“My Friends Didn’t Leave a Tip”
One couple asked for their checks as the rest of us were signing ours. The waitress took his card, ran it and brought back the book. When my friend opened it, his bill was there but his card was not in the
book. Keeping in mind the couple was a little drunk, the guy’s girlfriend was quite distressed. The couple told the waitress who grabbed two hostesses and began looking for it between our table and the waitress station (literally about 15 feet apart). Five minutes later — at the most — the waitress brought the card back and handed it to the girlfriend.
The boyfriend went to pay for the tab, which was over $150, and put down a $30 bill as tip. His girlfriend immediately grabbed the cash and started telling him not to tip her because she lost his card and didn’t “say sorry” when she returned it. At this point I said something because: 1) I think the waitress deserved to be tipped for the work she did. Nothing was actually lost (I think the card was in her apron pocket); and 2) I and the boyfriend frequent this restaurant/bar frequently, and I don’t want to be associated with someone who doesn’t tip.
So my questions on tipping are this:
1) Do most people feel obligated to tip? Do you start off assuming you’ll tip between 15-20% and go up or down from there based on service? Or do you start at 0 and only tip for satisfactory/good service? I believe that you tip not only for services rendered, but if you’re in a place you go to frequently, you’re tipping based on future expectations. The girlfriend in question thinks that you tip solely based on services rendered that time, and that a tip is a “bonus” and shouldn’t be expected.
2) What are offenses that would keep people from tipping? And do you tell the waitress or manager why you didn’t tip or just leave nothing? — Tipped Off
The girlfriend in question is one tacky hot mess. Was she raised in a barn? Or, perhaps Europe (where tipping isn’t as customary as it is in other parts of the world)? Otherwise, I cannot fathom how she has made it to legal drinking age without understanding the rules of tipping, which are thus: ALWAYS TIP! I mean, what kind of jerk doesn’t leave a tip after hours of hanging around, ordering drinks, needing service, and getting drunk? There’s no excuse! Servers work damn hard for their tips, without which they typically don’t even make enough to cover the cost of their commute to and from work.
Unless a server is entirely out of line, as in: spits in your food in front of you, calls you or your friends names, or sexually harasses you, a tip is always expected. Generally, a tip of 18-20% is customary, with the lower end going to those servers who aren’t as attentive and the higher end going to those who are fast with refilling water glasses, taking orders, and carding you when you’re a middle-aged woman going through perimenopause.
So, what do you do if you happen to be with a group of people and the check comes and your friends don’t leave enough of a tip? You call them out on it. You count the bills and announce, “We’re five bucks short. Did everyone make sure to leave 20% for the tip?” If no one ponies up — the cads! — you shame the jerks. You sigh, dig into your pocket or wallet, fish out a fiver and say, “Fine, I’ll cover it this time. Our server was great and deserves at least a 20% tip for dealing with all of us.” Then, the next time you’re out with said friends, ask for separate checks.
In your case, LW, since you frequent this bar regularly, I would have approached the waitress after your friends left, handed her a 20 and apologized for your pal’s bad manners. Even if it weren’t a bar that you frequent regularly, the right thing to do would have been to urge your friend to please leave a tip since you all know how hard the waitress worked serving your drunks asses all afternoon and that the lost credit card was a simple mistake that anyone could have made, especially after a long day of dealing with a bunch of obnoxious drunks during the holiday season, and it didn’t cost anyone anything except five minutes of anxiety. If they refused to leave an appropriate compensation for a job well done, I would have left it myself and then have been sure to not go out with those friends again.
In the event that the service sucked, you could opt to leave a smaller tip (say, 15%), and/or ask to speak to a manager about the server’s behavior.
Readers, what are some of your more memorable tipping experiences (either as a tippee or a tipper)? Have you ever not left a tip on principle? How have you handled bad service? Have you ever been out with friends who were stingy with the tipping?
If you have a relationship/dating question I can help answer, you can send me your letters at [email protected].
I always tip 20%+ unless someone is downright rude, and then it’s 15%. When I’m in the Netherlands and servers get a liveable wage and benefits, I go with the regional custom of leaving change on the table.
Any groupon users on here? I’ve been to a couple of places where I have a groupon where the server was downright hostile about it, and I don’t get it. The point is to bring in new business – I know to tip on the full amount, not the discounted amount, but after weird rudeness, or being left at a table for 30 minutes without anyone speaking to us, I don’t particularly want to tip well. Which would only further the hostility for the next groupon user.
