tipping

what he said

looool after the last couple weeks have been good with the tips, 54% of my paycheck went to taxes. can't win!

For years I’ve been tipping $1 per drink at “normal” bars (when ordering at the bar, of course). But now that “mixologists” and cocktails with multiple ingredients (and often complicated physical maneuvers!) are the norm at even my neighborhood bar, $1 no longer seems adequate. Are we to start tipping on $14 cocktails the way we tip on food? Say 15 to 20 percent? What do mixologists expect for that Cucumber Basil Crush with house-made ginger-elderberry liqueur, thai basil grown out back and ice shaved by hand the old-fashioned way?
A.

The dollar per drink you might tip for some “well” alcohol on the rocks is not adequate these days for that Cucumber Basil Crush. Mixologists are becoming chefs, and take special care in how their drinks are assembled and served. And for that reason, I’d tip $2.50 to $3 on a $14 cocktail — even if the bartender isn’t a great conversationalist.

http://dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/09/dear-flofab-please-dont-take-my-plate-yet/?src=tp

I miss frogbs

The very next time I order a Cucumber Basil Crush with house-made ginger-elderberry liqueur, thai basil grown out back and ice shaved by hand the old-fashioned way, I will be sure to make good use of this advice.

Man, this thread makes me so endlessly thankful I don't work at that restaurant anymore.

tipping is not just a city in china!

^^ meta frogbs

But really, don't ever sit down in an empty restaurant within 30 minutes of their stated close time. I know people who would go as far as to say an hour. Numerous people, tipped and untipped, are trying to clean the place up, both in the front and in the back of the house. Again you might say "tough shit, that's their job" but if that's your attitude you are probably already a horrible tipper and we don't want you anyway.

― Doctor Casino, Friday, July 29, 2011 12:17 PM (6 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this reply is half a year out of date, but i really dislike this kind of super-aggressive service staff hostility toward customers. look i know it's a tough job and that we're all just a bunch of drooling nincompoops, but the issue here isn't whether or not we figure it's you're job to be inconvenienced. a restaurant that chooses to seat you is a restaurant that has made it clear that it wants your business. period. if restaurants don't want the business past a certain point, then they should quit seating people at that point. and i tip very well, thank you, whether or not i can really afford it.

i mean, i wouldn't walk into a near-empty restaurant fifteen minutes before closing time and expect to eat. but a hopping full house at half an hour to close, why not? that's just me, though, and i don't expect everyone else in the world to adhere to my standards. bottom line is that restaurants shouldn't seat people they don't actively want to serve.

And for that reason, I’d tip $2.50 to $3 on a $14 cocktail — even if the bartender isn’t a great conversationalist.

Conversation skills come into it now? I've been way overtipping in that case.

For what it's worth, the restaurant I worked at was basically never, ever busy in the evening. I'm sure in the story I told, those people were the ONLY table seated in the restaurant.

And I maintain that in terms of increasing or decreasing the amount of unhappiness in the universe, the person deciding to sit down five minutes before closing is an asshole, even if the posted closing time ALLOWS them to do that. They're making a whole lot of people's day a lot worse. The ONLY way to make up for this is to leave a huge tip out of proportion to the price of the meal, and even this won't necessarily mean much to the cook, dishwasher, cashier, or whoever the fuck else is stuck there drumming their fingers waiting for this person to just goddamn order something already.

look i know it's a tough job

what job isn't tough though? the only jobs that aren't tough are the ones that are in another stratosphere from the ones you would get tipped for. 95% of jobs are tough.

Yeah I spent 5 years being yelled at, every single day, by at least 50% of the callers to my helpdesk job. No one much was thankful, everyone was rude, it was shiftwork, and it was very stressful.

Tips? Id fucking loved to have had tips.

They're making a whole lot of people's day a lot worse. The ONLY way to make up for this is to leave a huge tip out of proportion to the price of the meal, and even this won't necessarily mean much to the cook, dishwasher, cashier, or whoever

i've worked these jobs and these people can be pain in the arses. but ultimately they are right and the pissed off waiter, if he is pissed off, is very wrong. if it's the much of a problem then get another job.

*that much*

a call centre operator gets a call 5 minutes before the end of a shift that goes on for half an hour. that is brutal. and that person is not getting a tip or getting paid much, if at all, more than a waiter either.

well theyll get paid for that extra half hour of work

so will the waiter, cook, kitchen porter or whatever.

and if not then it's not the customer's job to reimburse them for that fact.

kitchen staff probably front of house... maybe

xxxpost I didn't like getting the last minute calls in the call center, but to be honest it's a less egregious crime than the restaurant sitting. The sin is when you call right at closing and aren't prepared (ie, if you're enrolling in something and don't have your choices already made, didn't bother to read your materials, etc).

and yea, you usually get OT anyway generally (or at least I did cuz I was already scheduled 40 a week). whereas in a restaurant, not necessarily, plus if you're a server you get paid dick so overtime isn't squat.

like the reason the last minute sitting in a restaurant sucks is because A. you probably cleaned everything and now it's getting messy again, and B. unlike a call center, when once the call ends, you can dash, you have to wait for the customers to actually get up and leave, which they don't always do after they're done eating and paid (sometimes you have to give them the subtle hints like turning the lights on).

