So how much do you tip?

[Liar]

http://www.faphost.com/images/8lnc0vn5xoq8mamdovbh.jpg

That just might be the most American thing I have ever seen.

 

[cloudy]

That just might be the most American thing I have ever seen.

...and it's called (I'm not kidding): the Weinermobile.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

My mother was a waitress, I bussed tables, and I was part owner of a restaurant bar. I'm critical of service.

Maybe one of the best places I ever ate was a buffet for construction workers. Walk in, pay, then get your grub off the buffet. The waitress kept the coffee hot and the water glass filled. There was a jar on the table for tips. Busboys cleared your spot the moment you left. The food was good and plentiful. A 20% tip was in order, though most of the guys left $1 ($3.99 breakfast).

And I posted the tale about the steakhouse where the server took forever to get our order, dumped a tray of food on my daughter, and the manager did a belly-flop atop our table.

Shit happens, of course. But the manager can keep the perverts out of the restrooms and keep the cooks hopping. And the server can take care of you rather than bullshit with her buddies.

 

[TheeGoatPig]

My bologna has a first name, it's O-S-C-A-R my name
My bologna has a second name, it's M-A-Y-E-R
Oh, I love to eat it every day, and if you ask me why, I'll say,
"'Cause Oscar Mayer has a way with B-O-L-O-G-N-A."

http://www.faphost.com/images/8lnc0vn5xoq8mamdovbh.jpg

I used to see one of those (there are two or three of them) driving around my area. It's the funnies looking thing to see driving down the highway

 

[kromen]

I used to see one of those (there are two or three of them) driving around my area. It's the funnies looking thing to see driving down the highway

I got to ride in one when I was in college.

 

[CharleyH]

Tipping isn't the same in all countries. In the UK many establishments include a service charge varying between 10 and 15% as a matter of course on your bill. You CAN ask for it to be removed but you have to be seriously pissed off to do that.

In the UK I expect to tip about 15% for normal service, rounding it up to the nearest whole pound. 20% is for exceptional service.

Where I differ from some people is that I give Christmas Boxes to the staff in the takeaway food places I use frequently. They rarely get any tips. For example I use a local KFC clone. My order is always the same and is sometimes being prepared before I get to the front of the queue to place my order and pay. The working staff get the money spread between them - I checked with the owner who is a personal friend. Unfortunately he told me that I am one of a very few who think of tipping his staff and the only one to give a Christmas payment. What they usually get is the few copper coins left by an obnoxious drunk who thinks that abusing the staff is amusing. The staff put those coins in a charity box.

Og

Okay, I am just going to stretch myself here. I have worked in restaurants (my parents being in the business) for 25 years at least and after doctors, nurses and teachers, British ex-pats are right up there on the cheap board. North Americans servers dread them (not all of them, but many). I give a good tip everywhere, even in the country I live (10 to 20 per cent). However, recently I noticed (in the country where I am) a tip box for Christmas. I can't help but think the owners put it up to give their workers a Christmas bonus without actually having to give one.

 

[Huckleman2000]

Rules to Live By #17: Treat the people who serve your food nicely.

Seriously. You don't want those people mad at you. They could take some really gross retaliation.

 

[CharleyH]

Rules to Live By #17: Treat the people who serve your food nicely.

Seriously. You don't want those people mad at you. They could take some really gross retaliation.

Babe? You have the wrong idea. I have never pissed or spit in a bad tippers dinner. Not many of us do. Maybe.

 

[Shwenn]

Babe? You have the wrong idea. I have never pissed or spit in a bad tippers dinner. Not many of us do. Maybe.

I've never seen that, either.

It's not about the tipping. It's about the treatment. If you are horrible to your server, you will get disgusting things in your food.

The advice I would give is, if you are upset at the service you get, your recourse is to not tip. Do that. Don't try to yell at and humiliate your server. That is the dumbest way to handle bad service.

I waited tables in college and I've had to take a coworker aside and explain that feces contains potentially life threatening bacteria so it is not okay to put that in a person's food, regardless of how cruel they are being. I have wanted to have a similar conversation about smegma but that would involve insinuating that the person had an STD so I didn't do it.

Most I've ever tipped was 20 on a 3 dollar ticket. But that was my first job, Waffle House. Our line cook had finished a work release program and was moving out of his halfway house back to his home town. The manager let him wait tables his last night. I went in and had a grilled cheese and left that tip.

I don't guess that really counts. I only ate there so I could leave that tip.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

I never tip. The restaurants should pay their employees sufficient salary. And the owner of a proper restaurant should never have allowed a group of people to go so far in their harassment as the group you mentioned did, Cat. Swedes are considered meek to the extreme, but even here the patron would have thrown them out for acting like that.

