Took me a bit to realize you meant ratted instead of the past tense of “rate”.

Though if they do stiff her on the money because of that technicality, I’d consider that a massive tactical blunder, maybe even strategic. Tactical because it reduces the incentive for individuals to inform because they’ll realize the reward has technicalities that can be used to weasel out of paying it, on top of the public backlash directed towards the employee and everything they are known to be associated with (McDonald’s). Strategic because it might just be another straw on the camel’s back about how the ruling elite fuck over the working class every chance they get, even for amounts of money that would be trivial to them, despite being life changing for the informant.

My guess is that the technicalities will slide and there might be a ceremony with a novelty giant-sized check (which would simultaneously dodge the above issue while also still fucking her over because such an event would give a face to the one who called the police on a popular fugitive). Then she can be used to justify some secret police shit, if they still feel the need to justify things at that point.