Tipping???? When do you and when don't you? (minimum wage, Christmas, how much)

[sfw1979]

Tipping..tipping and more tipping...where do you all stand on this?

I know the average person probably tips 15-20% when going out to eat, getting thier hair and nails done etc... but what about ohter things that maybe most don't tip? Is it fair to expect someone who is receiving flowers as a gift to tip the delivery person? How about furniture delivery? Most places if not all charge a decent delivry fee so are you still expected to tip the people that deliver it too? How about your mailman. Some people tip thier mailman around Xmas? How about when you are staying at a hotel and you have a few xtra towels brought up?

What do you think?

[GloryB]

I do tip the hotel housekeeping staff, but not the mailman. I make this decision based on what a person does and how much they get paid for doing it.

[subsound]

Tipping is for waiters the most, since they get royally reamed in the hourly department. If you get personal service, I usually think so (deliveries don't count IMHO unless they go above and beyond).

The big thing for me is quality...junk service gets junk tips. I tip very well for good service, even just a refill at a restaurant gets 15%. I have tracked the manager down to say "If you hire more people like this I'll never leave" plus a 30%+ tip. On the other hand I have given a penny tip because the service was so bad, I have tracked the manager down and said "This is the last time I frequent this restaurant because of my terrible service".

[Ohiogirl81]

Don't tip the cow if it's awake.

Oh, cash tipping ... Depends on the service. I tip my hairdresser and wait staff, unless it's a self-service restaurant. I tip the pizza driver. I tip the housekeeping staff at hotels.

The mailman??? Forget it. He makes three times as much money as I do, and has a handsome pension to boot. Not to mention that half the time he puts my mail in my neighbor's mailbox.

[BLAZER PROPHET]

Let's see, people I tip................. wait-staff, barber, delivery people (except UPS & Fed-Ex), washroom attendant (but that's a whooooooooooooole different story), motel housekeeping, valet attendant in the cheesy turtle neck shirt, wine steward, car wash attendant

People I do not tip................ mailman, airline stewerdess, massage therapist (the licensed one, anyway), stock broker (hell, I oughta shoot the bast***)

[totallyfrazzled]

In restaurants, if the service is acceptable we use the "double the sales tax and round it to the nearest dollar" method for tipping. Our sales tax is 8.625%, so that works out to either a 17% or 18% tip depending on the actual tax amount.

We do add the tip to the credit card total though. No sense missing out on any of those reward points!

I tip my hairdresser $10 (the cost of a cut is $30). I'm so glad to have someone I can trust to do a good job every time, I don't mind! The shampoo girl gets $2 or $3, depending on how many dollar bills I have left.

We don't tip the mail carrier because we get all our mail at our PO Box.

We don't tip the garbage collectors, they are Town employees and make more money and have more benefits than I ever have had!

We don't tip delivery men, because the store has already charged us some ridiculous amount (anywhere from $50 to $100) when furniture or similar items are delivered.

Most of the time we have found that hardly anyone takes the time to really give good service anymore, or to be careful about what they do if they are doing a repair or other service we've paid for. Most of the time such people leave the house or yard in worse shape than it was before they did whatever it was that we paid them to do!

We do give our "personal banker" at our local branch a gift certificate to a restaurant or store for Christmas.

[eevee]

I absolutely, positively, 10000% REFUSE to "tip" people in retail establishments. by this I mean the tip cup/jar stores like Starbucks and some other coffee shops all seem to have near their registers now. nope, sorry, I know you guys are getting paid minimum wage, or even higher in the case of most Starbucks, and people at Starbucks are getting much better benefits than me (I work PT and get NO benefits at all!). why should I give any money to someone who just had to take my order? Am I tipping them for not messing up my order? maybe if I get a penny or two, I'll leave those behind for the next customer (ie, leave it on the counter, and NOT in the tip cup) but I've even stopped doing this since I'm trying to save money (and yes, I KNOW I'd save tons of cash by not stepping foot into a Starbucks at all, but I have limited options for good coffee at my job!).

honestly, I don't find myself in situations where I have to tip often, just restaurants and bars, and at bars, I usually add an extra dollar for drinks up to $5, and give a bit more for drinks more than $5 (so around 20%, assuming they don't F up the drink and make it extra weak!)

[Capt. Cave Man]

I only tip cops & "hit" men.

[totallyfrazzled]

Originally Posted by eevee

I absolutely, positively, 10000% REFUSE to tip people in retail establishments. by this I mean the tip cup/jar stores like Starbucks and some other coffee shops all seem to have near their registers now. ...Am I tipping them for not messing up my order?

I agree, I don't normally do that either. However sometimes (for instance at Dunkin Donuts or a deli) the person who takes your order is the same one who actually makes the coffees or sandwiches or whatever. If I were to go into one of those places with a list for a big order of many different coffees and sandwiches and other things (say, lunch for a half dozen people, or for a construction crew, etc) that takes 10+ minutes to prepare and pack up, then I would put something into the Tips Cup. Assuming of course that the counter person didn't have an "attitude" about being presented with a big order (and I've seen that happen more than once).

[my54ford]

I usally tell the waiter to study harder next time ............