Sure, I know a lot of Swedes who tip the waiters/waitresses if they do a really good job, but I never do. Doing a good job is what they're hired for. If they do it, they deserve a good salary, not a tip. If they don't do a good job, they're not doing the job they're hired to do = shouldn't keep that job.
I never tip a bus driver either.

The waitress in your story suffered a lot, yes, and it was a nice thing you did, Cat. I wouldn't have done it. I would have talked to her and told her not to let the assholes get to her, she was a good waitress, and I would certainly have asked the manager to deal with the assholes - I'm VERY surprised he didn't!

But tip... never. Sorry, I just think that the salary should be high enough so you don't NEED tips to pay your rent. And someone has to do a lot more than what they're actually hired to do before I pay them any extra.











(Note: Tips are traditionally baked into the final sum of the tab, about 10% of the final sum goes to the waiters/waitresses.)

 

[unregistered]

 

[Salvor-Hardon]

I tend to tip double on Sundays. I did my time as a server in an Italian joint in college, and the worst groups by far were church groups coming in after service. Typically they were 5 to 10 people, always boisterous and demanding, and would leave tracts or pamphlets as tips. This was as I was studying for seminary, and lead to my eventual dismissal of ministry as a vocation. If those people are supposedly representing a god of service and love, then they need new bibles or a swift kick in the groin.

I know not all church people are like that, but the general trend was disheartening to say the least. So now, whenever I am eating out on sunday afternoons, and I see those groups across the room, I double my tip, just to make my server remember I am not one of them.

 

[Edward Teach]

Babe? You have the wrong idea. I have never pissed or spit in a bad tippers dinner. Not many of us do. Maybe.

First, I almost always tip 20% because it is fair, usually appreciated, easy to figure and won't break me.

Second, one of the biggest mistakes I ever made was getting drunk in an oyster bar one night, giving my waitress an earful, then ordering another dozen steamed oysters. I was sick as hell the next day and I refuse to even think about what they may have done to those oysters. God.

Hey Charley!
say hello to Launen and ask her to use that half breast Av again. Dayum

 

[fifty5]

My standard is 10%

In student days I worked a burger bar and did every job except manage the joint.

As griller, I got 50% more than a waiter. As a waiter, I earned more, through tips, than I did as a griller. The trick was to exceed expectations.

And that's what now alters my tipping rate.

Places that put 'service charge' on my credit card bill get zilch - it's my call, not theirs (but good service may well find cash under the last plate).

Attentive waiters/waitresses may well get more, but those who keep me waiting will get less.

A good cook/chef earns more by me coming back to the same joint, keeping him/her in a job.

My one exception to my 10% rule was a driver who looked after me when I worked abroad. When I say he looked after me, I'm saying less than the truth. Anyway, when I left that job, I tipped him 6 months wages. That was not a lot for me, but I thought he'd earned it. Some colleagues gave him shit. (This was in Pakistan. The guy in question had a salary tens of fold less than me. I was the stranger in his land and he did more than his duty. I was glad to be rich enough to make some recompense.) Other "menials" I tried to reward by treating them as human - endeavouring to do as much for them as they did for me.

The one I remember best was one of the armed guards. He used to escort me back to my hotel after I finished work. On the way, he did his best to teach me Urdu. In the morning, when I arrived, he slung his rifle over his shoulder and offered me a tiny flower.

It came to pass that he had a tiny, grotty picture of his father. I scanned that, retouched it and printed it large. that was what he wanted, so that was what I gave him. (Other "menials" had similar requests and I did my best for them all.)

Tips aren't just measured in cash.

 

[Edward Teach]

Hi FF! Good to see your wise ol' Brittish ass. Always liked you FF.

 

[fifty5]

Hi FF! Good to see your wise ol' Brittish ass. Always liked you FF.

I'm glad to hear that Ed. The same goes for me - mutual respect.

The fact remains that service staff deserve and I guess, usually get, what they deserve - and the same goes for many regular customers.

To me, the thing is to try and reward the lad or lass directly - pool tips or a percentage on the main bill don't seem to me to do that.

 

[Liar]

FF reminded me of a question I've been meaning to ask...

Never mind how much you tip. Who do you tip?

Most would tip the waitress. And the bellhop, although it's rare to find one these days. Some would tip the cab driver. Others the barber. Or the gas pump guy. Not many, from what I have seen, would tip the Wal-Mart greeter or the grocery store cachier.

So, who, and why/why not?

 

[Salvor-Hardon]

FF reminded me of a question I've been meaning to ask...

Never mind how much you tip. Who do you tip?

