This is really hard for me but I have had to put my foot down in recent times. It still makes me uncomfortable but I just can’t support this anymore. If I’m sitting down at a restaurant with a server I tip 20 - 25% but I’m tired of tipping for takeout and I absolutely refuse to give extra when checking out at a store.
What about at a coffee shop or something similar?
I don’t go to coffee shops but I wouldn’t tip there either. I don’t think I should be responsible for paying employees a living wage. Charge me appropriately for the item and pay your fucking employees.
Cash is the answer here, I might leave 25p in the saucer.
I agree that’s how it should be, but how things should be doesn’t pay the bills. Don’t take your anger out on the employees. Those are the only people you’re hurting.
And don’t put the blame on the customer. Demand better wages. I’m not taking it out on anyone.
You not tipping is not at all the same thing as demanding better wages and you know it.
First of all, I don’t go to coffee shops which is what we were talking about so the point is moot. Second, the fact that you seem to think it is the customer in the wrong and not the employers shows just how brain washed you are by corporations. People have been unionizing and striking across the country for living wages and that is the answer, not shaming the customer. Wake up.
Jesus fucking christ my dude. Not going to coffee shops is a valid option, but since you apparently haven’t noticed there are not yet living wages in most of the country. Either don’t use the services or tip until there are. Have some goddamn class solidarity and don’t force people to work for your benefit for poverty wages until things get better. Don’t pretend your greed is socialism.
It’s intended to make you feel guilty. That’s the point. “Make someone feel uncomfortable enough to give you money.” Don’t give in. Stay strong.
And 15% for table service is absolutely fine.
20-25% is still pretty excessive. I try to stay around 10-15%.
We have let tips creep up a lot in recent years.
That’s the golden number for me, but only if I eat in the damn place, not takeout. I also tip gas station employees only when they calibrate my tires or wipe my windows.
15% was standard in Canada, 20% in the USA
52, American. 15% was always standard in my world until recent talk of 20%.
Really? I was always told Canadians pass as being cheap because we usually give 15% when we go to the USA 🤔
Yep, 20% is definitely NOT standard. It is too damn high. I give 20% only when a server is freaking amazing.
I remember 5-10% being standard when I was a kid, although I wasn’t the one paying.
Honestly I dont use percentages unless the meal is insanely expensive. I never tip at something as simple as a coffee shop or quick-dine-and-go thing (unless I’m a regular). Otherwise they get 5, 10, or 20 depending on service and food (regardless of total meal cost). My favorite places always get a little extra (5 -> 7, 10-> 15, 20 -> 25)
Tips have crept up because cost of living has crept up but minimum wage has not. People can’t live on 2.25 plus tips and 7.25 if you don’t make enough tips to be more than 7.25. It’s just insultingly low wages and impossible to live off of
Tip value sure, but tip percentage? I mean think about it, the price of the food will go up, so the percent of that elevated food price will also go up. Like, if I bought a $20 meal and tipped 15%, that’s a $3. But if because of inflation or whatever, the $20 meal increases its price to $40, a 15% tip is now $6. The tip has gone up, but the percentage has remained the same.
So why are tips now going up to 21, 23, 25, hell I’ve seen a tablet that suggested 30%? (We all know the answer why, I’m being rherorical.)
Yeah, at server rates in most areas if they get less than 20 percent tip they are losing money.
That doesn’t explain why the tips in percentage increased. The cost of the meal at the restaurant is probably also related to the costs of living…
As funnystuff stated in the other reply, since food prices have gone up, tip amounts have gone up as well.
The two main reasons I see that tip percentages have crept up is the social pressure to not be the one that tips “poorly” and that automated prompt with suggested tips.
Those end up in a feedback loop. If you’re standing next to someone and the tip options are 15, 18, and 20 percent, there is a social pressure not to tip the lowest amount. It’s the same where if there are 3 wines on the menu, the cheap, the reasonable, and the expensive. Most people won’t buy the cheapest option. The cheapest option is there to pressure you into the middle one. Well, now that they have that, why not slowly increase the suggested amount to 18, 20, 22. Or like we are seeing in a lot of places now. 20, 25, and 30.
