tipping

How are you feeling about tipping this week?

Tip Jar Conundrum

Should I tip for a free drink?

Tipping again, non food

My secret technique for not tipping bartenders and getting good service.

You forgot:

tipping

by searching google for tipping trip, i just came up with a picture of my old cub scout troop

webelos at the tittybar

i'm on it

xpost

haha maybe not

for me it's pretty simple - you tip because the waitstaff (here at least) get less than minimum wage, and if the 10 or so servers in rotation were each paid an extra $2 an hour to bring it into line, the price of the food you're eating would inevitably be more. so, tip because if other people didn't, you'd have to pay more anyways. other tippers are subsidizing your meal, in a way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlrnYoWW8IA

and this week in lake wobegone…

those children are all above average

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2302/2191192881_f591c42671.jpg

not NY, obv

Classic Ramzi.

Wait, a tipping thread w/no mention of Mr. Pink and double that it's Ramzi? Awesome opportunity missed.

ok i would just like to point out: i was NEW, i didn't know how to sEARCH or whatever!

so, there ya go.

It's not the search function or whatever rule thingie. It's that you are totally Mr. Pink!

not that i know Mr. Pink, but i'll take it -- BUT, i'm black too. just sayin.

i basically have to wrangle customers into giving me tips here in nz. eg. the other night i had this gruff old dude who told me not to bother telling him/friend the specials because he knew what he wanted and there was no way his friend would order any of them. so i bet him $20 i could convince his friend otherwise and i won. he came back in last night and we upped the stakes: i had to get all three of them to order specials. i won again.

in many ways, the more of a challenge it is, the more satisfying the tip.

(i should admit that i make well above minimum wage at my job, so tipping ethics aren't really the same for me)

you convincer you

I wonder if the situation in NZ will change anytime soon. Here in Wellington, bar staff don't seem to expect it. However, being a good Canadian by birth, raised on the 10-15% rule (before it went up), and a regular attender of bars, I always tip.

At a number of restaurants here, I see tip jars at the cashier, as it's often the case that you'll be served by more than one person and you often pay at the counter.

This might well be moot anyway. If you're paying by EFTPOS, for example, which seems to be more and more the norm, you're probably "tipping" your bank and cold hard cash or coin may never enter the equation.

-- do i have to draw you a diaphragm (Rock Hardy), Saturday, January 20, 2007 10:37 AM (Saturday, January 20, 2007 10:37 AM) Bookmark Link

god i miss changeable user names!

QUESTION:

if you have no change for a good tip, is it better to tip £1 on a £22 bill or nothing at all?

I think nothing at all is better: it's like spitting in their faces if you give a pound.

My dad tipped 7 euros (on 88 euros) for takeaway. Which is very uncommon in Belgium. hah

so i bet him $20 i could convince his friend otherwise and i won

lol genius.

Sometimes America's tip-happy culture strikes me as kind of gauche or unctuous or something. (I tip anyway.)

I kind of hate at a coffee shop when the jar says "starving college students fund" or something. "But I'M a starving college student." Which is why I'm buying coffee at a coffeeshop, of course.

this economy doesn't have time for your identity politics

No one has time for an Abbott anymore.

Me and the railroads, waning in this world of euros...

Why don't they tip (poorly paid) salespeople? I'm serious, why doesn't this happen????????????????

Salespeople aren't as poorly-paid as servers. They're guaranteed at least the minimum wage, where servers earn $2.35/hour. In the event that a server doesn't make enough in tips to reach the minimum wage for a shift, the restaurant is supposed to make up the difference (never heard of this actually happening, though, even on the occasion when a waiter had two tables for the entire night, etc.)

why not just make it mandatory to pay the minimum wage and let them raise the prices?

You could do that, but to what end? Just so people wouldn't have to figure out how to divide by five in their head?

Servers would actually be getting $12-15+ an hour. You've just quintupled labor costs for the front of the house - and restaurants would have to make up the tip out that goes to hosts/bussers/bar staff as well.

Final cost to the patron is probably the same, it would help some waiters (bad ones, or unlucky ones) and hurt some good waiters (who make more by virtue of bigger sections, better tips). Kind of pointless to overhaul an entire industry for that.

why is the industry different to begin with? these people are working at the bar/restaurant, so why aren't they paid like a normal employee?

and you're omitting that it would also charge everyone equally for the service costs, not just good tippers.

good waiters will still get tips, at least they do where i'm at (where service charges are usually included, and servers are subject to a reasonable minimum wage) and at least others would be getting a living wage fram a shitty job.

^^good point. like i said, i actually get paid really well in comparison to the rest of the hospo industry in NZ, but i still get tips occasionally. during our busiest time of the year i probably make an average of NZ$3-5 p/hr in tips, but now that we're hitting winter it's about NZ$2 p/hr.

xp - Tradition. Don't know what to tell you - I'm sure there are studies and studies on the History of Tipping In America. The history is irrelevant, though - what incentive is there to change the system drastically? What's the big deal?

I've never known a waiter (above the level of Denny's) who wasn't averaging a living wage. That's the draw of serving in the US - despite the stress and aggravation, it pays pretty well compared to jobs of its class.

A good waiter at a nice restaurant can make a good living in most cities. Most of my waiter/bartender friends make way more than I do, and tax free at that!

I know a guy who tends bar 4 shifts a week and brings home $900 -$1000 each week... and the bar is beer/wine only! can you say E-Z!?

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/food/2008/07/oh_no_british_people.html

LOL

Comments are hilarious.

I wonder what this waiter has a degree in?

neat gin? stout fella

He should just stop being so passive aggressive.

Germans were always much worse than Britishes

Comments are hilarious.

Didn't expect to find myself writing the phrase "Tory even by Comment Is Free standards" today, but looks like I just did

hmmm

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/12/magazine/12tipping-t.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print

Under the old system, waiters earned between $25 and $35 an hour, much of which was untaxed. “Now, waiters make about $25 an hour, which is fully taxed,” Boyd says.

Fuck a bunch of that.

i had a horrendous experience at a bar a few weeks ago. don't think i posted about it -- basically, a bitchy bartender told me off for requesting her cheapest beer. she thought i wasn't gonna tip her, but the whole point was that i wanted a cheap drink so i could like, afford a tip. so after she refused to serve me at first, and gave me all the lip (it was awful), i refused to take the beer. then her friend asked me to leave and i said no, i'm here for a friend's birthday and that's stupid. then their guy friend came up and was like, uh, she was just a huge bitch to him, leave him alone. and he gave me a free beer. new york is fucked.

what bar was this at?

"The Edge."