I hate it SO much when I feel like a server ignores a group of people because they don’t feel like they are going to tip well—because then, obviously, I don’t want to tip well after you were just rude and dismissive towards me for an hour, but I don’t want to prove you right either. These kind of servers need to realize its a self-fulfilling prophecy….
I’m from Canada, and I always thought a 15% tip was customary. Oh no am I a cad??
Also, do you tip on the pre or post tax amount?
I always tip 20%. I might reduce it if it is legitimately terrible, but that is extremely rare. However, if they give me free things, I increase it :). I have a friend that reduce her tips drastically for minor things, and it just embarrasses me. The funny thing is, she is also my richest friend…she just feels like servers are obligated to cater to her every whim in order to earn a normal tip.
I kind of see tipping a little differently. I think it has come away from its original intention which is to give the server extra money for exceptional service. It’s come to the point where we are obligated to not only throw a tip down but a 20% one regardless of service. It really heats me up when they already add the tip to the bill. For example, I was out with my boyfriend last week at a resturant in NYC. Even though it was a Saturday night the resturant was not crowded at all. It took the waitress quit some time to come over and ask for our drink order. We then asked for 5 more minutes to decide on food. Well, 25 minutes later, all while the our waitress was flirting with the bar staff and we attempted to wave her down, does she finally take our order. After the food came out we saw very little of her. We have to grab other waitresses to get more napkins, a refill of wine, extra plate, etc. Then the bill finally comes alone and the 20% tip was already included! ( and may I also add, how many times does a resturant do this and you dont even realize and then leave even more $$). Anyways, needless to say we were alittle pissed. I didn’t feel her service deserved the 20%. I would have thrown her $10 on our $150 bill and would not have felt ashamed of it.
Don’t get me wrong, I support tipping but it shouldn’t be an obligatory amount. It is truly meant as an added bonues (and incentive) for excellent service. It should be the resturant/bar’s job to pay their servers livable wages. It shouldn’t be up to the customer to suppliment their income.
It drives me crazy when people act like they’re doing the server a favor by leaving any tip at all. For some reason, people don’t understand that the hourly wage for servers is so low that tips are how they make their money.
When we go out, 20% is standard, but we tip extra for great service (or for our favorite/regular servers). I have a friend who is a server at a steakhouse, and she once got tipped 73 cents on a $79.27 bill. The people thought “they’d be nice” by rounding up. She was furious because they had spent the entire night telling her how great of a job she was doing and being really friendly. It’s like they just had no clue.
I completely agree with Wendy that in a situation with low-tipping friends, you should first speak up, and then if they refuse to pay, just cover it yourself. It’s frustrating, but at least you’re doing the right thing.
I hate tipping- I think it’s really annoying and I think restaurant owners should have to actually pay their employees a decent ammount (and pay taxes on it, like the rest of employers out there).
That said, I always tip, and I always tip well, especially when a waiter/waitress has given excellent service. I usually leave 20%, but will adjust it based on the job done. Free stuff always equals a better tip!
I tip 20% standard, usually more, and it takes a hell of a lot for me to tip less. A night out with my mom when I was a teenager taught me to take the whole experience into consideration, and to be understanding if a server is having an off night (or if the restaurant is slammed and it’s her first night on the floor.
As for poor tippers, I briefly dated a guy who refused to leave a tip when we were out for dinner – and we’re talking a $15 total meal. I left the tip as he walked out…it didn’t last.
LW, good on you for speaking up. If they don’t take the hint, you may want to reconsider who you include in your visits to sit-down establishments (at least separate the checks!)
I’m late to the party this morning, but here are some thoughts because I feel really strongly about this issue…
In the US in particular, tipping has always been a big part of our culture (possibly because we are less comfortable than Europe with the idea of a serving class). Because of this, many service workers are actually paid LESS and expected to make up the difference in tips, which of course sounds ridiculous. In an ideal world, people would just be paid a proper amount and I could then Tip or not based on good service, but we aren’t in an ideal world so this is what I do…
For general food service, I assume that I’ll tip between 15-20%. As long as the waiter/tress is doing his/her job, they are going to get that amount because I know that if tipping wasn’t customary, the price of my meal would be increased by about that value. As long as a server is remotely interested/apologetic for things that are bad from a service standpoint, they will be getting that tip range. A simple ‘Sorry it took so long to get over here’ is more than appropriate because that’s how civil people act.