What sucks is that there are no repurcussions for businesses that suggest these larger percentages. Nor are there any for businesses that traditionally are not tipped to display the screen as well. Not until we either pass legislation to regulate tipping prompts or collectively refuse to purchase services from these businesses.
We’re talking percentages. There’s no reason why the percentages should have crept up when cost of living has gone up considering prices have risen along with the rest of cost of living.
Fuck it. 15 percent tops for me. This 20-25% for a tip? Fuck that.
Good god how do you write that all out and not realize the problem is the OWNERS, not the customers.
The OWNERS are the ones responsible for paying good wages. Start pointing your finger at the right people.
Of course it’s the employers responsibility to provide good wages, I never said otherwise. All I said is the minimum wage of literally $2 if you’re tipped is ridiculous
I understand what you’re saying, and agree it’s impossible to live on minimum wage in a big chunk of the country. However, tips are already pegged to inflation. If food gets twice as expensive, your 20% also doubles. For folks like Teachers, they might be lucky to get a 1 or 2% cost of living adjustment each year. That’s waaaaaaaaaay below inflation, and just falls further and further behind, like the base minimum wage.
Luckily in my state minimum wage is $15.74 plus tips.
In my opinion:
0% = absolutely abysmal service
10% = below average service
15% = average, expected amount of service 20% = above average or excellent serviceThat’s my tipping policy.
This is my policy if it’s a sit-down restaurant with servers making minimum wage… I absolutely refuse to tip fast food. Because I work in fast food, and over time I’ve seen wages get more and more skewed towards dependence on tips. It’s insane. Just give us a living wage, is that too much to ask of this capitalist meat grinder?
Same. The point of a tip is to tip the waiter, not anyone else. Tipping someone who’s taking my order at the counter just seems weird. Same with tipping in a mobile order app.
Same. It gets a little skewed towards higher % at lower dollar amounts though. I might have a $8 meal with a water and leave $2. It’s worth more than $1 and I’m not messing with change.
Why would you tip for before average service?
Not tipping at all is seen as rude in the US culture.
Besides, there’s a difference between below average service and absolutely horrible service. For example, there was one time years ago at a restaurant where my family went out to eat. First, our waiter got my mom’s order wrong. Then, when she mentioned it to our waiter, he picked up the incorrect item off the plate with his hands. I’m sure there’s more that I’m forgetting as it was years ago, but I think our entire meal (five people) ended up being comped. We were not happy.
Jesus, there’s a lot of hate for workers in this thread… 😬
Edit: I understand why employers do this, but the fact is they DO do it, and denying tips isn’t going to make employers pay their workers more money. They only understand money, not sympathy, and all you’re doing is taking away the employees’ money, not theirs. If it’s not hurting them, they’re not going to raise wages because they simply don’t care.
So while one stands there refusing to tip out of a (not entirely incorrect) philosophical viewpoint, those workers reliant on tips will be starving because without said tips they can’t afford rent let alone food.
In other words, I agree with the general logic behind the conclusion but not the specific logic.
TL;DR:
Making the employers pay the employees more money? Great!
Attempting to do it by hurting the employees but not the employer? Not so great!
Don’t make excuses for employers and shift the blame to customers. Missing out on W2 wages means that you are not going to have any social security in retirement unless you actually declare all your tips.
Yeah, I wasn’t. Read the edit.
I worked in food service and retail for a long time, not tipped. The idea that I have to leave a tip for putting my stuff in a bag and handing it to me is ludicrous to me. Employers can pay less because they can tell new hires they get tips.
Business owners need to pay their damn employees and stop using the registers to beg customers for more money.
Business owners need to pay their damn employees and stop using the registers to beg customers for more money.
And how exactly are you getting that message across by stiffing your fellow workers? Business owner makes the same money regardless.
I always tip. Not because the service was good or whatever. No one should have to earn a living being a circus monkey. Everyone deserves dignity at work. And everyone deserves a living wage.
By not supporting the worker, you’re playing into the game set up ny business owners and CEOs which is to foster an environment of in-fighting of the working class so they can continue to hoard wealth they don’t need.
So yeah, I’ll always tip and then I give grief to the owner to pay their employees as you say. Because it’s them who sets up that worker-on-worker fight club because that’s where the grief needs to go. Not the person trying to live on meager wages and deal with shitty customers.
