When Did "Tips" (Gratuities) Become So High?

[sidious618]

Waiters tend not to get paid much and if I have the ability to go out to eat I think I could do worse than to leave a little something for the person who served me. Throwing down an extra few bucks after getting a hamburger with fries is hardly going to kill me but it will likely help the waiter out. We live in a community and do need to look out for people.

 

[O'Dib]

Sounds to me like this culture makes waiters into a whole new underclass just so us normals could stroke our egos over being in a good enough position to practice trickle-down economics. It's a scam perpetuated by republicans, I tells ya!

 

[Yoda]

I probably average over 20 percent for my tips. I try not to be a difficult customer, and even with pretty terrible service I don't think I've ever gone below 10 percent.

So, with that said, I'd absolutely prefer if the tipping system went away. Prices would go up, sure, but probably by less than what I tip. Meanwhile, it's usually the customers who are the biggest demanding jackasses that leave bad tips, and their prices would go up. Win-win.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

No.

If you have no intentions of tipping, maybe you should tell your server up front that way they won't go out of their way to do anything special for you..

Who wants special service?
Who said I don't have any intentions to tip?

The way American servers are supposed to do their jobs seem was to intrusive into the dining situation and downright annoying, hovering around the table, refilling glasses all the time.
A good server is fast, friendly, reacts to the customers signals and otherwise stays away from the eating and talking customers.

For the most part, I leave the customers alone and bring them drinks when it seems they need them. I don't hover. It is off these tables I make the most money.

My problem is with the needy fucks who ask for only one thing, wait till I bring said thing back, ask for something else. I ask if there's anything else they need besides this item. No. So, I go get that item. When I get back, their drinks are slurped down and they need refills. I go get them. When I get back, they get back to asking for one thing at a time again. When I make multiple trips too and from the table, they've already slurped their drinks down again. It's these fuckers who don't tip. And they seem to get some sort of perverse pleasure in behaving in such a manner. And they usually don't tip. These are the people I have a problem with.

 

[Amaris]

If you have no intentions of tipping, maybe you should tell your server up front that way they won't go out of their way to do anything special for you..

Who wants special service?
Who said I don't have any intentions to tip?

The way American servers are supposed to do their jobs seem was to intrusive into the dining situation and downright annoying, hovering around the table, refilling glasses all the time.
A good server is fast, friendly, reacts to the customers signals and otherwise stays away from the eating and talking customers.

For the most part, I leave the customers alone and bring them drinks when it seems they need them. I don't hover. It is off these tables I make the most money.

My problem is with the needy fucks who ask for only one thing, wait till I bring said thing back, ask for something else. I ask if there's anything else they need besides this item. No. So, I go get that item. When I get back, their drinks are slurped down and they need refills. I go get them. When I get back, they get back to asking for one thing at a time again. When I make multiple trips too and from the table, they've already slurped their drinks down again. It's these fuckers who don't tip. And they seem to get some sort of perverse pleasure in behaving in such a manner. And they usually don't tip. These are the people I have a problem with.

Ooh, I know how you feel there. It was like that when I was helping another server on a 40 person group. They were churchies, and they had lots of kids. Between the other server and myself, we must have made a couple hundred trips back and forth during the 2 hours they stayed. They never wanted for drinks, for extra condiments or anything. We were polite, engaging, and treated them with great hospitality. When they left, the table was a marshmallow/coffee/ketchup/mayonnaise covered mess. How much did they tip? Two dollars.

 

[Yoda]

^Hey if Jesus wanted you to have more than 2 bucks he would've given them a sign. Shouldn't have pissed Jesus off like that.

 

[Amaris]

^Hey if Jesus wanted you to have more than 2 bucks he would've given them a sign. Shouldn't have pissed Jesus off like that.

Yeah.
Man, church folks were the worst, though. Them, and the Amway guys.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

^Hey if Jesus wanted you to have more than 2 bucks he would've given them a sign. Shouldn't have pissed Jesus off like that.

Yeah.
Man, church folks were the worst, though. Them, and the Amway guys.

I actually had an idea for a line of bracelets and t-shirts based on the old WWJD that people used to wear. Mine was going to be WWJT? What Would Jesus Tip?

 

[Amaris]

^Hey if Jesus wanted you to have more than 2 bucks he would've given them a sign. Shouldn't have pissed Jesus off like that.

Yeah.
Man, church folks were the worst, though. Them, and the Amway guys.

I actually had an idea for a line of bracelets and t-shirts based on the old WWJD that people used to wear. Mine was going to be WWJT? What Would Jesus Tip?

You should do that, and watch the orders come in every Friday night and Monday Morning.

