Jeff Burkhart: ‘Can I see some ID?’

I looked at the two young women with the two young men and decided to head off the inevitable by checking their IDs immediately.

“Can I see some ID?” I asked before they even ordered.

Four rolled eyes and two guffaws later, I was presented with three IDs. Two were vertical — portrait versus landscape — meaning that they had either recently turned 21 or weren’t yet. But what it really meant was closer inspection was needed.

“We’ll have two piña coladas, a Jack and Coke, and a vanilla lemon drop,” said the young man who didn’t have his ID out.

“Just a second,” I said, looking over the other IDs carefully.

In the bar business, there’s no more important task than verifying age.

I once worked with a guy who served a minor because he had been busy and made a simple arithmetic mistake. Failing to carry that one properly cost him his job. He had gone through all the steps, but in customer service, sometimes people don’t patiently wait. They apply pressure, either by jockeying back and forth, harrumphing or, in some cases, even stalking you up and down the bar. And in light of all that, he made a simple error. Not only was he fired, but he was charged with a misdemeanor, which is the penalty for serving a minor, accidental or not.

The two vertical IDs checked out. They were both barely over 21, but barely is as legal as way over. The third person was 23. The fourth person repeated the original drink order.

“Do you have ID?” I asked.

“I don’t,” he said, as if that ended the conversation.

“No ID, no service,” I said.

“It’s in the car,” he replied.

“Well, you’re going to have to go get it,” I said.

“Can I show you a picture of it on my phone?” he asked.

“No,” I replied.

“Come on, man,” he said. “I’m a bartender too.”

Then he really should have known better. But not everybody who does a job does it well. It reminds me of the old joke: What do you call the person who graduated last in medical school? A doctor.

2017’s California Assembly Bill 1221 created the Responsible Beverage Service Training Program Act, which officially began in 2022. It requires anyone who serves alcoholic beverages to be certified by the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC). The certification is called RBS (responsible beverage service), and the training that goes along with it, provided by outside contractors, lasts for three years, and then needs to be renewed, which includes retaking the training modules and repassing the test. It’s not expensive, but the training takes a minimum of two hours to complete.

Those of us who are industry professionals are now beyond the second three-year mark.

Recently, I taught a course in RBS designed to help people pass the test. Two of the biggest stumbling blocks are that many people want to rush through the training by trying to jump ahead. The courses are specifically designed to prevent this, and trying to do so only makes it take longer. Patience is key. The second stumble is that there are two verifications. One is passing the course, which has questions at the end of each module, and the other is taking and passing the test at the ABC website. It’s particularly confusing because many online RBS courses give you a certificate at the end of their modules. That certificate is relatively worthless. You must take and pass the test at the ABC website to be considered certified. And they don’t give you anything for that.

There isn’t enough space to go into all the particulars here, but there were a few things that I found interesting. And there was one question that every single person in my class got wrong in the modules. And it surprised me. It’s the first one listed.

• It’s not illegal to serve a pregnant woman alcohol. I’m not making any kind of value statement about that; I’m merely stating a fact.

• According to the state of California, 40% of all crimes committed involve alcohol.

• When driving, it’s illegal to have a BAC (blood alcohol concentration) of .08% or higher for adults. That level is .04% for commercial drivers and 0.1% for people under 21.

• Cannabis products are banned in on-sale liquor-licensed establishments, regardless of whether they contain THC or CBD and regardless of the source.

• There’s an entire module on illegal and legal drugs in the training. In fact, roughly 20% of the tests dealt with these issues. Weirdly, there wasn’t one single question about gambling, and gambling is prohibited in all licensed establishments unless they have a specific license to allow it, usually as card rooms or tribal casinos.

Leaving me with just two thoughts:

• If you see a bartender checking IDs, leave them alone. It’s one of the most important things that we do.

• Do you know what you call the person who passes the RBS exam with the lowest possible score? A bartender.

Jeff Burkhart is the author of “Twenty Years Behind Bars: The Spirited Adventures of a Real Bartender, Vol. I and II,” the host of the Barfly Podcast on iTunes (as seen in the NY Times) and an award-winning bartender at a local restaurant. Follow him at jeffburkhart.net and contact him at jeffbarflyIJ@outlook.com