So yeah, I’ll always tip and then I give grief to the owner to pay their employees as you say
Why would they pay their employees, if you are doing exactly what they want you? You always tip, so they always don’t have to pay it out of their own pockets.
I’m sure the owners keep saying “yes I’m so sorry I’ll consider it” and once they’re out of your sight they grin and think of it not a second more.
Because giving grief to the workers doesn’t trickle up to the owners. They make the same money regardless.
You can give shit to the owners while making sure workers make a living wage. These things are not related.
If you don’t want to tip, then don’t tip. But still give grief to the owners. If everyone shit on the owners as much as the staff things would change.
I can guarantee you that giving grief to the owners does nothing at all and changes nothing.
You cannot hope that people telling owners “this is bad I don’t like it at all” while still paying will change anything. It’s not how the world works.
And this, folks, is why tipping culture continues to get worse.
“Tipping culture” is a very reductive way to describe a living wage, but sure. Go you.
Tipping culture and living wage are not the same thing at all. It’s the owner’s responsibility to pay a living wage.
Plenty of places, even in retail and food service, pay a living wage without resorting to using the registers to beg.
Tips are an unnecessary evil.
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The other side if that is why should I tip you for putting cookies in a box. Or putting my take out food in a bag. Why should I pay 20 percent added on top because their manager doesn’t want to pay them and instead puts the expectation on me the customer.
Like, I get it for if you are serving me food, refilling my drinks etc, but these people need to get real.
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many people making the tips don’t want tipping culture to end. They support it.
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You are right. It is like any generalization. I’ll go edit it.
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Yeah but it’s not like I can easily go to places that don’t require tips though. It can often cost more to go to a place that doesn’t tip than the value of the tip.
So you actually like the tipping system because it allows you to get a meal cheaper at the expense of the person who just served you? Because the way you say this it doesn’t seem like you actually want tipping to go away since it’d make your meals more expensive.
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No, the opposite. I can’t go to a non-tipped place because everywhere around me requires a tip offering.
It can often cost more to go to a place that doesn’t tip than the value of the tip.
Sure sounds like your ideal situations is to go to tipping places but not tip to save yourself money at the expense of a working person. Go eat at McDonalds, they don’t do tips.
I don’t think a lot of these places “expect” tips. It’s just that they’re all using the same e-commerce kiosks now, and it’s a standard thing with a tipping screen everywhere you go.
I’m a generous tipper when it comes to bars, restaurants, or food delivery, but if it’s something that nobody tipped for 5 years ago, I ain’t tipping for it now just because there’s a kiosk in my face.
What do you mean charge 20%? How sure is the consumer to be that that 20% goes to the employees?
Are they just tacking on 20% because they realize they can get that extra fee for no reason? It’s bullshit and predatory. People are looking at prices to judge where they want to/can afford to eat at and this behavior makes the business look cheaper at first glance.
No, fuck that shit. No tipping and no “service fee” bullshit. Just give us normal, straight prices on the menu. If you cannot afford to pay your staff at the prices for the meals, raise the prices.
I’ve seen places that even write on the menu “to pay our employees a living wage” or similar to justify the fee. Which again, is fucking bullshit! A businesses inability to price its product is no reason for me to deal with fees.
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My point is that if someone leaves a 20% tip, that goes to the server and whoever they need to tip out like bartender and busboys. But it goes directly to them. When a business implements a service fee, that direct line to the service worker goes away. If I’m told there is a 20% fee to pay staff, I expect it to go directly to staff.
I’m all for dropping tips and paying living wages. But a “service fee” isn’t the way to do it. Just raise the damn prices.
A mandatory 20% fee is just the business saying that everyone has to tip 20%, and trust us that it actually goes to the servers/staff. There is functionally no difference culture-wise between giving consumers the choice to tip 20% and mandating a 20% service fee. It’s the same as the “gratuity added to parties over 8.”
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Yeah, people thinking they can end tipping culture on an individual basis are lying to either us or themselves. It’s like thinking your personal commitment to recycling is going to fix climate change. Tipping sucks but the fix is going to have to be systemic, through legislation almost certainly. When you individually refuse to tip you aren’t hurting the culture or the business, just the individual who provided you a service.
