If they're doing it to servers too, get ready for some massive turnover. I know a couple full-time servers that maybe claim 15% of their cash tips.

Essentially, when they handed you a packet of cash, there goes the paper trail. It was most likely up to you to claim the cash tips as income when you/your parents did your taxes. It wouldn't be a part of your W-2 wages, so you may or may not have. Now, they're going through their payroll system and tossing these tips on your paycard.

I haven't been in the restaurant industry since I was 16, so I have no idea if them going through their paycard means they'll bother to withhold taxes on those tips or not. Going through their card system, they're going to have to include that tip income on your W-2 at year end that they probably weren't before with just cash tips. If taxes are being held out, great. If not, you could be in for a surprise and owe money. From your perspective, that's what you should ask - are taxes being taken out of the tip income or not.