Restaurants don't like giving fapiaos because they don't want to pay taxes on their earnings. It's as simple as that.
I've had many restaurants offer to give me a large bottled soft drink in exchange for not getting a fapiao. In fact this happened again just last week at a rather well-known Peking duck restaurant. In all cases I decline their offer since I really do need the fapiao. For those that use the excuse of a broken fapiao machine, they will usually magicially "find" a fapiao once you threaten to call the tax bureau. I've also run into the "soft opening" situation a few times, in the early days they would offer to mail the fapiao once their machine was ready (and would make good on their promise). These days they will just give you a receipt and tell you to come back in a few weeks to get the fapiao.
As for Kro, I would like to give him the benefit of the doubt and suggest that this is the doing of the staff he's hired. Not issuing fapiaos also makes it easier to cook the books, in which case Kro needs to keep a closer eye on those he puts in charge of running the day-to-day operations. However, if what the poster above said about the menu is true, then that does raise some doubts.
Incidentally, I am reminded of an incident back in the summer of 2008 at Kro's Gongti location. The table next to ours had asked for a fapiao but the waitress told them that the machine was broken. When we finished our meal and it came time to maidan, I asked for a fapiao and expected to hear the same excuse. To my surprise the waitress said "mei wen ti" and did so with a smile. I wonder if it had anything to do with my friend who was a volunteer for the 2008 Olympics and was dressed in volunteer garb? For a while this left me with a negative impression of Kro, of course at the time I had no idea about his situation and I would like to think that this was the doing of his ex-partner.