How about if you just don’t go eat there? You aren’t supporting tipping culture and you’re saving money. Win win.
I agree with that. If you go to a tipping restaurant and just don’t tip you aren’t actually attacking the culture because A) The culture is driven top down by the business. and B) The business isn’t running on tips. When you pay the bill minus a tip, the business still got every dime they were intending to. They have no incentive to change.
So even if you don’t agree with me that this is a systemic issue that requires a systemic solution, you have to not give tipping businesses money at all if you want to even have a hope of making an impact on an individual level.
What’s even more fun are the places that ask for a tip… and the tip doesn’t go to the employees.
I assume any “fast casual” tip goes directly to the boss. If you didn’t come to my table and take my order then the little iPad is paying the guy that wasn’t here all day.
I recently had a pretty crappy experience at a restaurant for a few reasons, the last being their tipping system. You won’t believe how they asked me to tip, it was mad.
- There was no menu, I had to Google their name and find their website (which was some obscure subdomain on some obscure food payment site).
- Their site didn’t work in Chrome (on any of the phones we had with us), luckily I had a backup browser installed that worked.
- I had to order and pay on my phone, unable to use the cash I had budgeted and brought with me for the meal.
- It asked me how much I would like to tip, but this is paying DURING MY ORDER, when I had not yet received any service or food. I chose not to tip.
Tipping, here in the UK, is only something you do when you were very happy with the service (and have the extra cash you don’t mind giving away as charity, basically). Our waiters, as with every worker in the country, are paid a real wage that isn’t designed to be subsidised by begging.
So, being asked to tip for the good service BEFORE receiving the service? That’s INSANE.
Due to the various ridiculous issues we had just trying to order food and pay for it, and the audacity of being asked to tip that way, I will not be going back there again.
What’s wrong with the tried and true system of a waiter taking your order, you eat, they take your payment at the table either with a normal wireless chip-and-pin machine or by cash, and then you leave? It’s simple, easy, smooth and fast 🤦♀️
Yeah, that tipping before service idea has to be costing business. There are several places I avoid because they request tip before service. My local Foxtail coffee shop is one of those places, and the lowest tip option is 15%. On the 3 times I have tipped, they still gave me subpar service. Like, they didn’t even do the bare minimum, let alone anything exceptional.
Of course - what’s the incentive? They got the tip money without having to do anything.
I was assuming that they would have a commitment to earning that tip because of personal integrity and that they would expect to receive more tips in the future when I return.
I understand where you are coming from, but haven’t there been locales in the past where you tipped before service to let your server know you are magnanimous?
I could be wrong, but I swear I read this in a European travel guide from the late 90s.
It gets easier the more you do it. Don’t feel bad for not giving away the money you own.
You could try feeling bad for your server who can’t pay their rent or buy groceries because you decided they don’t deserve money for their work. Whether you like it or not, that’s the reality, and it’s as real as anything can ever be when you work all day and don’t make enough money to buy yourself a meal.
It seems fairly presumptuous of you to assume that your server can’t pay their rent or buy groceries, especially when the servers make more off of tips than most people make with their hourly wage. And I’m not sure where you think it’s my decision whether they deserve money for their work, I’m not their employer. It seems to me like you think customers should not only pay for something but should also pay the employees serving it to them. Where does the responsibility come in for the employer? Also, at some point personal responsibility comes into play, you can’t expect everyone to give you handouts all the time.
I worked in fine dining for 10 years. So no, it’s not presumptuous of me because I am speaking from personal experience based on my own life as well as many, many people I have known. I’d say that I’m one of the least presumptuous people in this thread when it comes to this topic.
It would be great if employers would pay servers a living wage, but that simply isn’t the way things actually work in restaurants.
Personal responsibility? Handouts??! Tell you what, how about you go to work for 8 hours every day and then have your business’s clients decide whether or not you deserve any money at all for the work you do. Would you say you’re just asking for a handout, or would you say that you deserve to be paid for the work you did?
The thing is, it’s your BUSINESS’s clients, not yours. You said so yourself just now. You work for the business, which sells services to the clients. At no point the clients should pay you directly.