Most would tip the waitress. And the bellhop, although it's rare to find one these days. Some would tip the cab driver. Others the barber. Or the gas pump guy. Not many, from what I have seen, would tip the Wal-Mart greeter or the grocery store cachier.

So, who, and why/why not?

I tip servers at restaurants and my stylist (finally found one I like). We do a christmas gift for the bus driver that takes the kids to school, and our postman. That's about it though.

 

[oggbashan]

The largest tip I ever left was in the former Yugoslavia in the early 1960s.

Our group was on its last full day in the country and their government didn't allow anyone to take more than 1,500 dinars out of the country.

At the time the exchange rates for hard currencies such as the dollar and pound were ridiculous. The official rate for one pound was about 850 dinars. The back-street rate was about 2,500 dinars. Yet 2,100 dinars was a week's wage for a skilled car mechanic.

On our two week visit we had spent 10 days on an island which had (then) no tourist facilities. We had been unable to spend our money. We had been backpacking from a base and trying to meet the locals. We had found that the easiest way to make contact was to offer to do some work for the landowners such as helping to rebuild a wall, clear debris from WWII, etc. As we were 18 fit young men we could do a lot in a day. We were usually entertained with food and local wine. But we couldn't spend money. No one would take it.

When we arrived at our last stop before leaving Yugoslavia, a city, we were staying in an upmarket hotel. We appreciated the facilities such as bathrooms with hot water and the meals.

We had been assigned a young waitress because she spoke good English. She was young, apparently about 15 years old, and obviously pregnant. We were embarrassed about being waited on by a pregnant lady and did all we could to help her but stopped because that embarrassed her more.

Our tour leader, at our request, made some discreet enquiries. The young lady had been assigned to us, not because of her English, but because the hotel manager expected that we, as foreigners, would leave her a good tip and she needed money because in a couple of months' time she would be unable to work. Her fiancée was doing his compulsory military service which would end about the time she was due to produce their baby BUT they didn't have enough money to get married nor to find a flat to rent which would require an upfront payment (probably = bribe) to get. The hotel manager had tried to do his best for her by letting her wait at our tables. The staff had made a collection for her but they were all low paid and couldn't do much.

It didn't take our group long to decide what to do. We had Yugoslav dinars we couldn't take out of the country, nor spend before we left. We collected all our small notes and coins except for tips we would leave for other hotel staff, and presented it all to her after our last breakfast. The total was over 100,000 dinars equivalent to about 40 pounds. When we paid our hotel bill we asked the manager whether there was any way we could send her money from the UK.

He told us that the "young lady" was actually 19 years old. The 100,000 dinars would be more than enough for their marriage and deposit on a flat - why would we send her more?

Why not? we retorted.

He replied that we had already given her the equivalent of winning the regional lottery. He had other staff that were nearly as hard up as she was and also couldn't get married or set up home.

We "adopted" the hotel for a few years. We were sent pictures of our waitress' wedding and their son. We had pictures of other weddings, other children. Eventually the exchange rates became normalised and our contributions weren't needed.

We couldn't have spent 100,000 dinars. The bill for 18 of us in the hotel for two nights including full board had been 6,000 dinars.

Og

 

[Boota]

I never tip. The restaurants should pay their employees sufficient salary. And the owner of a proper restaurant should never have allowed a group of people to go so far in their harassment as the group you mentioned did, Cat. Swedes are considered meek to the extreme, but even here the patron would have thrown them out for acting like that.

Sure, I know a lot of Swedes who tip the waiters/waitresses if they do a really good job, but I never do. Doing a good job is what they're hired for. If they do it, they deserve a good salary, not a tip. If they don't do a good job, they're not doing the job they're hired to do = shouldn't keep that job.
I never tip a bus driver either.

The waitress in your story suffered a lot, yes, and it was a nice thing you did, Cat. I wouldn't have done it. I would have talked to her and told her not to let the assholes get to her, she was a good waitress, and I would certainly have asked the manager to deal with the assholes - I'm VERY surprised he didn't!

But tip... never. Sorry, I just think that the salary should be high enough so you don't NEED tips to pay your rent. And someone has to do a lot more than what they're actually hired to do before I pay them any extra.











(Note: Tips are traditionally baked into the final sum of the tab, about 10% of the final sum goes to the waiters/waitresses.)

Svenska, I agree with you in principle. However, I don't know how they do it in Sweden, but in the U.S. a waiter/waitresses tips are taxed. And it doesn't matter that you didn't get any tips for a shift. They take a percentage, I believe for tax purposes it's 10% of the total cost of product served, and the server has to pay that amount in taxes on the tips that should have been garnered by that amount of product, whether they actually received tips or not. Granted, it's kind of a bullshit system, but it's what they deal with.

