Melissa Craig, 47, was astounded when she looked at the receipt a pair of customers left behind in mid-February.

“I just stood here for a minute, and then I had to sit down,” said Craig, a waitress at the Capitol Coney Island restaurant in Flint.

To a $4.46 bill, the customers had added a tip of $2,020. That’s the same amount given to a waitress in Alpena on Dec. 29, an act of generosity that spawned a hashtag-driven movement inspiring celebrities and regular folks alike to start the new decade by being kind.

The Alpena waitress, Danielle Franzoni, reacted by leaving a $20.20 tip for another waitress that evening. Moved by Franzoni’s action, the couple who tipped her, who’ve maintained anonymity, decided to leave liberal tips to a total of 20 waitresses across Michigan, including at least one other server in Alpena.

This photo provided to The News by waitress Melissa Craig shows the receipt on which a couple had left Craig a $2,020 tip.

Craig was the 20th.

At the Coney Island in Flint, Craig had just punched out for the night on Feb. 20 when she checked on several tables, seeing if they needed anything before the next waitress took over.

The couple ordered two cups of coffee, asking that Craig remain their server and clock back in so they could pay her, she told The News.

She was astonished when the credit card receipt they left behind told her they’d given her thousands of dollars as a thank-you for their two cups of coffee.

Along with the receipt, on which they had scrawled, “#20 of 20; 2020 Tip Challenge — Thank you for your hard work,” the couple left a note and a file of photocopies of their other 19 receipts, telling her about her place in their story of giving.

“I’ve never had anything like that happen to me before,” said Craig, a mother of five recovering from recent hospitalization and recently informed that the home she is renting is being sold.

Two weeks later, however, Craig still hasn’t gotten the tip from her employer.

In an email to The News, the couple provided a credit card statement showing the $2,020 has been charged to their account.

But the owner of the Coney Island restaurant, Anastasia Pirkovic, said the store has not received the funds. The money is on a 120-day hold while the large amount is checked for fraudulency, the owner said.

Pirkovic would not say directly whether Craig will receive her tip.

“Let it clear first,” Pirkovic siad. “We’ve got to get one thing at a time settled.”

The local sheriff’s department is checking into the amount as well, the owner said.

A message left with the Genesee County Sheriff’s Office was not returned Wednesday evening.

“We don’t want to get involved in any scams,” Pirkovic said. “However they tell us to resolve it, it’s going to be resolved.”

Meanwhile, Craig is grateful for the act of generosity shown to her and is looking for ways to “pay it forward.”

When an elderly customer was placing her order recently, she wanted applesauce with her meal but decided not to pay the extra $2.69 for it.

“I bought her the applesauce,” Craig said. “Out of my own pocket.”

IT STARTED IN ALPENA

The Alpena News was first to report the story of an 8,700% tip left at Alpena’s Thunder Bay River Restaurant just before the new year. That story, picked up by the Associated Press, spread far and fast, repeated in newspapers, online, and on major television networks, from CNN to Forbes.

On Jan. 1, musician Donnie Wahlberg took up the challenge, leaving a $2,020 tip for a waitress in a Chicago-area restaurant.

Lit by social media, the idea sparked mega-money tips to restaurant workers during the first months of the year. From a bartender in Indiana, to a waiter and single dad serving musician Harry Styles in the Virgin Islands, to a waitress left $5,000 by a billionaire car magnate in Massachusetts, big tips have become a big hit in 2020.

Tweets with the hashtag #2020tipchallenge spread stories from around the country and even overseas of people thanking faithful waitstaff by leaving generous tips of $20.20 or more.

Julie Riddle can be reached at 989-358-5693, jriddle@thealpenanews.com or on Twitter @jriddleX.