Using my profession as a software developer (and putting aside the salary of a developer because I know it’s not comparable in terms of salaries, but bear with me for the sake of the example) - sometimes clients pay money for new features that they want our service to have. I do all the work of researching it, understanding the requirements, I design the feature, write code for it, do automation tests for it, deploy it, and enable it - all for my client. It took me 3 months.
But hey, I did all that and the client never paid me. They paid the place I work for. How come? I would love to get 15% of the money the customer paid. But it’s just not happening. I do not get a tip.
But that’s fine. Because this is how it works in almost all industries. A client pays the business. The business hires workers and pays them. The workers keep the place running by doing their jobs which ends up in sales.
We (as a society) don’t pay tips to a doctor doing a physical exam on us. We don’t pay tips to a city worker approving our registrations. We don’t pay tips to a university professor teaching us a course. Those all examples of professions that include some kind of a frontal service to clients, yet they never expect it either, because they get properly paid by the workplace.
Now, it is not the same for waiters and bartenders. They expect tips. You are a jerk and rude if you don’t tip, and we don’t want you here. Don’t you dare give our business money if you aren’t going to give some of it to us as well.
So why is this so different from the other professions? I would wager the main issue stems from the terrible minimum wages, forcing waiters so look for alternatives. The alternatives ended up being very good for the employers, so they reinforced it and made it the standard. The more they can convince everyone to tip, the more they shift the “pay the worker” part of the business to the client. Suddenly the client is paying for both the service they bought AND the worker. The business is very happy that they get to keep more money to themselves and the responsibility is now the client’s.
It has now became so normalized in USA that people will fight to keep this new normal. Instead people should strive to make those businesses work just like any other business by giving them fair wages.
I basically agree with your point of view, but the fact of the matter is that the way servers are paid is an exception to the rule. It’s unlike other businesses, and even on a federal level the wage laws are different specifically for servers.
It’s an issue that’s a lot more complex to solve than just stiffing your server and saying, “I’ve done my part to fix things!”
Oh, for sure. It’s not something you, I, or just any group of people can change. It needs to change from upside down.
The issue is that changes like that don’t happen unless they are almost forced to by really big groups demanding it.
I would be questioning why I expect my clients to pay me when that’s what my employer does.
Why am I not surprised with your total lack of empathy?
If you don’t like tipping and actually believe that people should be paid for the work they do, then don’t eat at restaurants. Show those restaurant owners why they should pay people, and be the change you want to see in the world. Otherwise, you’re just an asshole.
I certainly have empathy, it’s just located in a different spot than yours. We both want the same thing, servers to get what they deserve. You though think that I customer should pay the wages of an employee which makes absolutely no sense to me. To me the employer, the one that actually making money, should be the one to pay their employee. I’m just trying to figure out why you think the way you do.
I was never trying to justify the arrangement where the employer doesn’t pay the employee. However, the reality of the situation is that it doesn’t happen that way. In the U.S., at least, servers make their living almost exclusively by being tipped. Yeah, it’s shitty of employers not to offer a better wage, but it’s equally shitty for people to go to restaurants–fully aware that servers need tips to make ends meet–without tipping servers.
It would be better if the workers were actually paid enough.
The workers are paid enough. Other people are still tipping and most tipped workers prefer the tipping system over an actual livable wage because they make more in tips.
They get paid what they get paid. Get another job if it doesn’t pay enough.
You’re not wrong, but I’m sure as hell not subsidizing it.
Over here in the UK we don’t tip as a rule, unless we’ve been directly served by someone, and even then it’s mostly just to leave whatever change there may be.
But it’s become very fucking common for chain shops to ask if we want to round up to the nearest £ and donate that money to whichever charity they’re working with.
And my answer is always, always, no.
Why not if it is a charity? I’m guessing you’re not trusting them?
Charity donations are tax deductible (usually) so what you’re doing is giving the business a means to bring down their contributions for the year. It’d really be best if you just donated directly.
No. That’s not how that works.