On the rare occasion a server is just awful. By awful I mean they ignore me, are rude, effectively aren’t doing their job, and seem genuinely uncaring at this fact. In these cases, I ask to the see the manager, and explain why I was unhappy with my service. I still tip the appropriate amount though.
On the rare occasion when a server is just awesome, they get a tip well above 20% and I also ask to see the manager to tell them how great their employee is and that if all their employees are like that, I’ll definitely be coming back.
terrible group tipping moment: Was out with old and new friends in DC, some of us were visiting, some of us were living there so not everyone knew each other before we meet up for a movie and lunch in chinatown. I knew three of the people in our group were on tight budgets, I was close with one of them, having meet the other two just that day. So when my really good friend suggested a restaurant that she always goes to in Chinatown, all of us checked out the menu and prices before. Everyone said they were fine with it and we sat down to lunch. Then the two in the group who I just meet ordered small appetizers and water, while the rest of us had larger orders and drinks. Fine, to each his own. At the end of the meal we split the checks and those three that were on tighter budgets paid together. While my good friend put in enough money to account for tax and tip, the two others put in exactly what their meals cost and no more. While the total sum paid their whole bill, it was with no tip as my friends tip/tax went to cover their tax. The chinese waitress sees this and outright tells them that there has been no tip added to the bill. They both shrugged and said ‘ok’ and did nothing. I was mortified and also embarrassed we had taken them to a restaurant that my other friends and I frequent. We both added more tip to our bills before handing them in and were just generally annoyed for the rest of the visit.
I used to do payroll for a bunch of restaurants. Federal law in the US says that waiters/waitresses are required to report their tips to payroll each day, and any waiter or waitress that receives lower than minimum wage in base salary + tips is required to have the difference paid to them by the restaurant or bar that they work at. So if a waiter or waitress is getting less than minimum wage, the restaurant is basically breaking the law.
Here tipping isn´t really expected as in the US. I just googled it, and apparently the average tip here ranges from 5-10% (which is what my husband and I usually leave- although I´m a bit more generous). Most restaurants now also charge you a “service fee” per person.
We also don´t tip hairdressers, etc. I usually leave the change for delivery people, and if the person at the service station is nice, washes my windshield, etc, I also tip something.
I don´t get how restaurant owners in the US get away with paying such low wages.
They get away with it because its the federal minimum wage. And if we tried to raise it so they were required to actually have a base pay of real minimum wage, I’m sure there would be a huge uproar.
I feel the need to clarify something – it is true that most Europeans are not used to tipping (it’s becoming more common in these last few years), BUT waiters are decently paid for their services by their employer and can survive on the pay that they recieve.
I do agree that it is polite to tip when a service is great or enjoyable, I don’t consider myself a barbarian when I don’t tip an average or below average performance.
I have five kids, so you can imagine that we don’t go out often. That said, I always tip extra because, no matter how good they are, kids are extra work. They spill. They drop things. They leave a bit more mess to clear.
Another issue is that I don’t drink. And I assume that they’re expecting a tip that also includes the alcohol total…so I always tip extra for that.
One night, my daughter and I were out on a night of abstinence from meat, and couldn’t really find anything appealing. So we ordered an appetizer each (which really was plenty). Was that fair on the server, who has to do the same amount of work? Absolutely not. So I tipped on what the bill would have been had we actually had a “normal” meal. Plus a little, since I wasn’t drinking.
That said, I have left no tip before, with a written explanation of what specific behaviors led to that decision (I don’t really remember details, but I wrote about a page) in as positive a vein as I could. I really did it with the intention of helping the person … now that I’m older, I think I would leave a tip with the comments if it happened again.
I always leave 20% no matter what. Even if the server is rude and shitty. (Ok, maybe only 18% if the server is rude and shitty.) Why? Because you don’t know what kind of day they’ve had – you don’t know what they’re going through, who they’re supporting, what’s weighing on them. It’s kind of rude and shitty of you to decide you’re going to cut a server’s income because you thought he or she should have refilled your drink faster or whatever. A good friend of mine – who is super rich, by the way – leaves only 15% if the server was fine and nothing or 5 to 10% if the server sucks, in her humble opinion. Really? Really???!!! When I’m with her, I always end up adding to my bill the tip she should have left. And this friend of mine always insist on going to really nice/trendy places that I don’t want to go to because I hate spending lots of money on froufrou food that comes in small portions. So, I end up spending a shit ton b/c she chooses some trendy new restaurant and then I have to leave her portion of the tip too. God, this friend of mine sucks. I remember now why I avoid her calls.
