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Practically everyone I meet who is visiting the U.S. from another country has the same complaint, and sometimes horror stories, about tipping. It's strange enough that prices listed in the U.S. almost never include sales tax, and even stranger when tipping is factored into the equation so that the total price is 20-35% higher than the listed price. Nowadays you are expected to tip for your taxi ride, your morning coffee, who knows what else. A couple I met from Australia the other day told me about how a bar kicked them out for tipping "only" $8 on a round of drinks that that bar said were supposed to warrant a $12 tip.
TIPS is an acronym for To Insure Prompt Service. I think its glorious. I used to live in Europe and got so tired of awful customer service, being treated like an animal by waitstaff.
TIPS incentivizes pleasing the customer. Nothing incentivizes better than the hope for individual gain, which is not just why TIPS work, but why capitalism works.
TIPS incentivizes pleasing the customer. Nothing incentivizes better than the hope for individual gain, which is not just why TIPS work, but why capitalism works.
We tip minimum 30%- usually more. My wife tipped 50% last night after dinner.
These are working people who are busting their butts to make ends meet. Have some appreciation and sympathy.
Being in a service job like that would suck, as the employee has to be nice, even to jerks. Would you want their job? Try to be a little bright part of their day with a random act of kindness. It is infectious.
^ And this self-righteous attitude is why I hate the tipping culture in the U.S.
Same here. Why have to help pay a salary the employer refuses to pay his own employees. Besides most dont deserve a tip with the attitude they have sometimes. Im not paying for your bad choice of job.
Still trying to understand people having issues with what is inherently and almost perfectly voluntary for all parties involved?
If tipping bothers you, don't do it. If having a job that is based around the concept bothers you, don't get that kind of job. If businesses that hire workers who work for tips bothers you, don't patronize that business. Etc.
All of this is voluntary association, and nobody is forced to do anything. Why the angst?
I guess because it just seems to be a very opaque and non-transparent pricing system. Sure you can refuse to tip, but it's expected even for the most average of service that just meets basic expectations of what the jobholder should be doing and you will get shamed if you don't pay that extra 20% or whatever so realistically it should be part of the advertised price.
If it is 'no tip for standard service, that's included in the wages, but you have a genuine option to tip on top of those wages if you get service that goes beyond expectations' then that is fair enough in my opinion, but when it's expected just for doing the basic job then that system doesn't seem to make sense to me.
It's like if a grocery store advertised very cheap prices for its products, but then when you got to the cashier you were expected to give an extra 5% for the guy who stacked the shelves for you, another 7.5% for the cashier who scanned your goods, maybe another 1% for the workers who maintain the store nicely etc. It's all part of one service, either 'getting a restaurant meal' or 'buying some groceries' so why the extra charges on top of the advertised price?
If I buy some new windows for my home then the guy selling them to me probably gets commission from their employer, but I'm not expected to pay extra to him on top of the price of the windows as a customer for the service he provides me in selling those windows.
Like I said before, would it be reasonable to pay chefs $2/hour, charge only the cost of ingredients as the advertised menu price then invite/demand a 50% tip to the chef team on top of that if the meal was cooked to standard?
TIPS is an acronym for To Insure Prompt Service. I think its glorious. I used to live in Europe and got so tired of awful customer service, being treated like an animal by waitstaff.
TIPS incentivizes pleasing the customer. Nothing incentivizes better than the hope for individual gain, which is not just why TIPS work, but why capitalism works.
So why not extend it to other sectors? Only pay the cost of the tire when you get it replaced on your car, then have a 'voluntary' (but not really voluntary as you will get shamed and banned if you don't pay it) 20% tip on top of that if you like the way the mechanic fitted it. It doesn't work like that in such a job, you are paying for his time and if he does the work for you then you pay, you don't get to choose whether to pay him or not as long as he did what he was contracted to do.
I live in Europe and I can't remember ever being 'treated like an animal' by somebody serving food and drink. You place your order, they bring you the stuff, you pay, that's it really, there is no great knowledge or skill required in doing that. If anything you would think that the chefs doing the skilled work of preparing the food should get tips depending on how good the food was.
By the way, the acronym story you quoted is false, that is not the etymology of the word 'tips', singular is tip which wouldn't make any sense 'to insure prompt' and the use of 'insure' also doesn't make sense in the context, it should be 'ensure', there is no insurance contract involved.
To be "embarassed to be an American" has to be this weeks second-runner-up for crybaby drama queen....right behind the person that *gasp* had to buy paper bags at the store. I mean holy cow, 70,000 homeless in the Bahamas thank god they don't have to deal with tipping or paper bags am I right?
To be "embarassed to be an American" has to be this weeks second-runner-up for crybaby drama queen....right behind the person that *gasp* had to buy paper bags at the store. I mean holy cow, 70,000 homeless in the Bahamas thank god they don't have to deal with tipping or paper bags am I right?
Seriously, who wants to eat out these days, with the crappy food + crappy service, and then be expected to tip 20-25% on top of that?
Time to take the bull by the horns and "opt out" by cooking at home. I pray for the day when everyone else gets smart and boycotts restaurants en masse.
I do the same. Eating out is reserved for special occasions and we only go to places know we will get good service.
The scope of this topic is not limited to sit-down-and-order-from-server restaurants, but all all scenarios where tipping is "expected," not limited to food.
For example, last week I went to the famous Katz's Deli in NYC. It's the type of restaurant where you walk up to a food maker (in this case a meat cutter), order, and sit down. It cost $22 for a pastrami on rye. That is not including any sidedishes. Of course, there was a line on the receipt for adding a tip. By the rule of "always tip at least 20%," that means I'm up to $27.40+ for a sandwich. And this is a place that is always swimming in customers. Some say tipping is optional, but then there are horror stories of restaurant managers telling customers who tip an "inadequate" amount to never come back, or chasing them down the street (this regularly happens to unwitting customers at a Thai restaurant near where I live). So, tipping is basically coerced. Add in sales tax and I paid $30+ for a sandwich that was prepared in less than 20 seconds.
I would've walked my ass out of there you can keep your 30 dollar sandwich
TIPS is an acronym for To Insure Prompt Service. I think its glorious. I used to live in Europe and got so tired of awful customer service, being treated like an animal by waitstaff.
Treated like an animal by waitstaff huh? Well, I've lived in England all my life, and have never been treated like an animal by waitstaff. They wouldn't have their job long if they did that. Stop talking tripe.
Unless of course you felt they treated you like an animal because they didn't hop to it, and refill your glass quickly enough.
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