After working in restaurants I don't mind tipping at all. Restaurant work, for the money received, is inordinately hard work. Particularly waiting tables. The term Hell On Earth comes to mind. Tipping also comes in handy when you appreciate better than average service and would like to keep getting it. My band, when we play locally, always go to breakfast at the same spot after a show. The waitresses all hope we sit in their section because we tip very good, so when we come in everything is damn near perfect. Not just what you'd expect as an average, but exceptional. And this is for only a few dollars more.

 

[Guest]

I never tip. The restaurants should pay their employees sufficient salary. And the owner of a proper restaurant should never have allowed a group of people to go so far in their harassment as the group you mentioned did, Cat. Swedes are considered meek to the extreme, but even here the patron would have thrown them out for acting like that.

Sure, I know a lot of Swedes who tip the waiters/waitresses if they do a really good job, but I never do. Doing a good job is what they're hired for. If they do it, they deserve a good salary, not a tip. If they don't do a good job, they're not doing the job they're hired to do = shouldn't keep that job.
I never tip a bus driver either.

The waitress in your story suffered a lot, yes, and it was a nice thing you did, Cat. I wouldn't have done it. I would have talked to her and told her not to let the assholes get to her, she was a good waitress, and I would certainly have asked the manager to deal with the assholes - I'm VERY surprised he didn't!

But tip... never. Sorry, I just think that the salary should be high enough so you don't NEED tips to pay your rent. And someone has to do a lot more than what they're actually hired to do before I pay them any extra.











(Note: Tips are traditionally baked into the final sum of the tab, about 10% of the final sum goes to the waiters/waitresses.)

Unfortunately that is untrue in the US. The last time I was a server we were making $3 an HOUR.... less then half of minimum wage. The tip is not 'figured into the bill'. So every time you stiff a server you are making sure that they don't actually make any money. The restaurant doesn't suffer, they don't actually care if you don't tip. However, those servers that are actually doing their jobs, working hard and making sure that you are getting the service that you desire.... get screwed. Nicely done.

 

[freshface]

I like the Australian system best. Nobody tips and everyone makes a decent wage. Here in Germany, the tax and tip are included in the price of the meal. If the menu says ten Euro, then your final bill is ten Euro. I don't mind being charged a fair price so that people are paid properly, but I hate the expectation everywhere I go that I'll pay a bit more to make up for low wages.

 

[oggbashan]

As I said in an earlier post, tipping varies with countries.

In the UK, all waiting staff must be paid the minimum wage. How the service charge and/or tips are divided between the staff has to be agreed and there are tax consequences as a result of that agreement.

Where the restaurant has a service charge, it is assumed to cover gratuities to the staff. Any tipping when a service charge is on your bill is for exceptional service.

People travelling to different countries can inadvertently offend by using their home country's tipping practices.

Og

 

[christabelll]

In Virginia - it's $2.19 an hour against tips. Heaven help you if its a slow or "quiet" night. And I said AGAINST tips meaning that even that meager amount lessens when you make $50.00 or more in tips that night. 10 percent of that comes off your wages. An 8 hour shift is 17 bucks and change minus 5 bucks from fifty. So for eight hours you have earned a wopping 12 bucks and 45 dollars in tips. So all said in 8 hours you would earn approximately 5 bucks an hour for working your ass off for pricks and jerks and stingy muthas. Oh and don't forget that 55 dollars (or so) you just earned gets taxed too... upwards to 33 percent. So your actual take home would be about 35.00. (and if you happend to qualify for full time benefits (insurance) that comes out of there too... taking to about 25 per day actually worked.

Thats not enough to feed yourself for a week these days let alone pay for rent or heat or anything that really matters.I dont think tips should be taxed at all. Its a gift. Not a wage.

I will always tip exemplary service. I will not tip a slovenly hellion with better things to do than their job. Give people a decent wage and for the most part they do a decent job.

And Ogg were you always this altruistic?

 

[Liar]

After working in restaurants I don't mind tipping at all. Restaurant work, for the money received, is inordinately hard work. Particularly waiting tables. The term Hell On Earth comes to mind.

I'm sure it can be, at the wrong place. I waited tables, sweeped floors and chopped lettuce in a handful of restaurants and cafés when I was in my late teens, and I must say that except for the crappy wages, the actual work wasn't all that bad. I've had worse jobs. Try cargo hauling in a dryfreeze factory, or your average supermaket slavery job for contrast. Or for pure soul-eroding means to make a living, try telemarketing.

Nobody tipped me for that shit.