Deductible means they don’t pay taxes on the money they donated
It does nothing to reduce the tax burden on their profits, if the money they’re donating wouldn’t have been profit in the first place
Because it just doesn’t feel right to me. And I know that it’s kinda churlish, but there’s a part of me that doesn’t want huge supermarket chains who keep posting record profits while paying the bare minimum they legally have to, to take the credit for me donating a few quid a month in rounding up my bill. Many of the charities wouldn’t be needed as much if these companies actually paid adequate wages.
Do what you want, but that’s not how that works. Businesses aren’t “using” or “taking” your donation or claiming them as their own. They’re basically just serving as a collection point for whatever charity indicated. If you choose not to claim it yourself, that’s your choice, but the donation is “from” you “to” the charity. The supermarket or whatever just provides visibility for the charity and the collections logistics. It saves those charities having to find people to stand outside and ring a bell and hope you have change in your pocket.
If you’re not contributing to a charity in lieu of not participating in these “round up donations” programs, then you’re simply choosing to not donate to charity. Which is fine, as far as that goes.
Oh aye, I know they’re not claiming tax or anything like that, and I get that it’s essentially just a digital version of having a change pot on the counter, but it still feels like Tesco getting to crow about how much their customers have helped raise, while they’re paying as little as they can legally get away with, y’know?
But ultimately it’s not really rational response, and I know that.
I get you. I basically swing back and forth between how you feel, “hell with this corporate public image campaign” and going “well, what the hell, it’s .12 for a good cause.”
That way I’m being irrational in all directions.
I might be wrong but don’t they use these charities to get tax reductions?
I don’t think they do, but I’ve seen them announce things like " company name teamed up with x charity and we managed $200,000 !"
Conveniently forgetting to mention that they donated little to nothing themselves.
What annoys me isn’t that they ask for a tip, it’s how much they ask. I’m willing to round up to the nearest dollar if the service was good, but those little iPads always seem to ask for at least 15%. I am not giving a 15% tip to someone who only pressed buttons on a tablet.
This was so weird in the US. Everywhere you get asked for a tip. I got a tip screen even in a supermarket once. For the cashier. I got back home to the EU today and was happy to not tip anymore everywhere…
It’s the Square checkouts and the other new POS like them. I’m pretty sure Square takes a chunk of the tip which is why they’re enabled by default (and I’m not sure you can disable them).
I order through Favor regularly and tip generous.
Congrats
It’s getting ridiculous though like even gas stations are starting to ask. Like sorry why should I leave a tip to get a Snickers and bottle of water rung up?
if u are in :amerikkka: and u have the means please tip people whenever and wherever you can, if leaving a tip is an option it is likely because the person you’re interacting with is being crushed under pitiful wages and astronomical expenses
We all are, hiding it doesn’t help.
Tipping culture is just a way that disproportionally affects workers in such a way that there should be a mathematical equation that compares titty size of the waitress to how much you will tip. Theres a reason why people think there is misandry in fields that require tipping. I try to not tip whenever I can unless I am friends with the people there. Why? Chances are, you get paid a minimum of 10+ an hour wage and you get pissy if I even think you didn’t deserve that cherry on top. No I dont want to pay you more than I make an hour for serving my food. Its not up to me to decide how much you deserve for your efforts. Yes Ill be bitter, i dont care, i fucking hate tipping culture. Ill fight anyone that thinks otherwise… in a videogame of course.
Edit: also I want to give a shout out to BJs for being the most toxic environments for tipping. They only allow electronic payments on some proprietary website and it auto adds 20% and they cross their fingers hopeing you didnt see. Then it asks if you would want to tip ON TOP of that. If you bring it up to staff they will actually announce that you arent tipping. Like fuck you guys
I agree, I don’t like to tip for blowjobs either. I also prefer to pay by cash for those.
Seriously though, I don’t think I tip based on attractiveness. But I do tend to tip more as I get more drunk. A few of my friends even check how much I’m tipping if they think I’m too drunk and tell me to lower it. They’ve probably saved me around $100 in the last few months lol.
Me, reaching over from the POS side paying for the transaction I’m ringing up, leaving no tip for myself
Why is there never a button for just the tip?
My local vape shop has started asking for tips when you pay now. I’m definitely not tipping for a D8 cart that’s already 20% more expensive than buying it online from the makers.