Even if the girlfriend is from Europe she should still be versed in the American tipping culture – my dad is from Germany and so we have family friends come over to the states to visit (since they get months of vacation a year) and all of them – teenagers to adults, understand that waitresses here don’t make much money and that the tip is their salary. Just saying, don’t give Europeans a bad name 😉
20% is standard for me…25% if they were attentive without being annoying….15% if I’m not happy…and honestly I have stiffed before if the service is abysmal. So far stiffing has only happened once in my lifetime and I eat out several times a week so don’t judge me too hard.
Also…I don’t know about you guys, but I miss purple thumbs…and I originally was against them.
Also, I agree that tipping isn’t really an option anymore…but could we call it a service fee then? Because if it isn’t optional it really doesn’t fall under the definition of a “tip” anymore…
I always tip on the whole amount. Just this weekend I ordered a pizza and the guy had to drive through the pouring rain to bring it to me. He got a huge tip. I felt for him.
Here’s a question I’ve been wondering about for a while, and maybe you guys can weigh in. We often do take-out at higher scale restaurants. Is it appropriate to tip? I tip a small amount if my food is ready and waiting, but I’m not sure off if this is a good idea or a bad idea? If I should, what’s an appropriate tip?
I always loved this story (who knows if it was ever true) showing even small children know right from wrong.
Many years ago, a 10-year-old boy walked up to the counter of a soda shop and climbed onto a stool. He caught the eye of the waitress and asked, “How much is an ice cream sundae?”
“Fifty cents,” the waitress replied. The boy reached into his pockets, pulled out a handful of change, and began counting. The waitress frowned impatiently. After all, she had other customers to wait on.
The boy squinted up at the waitress. “How much is a dish of plain ice cream?” he asked. The waitress sighed and rolled her eyes. “Thirty-five cents,” she said with a note of irritation.
Again, the boy counted his coins. At last, he said, “I’ll have the plain ice cream, please.” He put a quarter and two nickels on the counter. The waitress took the coins, brought the ice cream, and walked away.
About ten minutes later, she returned and found the ice cream dish empty. The boy was gone. She picked up the empty dish—then swallowed hard.
There on the counter, next to the wet spot where the dish had been, were two nickels and five pennies. The boy had had enough for a sundae, but he had ordered plain ice cream so he could leave her a tip.
I would be embarrassed, if I was you. It was most likely a mistake, and the waitress gave great service the rest of the time, and your friend is pussy for letting his GF tell him what to do, and his girlfriend shouldn’t be allowed to eat out. The waitress was probably mad at you guys for taking up the table for so long, but you didn’t see her giving bad service, because of that. So instead of making $5.00 an hour for waiting your table she made nothing… sweet.
I believe that everyone…EVERYONE…regardless of who they are should have at least one job in the service industry in their life. I really truly think it makes you a more compassionate person. My standard is 20% regardless of the service, because having waited tables and bartended for so many years, I know how even if the server is a little bit off, a good tip can actually brighten their mood. If there’s really crappy service, I still give 18% and you can bet that I’m going to your manager. I rarely get rude servers because I am super polite and ask questions about them, chat with them, and smile my ears off. I usually give about %30 for great service, and if I know you and you’re taking care of me (like my old coworkers) yeah, then they’re getting 50%-100% tip. However, when I was bartending for my old coworkers on their nights off, I was getting the same. Coworker once gave me $80 on a $30 tab.
No, I’m not made of money…if I don’t have enough money for a decent tip, I don’t go out. Dining out is a luxury, not a right. It’s kind of selfish to think that just because you don’t believe in tipping, you don’t have to leave a tip. We all have to do things we don’t like to do in life, so don’t punish a server just because you’re angry at the establishment.