 

[iguana_tonante]

Also iguana, I hate the drink refill thing. They often come and take away your drink and give you a new one before the first one is entirely done, and I like flat, watered down pop so they take away the most delicious part.

I like my coke flat and watered down, too. Fizzy drinks make my nose itch.

Well, I think a big part of it is that the soda and often lemonades they bring you don't come from bottles or pitchers, they are from the soda fountain machines (I can't think of the proper name for them so here's a picture: Soda thing).

Here in most restaurants soda and other soft drinks come from a fountain too. Some upper class restaurants don't have them, but you are not supposed to order soda in there, either.

 

[MacLeod]

Wow.

I have a funny feeling that some of the people here who are pissing about tipping have never work as waiter/watress.

I have no problem with tipping. I would either tip the 15% gratuity or whatever I have enough to tip. I even tip if the service was sub-par (it might be less).

Is it just me or does most Americans have an entitlement complex?

I'm entitled to get a tip.
I'm entitled not to tip you, whether the service was good or not.
I'm entitled to get a 20% pay raise but beggers can't be choosers, right?

People who have never worked in a particular field espically the service sector don't always realise the amount of crap they have to put up with. It doesn't matter if it's waiting on tables or being a cashier in a store.

 

[Gaseous Anomaly]

I tip generous most of the time but last night the waitress brought me my dinner and left off one of the sides. I asked her about the side dish and she said oh, I'll be right back with that for you. 30 minutes later she brings me the bill with the side dish charged and still no side. I left her .50 on a 12 dollar bill. I have no problems doing that, she was lucky to get 50 cents.

 

[MacLeod]

I would actually be getting the side which I didn't recieve removed from the bill as I don't see why I should pay for something I didn't get.

 

[Scout101]

People who have never worked in a particular field espically the service sector don't always realise the amount of crap they have to put up with. It doesn't matter if it's waiting on tables or being a cashier in a store.

And people that have ONLY worked in the service industry don't always realize that the rest of the freaking world works the same way, and that it's not unique to them. Actually BETTER in the service industry, as the pricks GO AWAY after an hour, instead of having to deal with them for years...

Everyone puts up with crap. As much as waiters bitch about bad tips, it's not commonplace. Never seen a waiter that wants to do away with the system, because despite the bad tippers, they're plenty more that are good, and it ends up being a decent-paying job for not requiring any difficult training or special skills.

For anyone bitching about tips, would you do away with the system and take a straight $10-15 an hour? Of course not. Because you'd lose money.

 

[Gaseous Anomaly]

I would actually be getting the side which I didn't recieve removed from the bill as I don't see why I should pay for something I didn't get.

It was late and I was tired, this just seemed easier in this case.

 

[JoeZhang]

People who have never worked in a particular field espically the service sector don't always realise the amount of crap they have to put up with. It doesn't matter if it's waiting on tables or being a cashier in a store.

People who work in the service sector doesn't always realise the amount of crap I had to put up with to kill all those cows to turn into burgers for them to serve - they just think the burger appears from nowhere. It doesn't matter if it's working the bone saw or chucking the heads away.

 

[Spot's Meow]

People who have never worked in a particular field espically the service sector don't always realise the amount of crap they have to put up with. It doesn't matter if it's waiting on tables or being a cashier in a store.

And people that have ONLY worked in the service industry don't always realize that the rest of the freaking world works the same way, and that it's not unique to them. Actually BETTER in the service industry, as the pricks GO AWAY after an hour, instead of having to deal with them for years...

This is a good point. You have to deal with customers in the service sector, but any other job has its own clientele they have to deal with, whether they be the general public or a specific group of people they continually work with. I can think of individuals I have to deal with often in my job that are far worse and more annoying than when I worked in a service position. And as you said, I will have to be dealing with them for years on end, rather than for only one encounter.

The bottom line is, there are shitty people all over the place, and we all have to deal with them.

 

[tighr]

I'm surprised at all these non-tippers on a fairly left-leaning liberal political board. But then again, this isn't TNZ.

 

[Kestra]

I'm surprised at all these non-tippers on a fairly left-leaning liberal political board. But then again, this isn't TNZ.

Who are the non-tippers here?

 

[BillJ]

I'm surprised at all these non-tippers on a fairly left-leaning liberal political board. But then again, this isn't TNZ.

Who are the non-tippers here?

No shit.

Went to a restaurant on Friday night and still left a 12% tip even though it took a half hour for the waiter to even come over and get the first drink order for me and my family then another fifty minutes to get our food.

Got out of a movie at eight and didn't get out of the restaurant right below it til almost ten.