So usually after they leave, you still have a bit of work to do, whereas in a call center you can generally up and walk out the door.

yeah, not sure folks are understanding that the average American waiter is making $2.13 an hour in wages

yeah my paychecks were usually like $20-$40

bartender wages are all over the place - sometimes decent money before tips (by decent I mean actual minimum wage), sometimes completely off the books so that tips are their entire income, sometimes $2.13 an hour just like a waiter

At my first waiting job, I actually had health insurance, drawn from my paycheck. Only I didn't realize that I didn't really have insurance for six months because my paychecks were non-existent even before my insurance. (I was 18 and stupid, or that might have occurred to me.)

fwiw front of house staff in a nice place are probably making way more money than someone in a call center after tips so i dont think its really 'about' that. and sometimes you just really want to eat at a place or are tired yourself and dont want to search for anything else or this was the only place everyone could agree on blah blah blah its not the end of the world but you are being inconsiderate to the ppl that work there

I promised myself I'd never go back into the restaurant industry after I got laid off in 2003, and so far haven't. I now make about 5 times the salary I did back when I was a waiter. And I find the work stimulating and like it. I wasn't built for restaurants due to my short fuse and big mouth.

a call centre operator gets a call 5 minutes before the end of a shift that goes on for half an hour. that is brutal. and that person is not getting a tip or getting paid much, if at all, more than a waiter either.

― jed_, Friday, February 10, 2012 2:48 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

well theyll get paid for that extra half hour of work

― BJ O (Lamp), Friday, February 10, 2012 2:49 PM (1 hour ago)

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA youre joking right?

Nowhere I worked. "time in lieu" if youre LUCKY. Half an hour is "just suck it up and do yr job" most times tho.

But in fairness, a 40k a year callcentre job is a lot better than a 14k a year waiting job, so.

i guess my impression is that almost any call centre jobs employees here would get an hourly wage rather than a salary

Nowhere Ive worked, its alwayts been a yearly wage. But perhaps it's diff in Aus IT companies. Also I'm tlaking IT rather than more generic "answer the phone for an insurance co" tbf.

yeah - i mean people get inconvenienced by their jobs all the time in lots of little ways but if im calling an IT help desk or my credit card customer service # or w/e i dont really have any control over which rep i get whereas im actively choosing to sit down in an empty restaurant 5 minutes before they close, yknow?

like i think jeds right that a server just has to shrug it off, really, and there are plenty of shittier things people do regularly to waitstaff than make then work an extra hour but its a dick move, regardless of how you rationalize it

O I agree sitting down to eat 5 mins before closing is a dick move.

And I maintain that in terms of increasing or decreasing the amount of unhappiness in the universe, the person deciding to sit down five minutes before closing is an asshole, even if the posted closing time ALLOWS them to do that. They're making a whole lot of people's day a lot worse. The ONLY way to make up for this is to leave a huge tip out of proportion to the price of the meal, and even this won't necessarily mean much to the cook, dishwasher, cashier, or whoever the fuck else is stuck there drumming their fingers waiting for this person to just goddamn order something already.

― Doctor Casino, Thursday, February 9, 2012 7:11 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i'm not defending the practice, but i still just don't see this. the primary responsibility for increasing "the amount of unhappiness in the universe" lies with the person who sat the customer, or the policy that forced them to. if you really want someone to blame, that's where you should look.

agree that it's a dick move, but also imagine some naive couple unfamiliar w/ the area looking for some place to eat late at night. they find a place open and go in, knowing it's a toss-up whether they get seated or not. if the restaurant says that it's happy to serve them, i hardly see any great transgression in their ordering dinner.

otm

the manager/hostess is a dick, not the customer

I end up at restaurants quite often shortly before posted kitchen closing hours, here's what I do to try and not be a dick:

- if the place has already pretty much cleared out, don't go
- sit at the bar
- ask if the kitchen's still open
- pick what I'm going to order very quickly, or preferably know before walking in
- if other patrons are still ordering full meals, order anything. If not then get something that's quick to prepare
- close my check when the food comes out so the bartender/server can do their paperwork

On the flip side of things, the shittiest moves a a restaurant can pull when a table's still seated and not staying egregiously long are using cleaning solution on the tables around them, putting up chairs and stools, and turning up the dining room lights for cleaning.

wow

Crushed cucumber artisinal basil hand-milled gin whathaveyou bartenders should get paid more than regular bartenders because it really is skilled labor and bars that offer these kinds of drinks are really relying on the bartender's as a fundamental part of their business model. I bet those bartenders still make tipped employee minimum wage, though.

Anyway, if I were paying per drink for that kind of fancy cocktail I'd run a tab and tip 20%+ at the end.

v good pr0 tips from I DIED

bartender's skill, I meant to say. xp

I think the answer to a lot of these problems is 'more people should be tipped', if people in other shitty jobs get tips too once in a while they will be less bitter. I don't think the person who makes my burrito is doing less overall labor than the person bringing me a beer. tips for everyone.

I went to the podiatrist today and there was a tip line on the credit card receipt from my copay. I did not tip, although I was very satisfied with the service.

Next time you go in he's going to take one (1) toe.

I think the answer to a lot of these problems is 'more people should be tipped', if people in other shitty jobs get tips too once in a while they will be less bitter.

My solution would be to have actual living wages paid to people for their labour. Radical idea, I know.

lol ikr

Banker leaves 1% tip on http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/24/banker-1-percent-tip-receipt_n_1299280.html33 lunch in defiance of the 99%

http://i.huffpost.com/gen/511964/BANKER-1-PERCENT-TIP-RECEIPT.jpg

I mean, I can't imagine that this asshole thinks he's EVER going to eat there again without getting a spit-and-semen burger, right? Frankly, if I owned that place, I'd give the wait staff permission to shoot him on sight.

Yeah, saw this story the other day. Can't wait for the doucherocket to be ID'd.

Sorry, effed up the coding but the link works.

seems kind of too cliche to be true, or possible cliche enough to be true