I suck at math, so I always leave $2 to every $10 on my bill. Sometimes that ends up being more than 20%, but even though I’ve never worked more than 2 weeks as a waitress (volunteered so a friend wouldn’t lose her job, and I sucked!), I think it’s part of going out. Waitresses and waiters don’t make that much without tip, and they’re helping me enjoy the eating out experience. If you sit down to eat, then you tip for service. I’ve definitely asked to talk to the manager if I’ve had a completely crappy experience that would warrant decreasing to a 15% tip, but I’ve never just not tipped for a sit down meal or bar tab. I think LW should have covered tip, especially since it’s a place frequented often, and then had a talk with the friend about his and his girlfriend’s inappropriate behavior.
Here’s my question, though: if you order take out, do you tip? Like if you call it in or walk in, place your order at the bar, and then the bartender hands you the food from the kitchen once it’s ready, what’s acceptable practice?
I could Think of some more colorful Words for sAid girlfriend, but I’ll sTifle myself.
A tip is not a “bonus,” it’s standard practice. It’s kind of like giving up your seat to a senior citizen or a pregnant woman; it’s not required by law, but assuming you were raised properly, it’s just what you do. Withholding a tip because one card from a party-table was misplaced for a couple minutes is totally unreasonable (and it wasn’t even her card!)
People are probably going to think this is overkill, and that’s fine, but if it was me, next time I see that waitress at that bar (even if she’s not waiting on you, but especially if she is) I’d give her the extra $20. Tell her you weren’t aware until later of the faux pas made by certain members of your party. It’ll make you feel better, the gesture will mean a lot to her, and she’ll remember that. And trust me, especially if you’re a regular, you always want to stay in the waitstaff’s good graces.
There was one time when my friends and I tipped my waiter mere pennies. That being said, it was a restaurant that the three of us went to ALL the time (once a week/once every two weeks), and were usually pretty good with our tips (20%, and I think one time we left the waitress close to 50% and a smiley face on the receipt because she charged all three of us for one “bottomless” meal and we kinda fell in love with her). The waiter we only gave pennies to really pissed us off because he straight up ignored us because we were kids (16, 15, and 14). He would happily serve the tables around us but just pass over us. We were mad, and we didn’t know how to handle it, and probably would have been too embarrassed to talk to the manager or anything like that. So we left pennies. Was it not right? Yeah. Do I regret it? HELL TO THE NO.
I work in theatre. Many of the people I work with get by by waiting tables. Barring unusually dreadful service, I always leave 20%.
Curiously enough, growing up in the 80s in Southwest Va, I was taught that 10% was standard for poor service, 15% for good, and 20% for truly excellent. Is this a regional thing, or have tips inflated too, to the point that 20% is now standard for any kind of service at all?
If 20% is now standard for average service, I guess I’ll have to reevaluate the idea that I always tip “generously,” because 20% is about all I can afford to budget for tips at this time, barring really amazing service.
I don’t think there is ANY excuse not to leave an appropriate amount of tip now – especially since most phones come with a tip calculator now. When I still lived in the NY region, an attorney who used to wait tables advised me that doubling the tax in a restaurant is the minimum tip that should be left at the table in NY. Since it’s a lower tax rate here in SC, I generally like to go by leaving $5 for every $20 of food and beverage ordered.
If I order something takeout, I like to leave at least $1.00 or round up to the nearest multiple of 10 (e.g. lets say, my food order totals $14.95 – I leave a $20 and tell them to keep the change) for the staff who take my order. Even in fast food restaurants, if there is an option for a tip line, I write at least a $1. There are some dining establishments I visit that do NOT accept tips (like our favorite chinese food place, when we call in our order, or when I was travelling through Europe) – those are the only times I don’t tip. Even if service was horrendous, I at least leave 10%. The one time I didn’t leave any tip was when the waitress was being very cold and condescending to me while I was on a date with my husband – you don’t get a tip if you’re racist.
I never know when I’m having car trouble: Do I tip the AAA repairmen or the two truck drivers?
I usually always tip 20%… even if things take a while. Even though I’ve never been a waitress, I know I’d be terrible at it. I give waiters and waitresses all the credit in the world for doing what looks like a difficult and often annoying job. Even if something is forgotten or slow, I usually tip 20%.
I have one exception. Granted, I was in high school and we were dumb teenagers that didn’t consider the better thing would have been to speak to a manager. But, I remember having an awful waitress at Friendly’s. She was downright RUDE and literally sighed and made faces when we requested refills on soda or water. Maybe we were annoying? But, I didn’t really run with a bad group of kids that would have done much to warrant her attitude. There were other things she did, but it was 15 years ago, so I don’t remember the details. We left her change. Looking back, that wasn’t right. But, like I said, I was a teenager.
