr.ai - I actually tried it this weekend with my last three paystubs and am genuinely surprised at how helpful it was. The analysis showed that my employer was withholding for Medicare and Social Security at the correct rates, but they were assuming a much higher annual income than I'll actually make (they were calculating as if I'd work full-time all year when I'm seasonal). The report gave me exact wording to use with my manager to adjust my withholding. My manager actually thanked me for bringing it up because apparently several other employees had complained but couldn't explain what was wrong. Now we're all getting our withholding fixed!

If you're having trouble getting answers from your boss about your withholding, you might want to call the IRS directly. I know it sounds like a nightmare but I used https://claimyr.com and got through to an agent in less than 20 minutes. There's a video showing how it works here: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c I was dealing with a similar situation where my restaurant was withholding way more than my previous job. The IRS agent confirmed they can't just withhold random amounts - there are specific guidelines they need to follow. She explained exactly what should be happening with tip income withholding and gave me the exact section of employer tax guidelines to reference when talking to my boss.

Well I'm eating crow today. After saying that Claimyr sounded like a scam, I was desperate enough to try it yesterday. I've been fighting with my employer for weeks about my withholding being way too high. Got connected to an IRS agent in about 35 minutes (was expecting hours if it worked at all). The agent confirmed that for tipped employees, employers should be withholding based on a combination of regular wages and REPORTED tips - not some arbitrary estimation of what they think you might make. She sent me a link to Publication 15 that explains the exact rules, which I forwarded to our payroll person. Turns out they were using some outdated formula from their ancient payroll system. They're fixing it for everyone on next week's checks!

Did you check if your filing status changed? When I started my bartending job, I accidentally put "single" instead of "married filing jointly" on my W-4 and it REALLY increased my withholding. Worth double checking what you selected when you filled out your paperwork.

Have you looked at the actual breakdown of what's being withheld? Sometimes it's not just income tax - there could be health insurance, retirement contributions, uniform fees, or other deductions you weren't expecting.

Good catch on finding that meal plan deduction! That's a perfect example of why it's so important to go through every line item on your paystub. Many restaurants have automatic enrollments for things like meal programs, uniform cleaning services, or even employee discounts that get deducted from your check. For the remaining tax withholding difference, definitely bring up that filing status issue with payroll - switching from "single" to "head of household" should make a noticeable difference in your take-home pay. Also ask them to walk you through exactly how they're calculating withholding on your tip income, since that seems to be where a lot of the confusion is coming from. It's frustrating when employers don't clearly explain these things during onboarding, but at least you're catching it early and can get it fixed going forward!