Sorry if I’m repeating a question, but I was wondering-how does one tip at Happy hour? I know the drinks and food are discounted, but sometimes-ok often-after having 2-3 cocktails, its hard for me to remember the original price and calculate tip, so I have done just 20% of what my bill is which is heavily discounted. Am I horrible person? Should I always make it a point to tip what my bill would normally cost? Any tips on how to remember post 2-3 drinks?!
i typically give 20%, more if the person is really nice or i know them. only once have my husband and i not tipped someone well. and the server was terrible. she came out and took our orders and then someone else brought our drinks and a different person brought our meals. then we had to flag someone down to get one refill and then flag someone else down for the bill. it wasn’t a busy night and we couldn’t figure out what was going on. we would see her walking around but when we tried to get her attention she ignored us. we talked to the manager and he just kind of made it seem like we were making a big deal out of nothing. we haven’t been back and probably never will.
I agree that tipping is necessary. I also think all the “rules” of modern day tipping are just way too complicated. It would be so much easier if it were like it used to be — when the server went above and beyond, you leave a tip. But, unfortunately tipping has become part of the culture of eating out. We all need to tip because servers simply can’t LIVE off of $2 per hour.
My boyfriend used to work at a restaurant where he earned something like $2.50 per hour plus tips. He was earning money to get him through college at the time. He was a great waiter so he ended up earning some pretty good money in tips, but without those tips he would have been earning maybe $15 for a night of work. And that work is HARD. Trying to please everybody, fill everyone’s drinks, take care of everyone’s needs…it’s not easy money by any means.
I always tip, no matter how bad the service is. I never tip below 15% and will tip as high as 30% for really good service. I never tip less than $2, no matter how small the tab. I always tip my delivery guys, housekeepers, hairdresser, barrista, mailman, and bus person if I’m eating at a buffet. I worked for 4 years as a housekeeper at a hotel to put myself through college so I know what kind of crap (literally sometimes) they go through. One time we had a whole football team stay for a week of training. Teenage boys who spend their day practicing outside in July, 4 to a room, is bad enough but when they decide that they need to shave their heads to bond things get real. You know how hard it is to clean your bathroom of all the hairs you shed… No tip. We shut down the building for a whole day and stayed overtime just to get the place back to reasonable cleanliness. I know it’s my job to clean your hotel room but it’s not too much to ask that you have some consideration. And they stole/left on the field half our towels while the rest had questionable stains. My theory is that the majority of people who work in those fields do so to make ends meet. I worked their because I needed to support myself but needed a place flexible because of my school hours. Unless the service is truly horrific, I always leave a standard tip. My partner and I always fill out the customer satisfaction survey, whether to say how much we enjoyed the meal or to complain about the service.
While I think a gratuity should be just that, it simply isn’t and stiffing the wait staff for bad service might make you feel good at the moment and you might be justified in it but I don’t think it’s right when they depend on tips to live. Definitely complain to the manager though, that’s really the only practical thing you can do. Stiff the waiter today and all you’ll get is to be known as a bad tipper every time you go to eat at that place afterwards.
Yeah, the whole tipping thing. This is one of those issues that exists in theory, and then the reality is very different. What I mean is, in all honesty, I’m kind of in theoretical agreement with the guy from the opening scene of Reservoir Dogs. That is, serving is a hard job, and they should be compensated well by their employers, not the customers. There are a shit ton of other hard jobs that also service customers- tellers, retail etc. And their pay is horrible, just because it doesn’t involve food? At some restaurants, servers can make a great deal of money on tips. And what, serving alcohol is exponentially more difficult to warrant a relatively huge increase in tips? In many European countries, servers make a decent living- and tips are not the norm, unless the customers are American and don’t know any better. You leave some change, maybe. But they still make a living, because their employers pay them a wage that is appropriate for what they do. Here, the weird tipping custom actually enables restaurant employers to tip BELOW minimum wage because tip income is taken into account. Seems rather silly to me.
BUT. In reality, you’re just eating chicken tacos, not freedom fighting. You should tip this poor kid that’s working their butt off. And most people who are stingy towards wait staff are stingy in other ways, and in practice, usually not very nice people.
I always tip at least 20% including take-out delivery. I was taught to calculate it by doubling the first digit of the total bill (so, $40 would be an $8 tip) but I tend to round up (a $32 bill would get a $7 or $8 tip) and so does my fiance who is an equally emphatic tipper, which is something I’ve always appreciated about him. He’s cheap and tries to avoid spending money we could save but he considers a solid tip to be part of the expense of eating food we didn’t prepare ourselves.
To me, stingy tipping is evidence of not understanding the value of those extra dollars and what they mean to the person receiving the tips. An ex used to use the tip calculator on his phone to figure out exactly 15% tip and wouldn’t leave a penny more. He also didn’t work until after graduating college and had no concept of how much a person earns for a given amount of time/work because his parents always gave him a sizable allowance just for being their wonderful son. I don’t resent him for that because he didn’t exactly choose to have parents who could do that, but the tipping made me absolutely nuts. It wasn’t a total dealbreaker but it definitely helped when I made the decision to break up with him.
For all of you who “never tip less than 20%,” or 18% or 15%, no matter what, even if the service is bad, I have news for you – you are doing a disservice to bad servers. You’re telling them “you’re awesome” when they suck. How will they ever improve or give a crap about customers if you have them strokes they haven’t earned?
When I waited tables, I had a lot to learn. No customer would ever say to my face I was doing something wrong – most people don’t want the confrontation, nor should they have to be put in such an awkward position. BTW, chewing out the server to management could lose the server their job. As long as the server isn’t rude or disrespectful, I won’t criticize them to the manager.
It was my responsibility to do my job well and figure out what I could do better if I received a lesser tip. After all, my performance was my responsibility. The good ones will learn (and get tips from other servers), the bad ones will move on. Vindictive and judgmental customers are part of the package, care about the people you serve and most won’t penalize you.
One final point – I made $2.00/hr in wages back in the mid-80’s when regular min wage was $3.35/hr. I can’t believe some of the posts where server min wages haven’t progressed alongside non-server min wages. That is a major problem.
There have been two instances that I did not tip.
1.) I was in high school and went to a Denny’s with some friends. There was one other table besides us, but those people ended up throwing some money on the table for drinks and leaving. Our waitress said that our group of 6 was too large for her to take the order, and that we would have to go to the front and give the manager our orders ourselves. So we did. She brought us our food, but that was it. We asked for refills and were ignored for at least 10 minutes. When she finally remembered, she brought the pitchers out, handed them to us, and told us to refill our own drinks. We asked for the check and didn’t receive it until 30 minutes later. She took forever to bring our cards and receipts, so one of the guys went to find her and ask her so we could finally leave. She handed everything to him and said “here you do it”.
2. I went to a Mexican restaurant with my boyfriend. Our waitress took our drink and food order…and that was all. She never brought us the drinks, refills, more chips, more salsa, food, anything. Another waiter would see that she set everything down somewhere else and would bring it to us. We couldn’t even ask our waitress to bring us anything because she never walked by our table again. The food was also terrible. When we were leaving the manager asked us how everything was and my boyfriend told him that we had only seen our waitress once. The manager shrugged and walked off.
Besides those two times, I always tip 15% for “eh well it wasn’t horrible” service, 20% for average, and more if the service is better.
I knew a guy (from a fairly wealthy family) who wouldn’t tip food deliverers at all. Suffice to say, he tells bums asking for change to “fuck off” and mooches off his room mates groceries (while refusing to share his).
I hate stingy people.
That being said, I tip %15-%20, depending on service. If service is really terrible, and there’s not a huge crowd in the restaurant or anything like that, then I don’t tip. But that’s very rare.
I spent a summer in the middle of nowhere in Africa- there’ s no tipping yourself for your constant diet of PBJs and canned vegetables in the veldt. And even on the rare occasions when we spent time in the city, a 10% tip was considered extremely generous even in a nice restaurant. So when I came back to the States, there was a good two week period during which I was constantly forgetting to tip my waitresses! It was horribly embarrassing.
I tip starting at 20%for average service. I have only ever left a bad tip once, after a truly horrendous occasion that started with no server even approaching ate table for 40 minutes to take drink/food orders, and ended with the server dumping a pot of hot tea in my lap. When folks who came in after you are getting their food, but no minutes to taken your order yet, it’s not going to be a good scenario. We left a quarter for a tip and spoke to the manager. He had the decency to apologize, but I’ve never gone back there.