Went to get my monthly haircut the other day. A $15 haircut.
Comes time to pay, and they have the usual little card machine thing.
A new feature in this shop is that they now give tipping options up front. They are:
Why not swing for the fences and include $20 as an option?
ETA: I’m typically a fairly calm person, especially in public. But even I gasped and then snickered a bit. Option D.
So not based on the amount the service cost? My hair costs a fortune and my tips are way higher.
Nice though, that haircuts still cost just $15 there 
I’m not sure what the tip suggestions are based on – it was the first time seeing them at this shop. 7/12/15 seemed odd.
I just get the sides and back trimmed and about an inch off the top. I’m out of there in 10 minutes.
It is a chain. They’re quick.
I have always tipped and tipped well at a restaurant for good service (I spent many a year as a wait staff!) I have tipped 20% for a long time and round up. I don’t, however, usually east out at particularly expensive places, so an extra dollar or two isn’t going to break my bank. But I figure if everyone tipped an extra dollar or two, it could make a difference to the server.
I never feel guilty when I don’t tip at a counter/self-serve place. Just like I never felt guilty about not buying an item at at Mary Kay/Longaberger Basket type parties. I consider it a computer software thing and happily select No Tip. There are exceptions of course, and sometimes I throw some cash in the jar.
Today I took my daughter to lunch. It was $31+
The bottom said 20% was $6.35.
I left $6.
Some would have said $5.60 or something.
Why? The $31 was $28 before tax.
I typically tip on tax…but many say you’re not supposed to - and many “calculations” - whether on paper or screen, don’t include tax.
This one did.
Should it be? If not, it’s another way they get you to overpay.
In Los Angeles, tax alone is 9-10%. I never tip on tax.
I always tipped post tax for years before I read in Ann landers it was supposed to be pretax. So then I started doing 20% pretax and either just rounded up to the nearest dollar or added a second. Then in later years, I’ve gone back to post tax. With all of the kids gone, our meals just aren’t that expensive. We don’t go to fancy places.
We are out of town and went to dinner to a place I would consider to be nice for us. H for soup, salad, chicken fingers and fries and a beer. I got a Buffalo chicken sandwich and potato salad and Diet Coke. After tax it was $42. I tipped $12.
But lately I’ve been noticing several of our fast food credit card machines have stopped asking about tips. I won’t complain about that.
Local tax is 10.1%. The government did not make or serve me the food… so no tips on their share.
Grabbed two bottles of super overpriced OJ from the cooler at a coffee stand at Denver Airport. The kid who took my payment turned the screen towards me and theatrically rolled his eyes. Options for the tip were 18, 20, 25, and “custom” %. I used the latter and entered “0.” No guilty feelings about that.
I wish the machines I see started at 15%!!
I would love to see a deep dive into where all the tipping money goes. Most people assume that when they put a $20 tip on their table that it goes to their server. Or at the very least that 100% goes to the workers. But does it? Or does some of it go to management or ownership?
Now that major corporations have built tipping into transactions that historically were not tipped and which involve very little direct customer service, like fast food, are 100% of these tips that are collected by the corporations getting distributed directly to the staff at the location we received service from? If I tip on the Panera app, does 100% go to employees only at my location and 0% to the corporate or the franchise owner?
Are there any rules on this and any auditing?
I’m not familiar with the legalities, but I’ve worked tipped positions, and my kids have worked a bunch, all of the tips went to the employees, either individuals or pooled. However, service charges are another matter, like DoorDash pays $2.50 to the driver for each delivery, that’s it, the rest of the fees go to DoorDash.
You’d hope this to be the case but I found out at a fast casual, the owner was keeping the tips because he raised wages so much - in essence they were covering his shortfall.
When I heard that I don’t the worker it’s bs, not legal, and I left a tip for them, not the owner.
But they were kids there and I doubt he said anything to the owner.
I was looking up the difference between tip and gratuity and found this on a California Labor Law FAQ.
What is a tip?
|A.|A tip is money a customer leaves for an employee over the amount due for the goods sold or services rendered. Tips belong to the employee, not to the employer.
When a customer pays their bill with a credit card and the payment includes a tip, when can the employee expect to receive the money from the employer?
|A.|Payment of a gratuity made by a patron using a credit card must be paid to the employee not later than the next regular payday following the date the patron authorized the credit card payment. Labor Code Section 351
My employer is deducting the credit card processing fees from my tips. Is this legal?
|A.|No. Labor Code Section 351 provides that the employer must pay the employee the full amount of the tip that is indicated on the credit card. The employer may not make any deduction for credit card processing fees or costs that are charged to the employer by the credit card company from gratuities paid to the employee.
I work in a large restaurant as a waiter. My employer told me that I am required to share my tips with the busboy and the bartender. Am I obligated to do this?
|A.|Yes. Labor Code Section 351 provides that “every gratuity is hereby declared to be the sole property of the employee or employees to whom it was paid, given, or left for”. The section has been interpreted to allow for involuntary tip pooling so long as the tip pooling policy is not used to compensate the owner(s), manager(s), or supervisor(s) of the business, even if these individuals should provide direct table service to a patron or are in the chain of service to a patron. In addition, the policy must be fair and reasonable. Therefore, your employer can require that you share your tips with other staff that provide service in the restaurant so long as the employees that share in the tip pooling policy are employees to whom the tip was paid, given, or left for. In this regard, the courts have validated policies that distributed tips among employees who provide “direct table service” or who are in the “chain of service” provided that employee in the chain of service bears a relationship to the customers’ overall experience. (updated March 2013).
Are the tips I receive considered part of my “regular rate of pay” for overtime calculations?
|A.|No. Since tips are voluntarily left for you by the customer of the business and are not being provided by the employer, they are not considered as part of your regular rate of pay when calculating overtime.
Is a mandatory service charge considered to be the same as a tip or gratuity?
|A.|No, a tip is a voluntary amount left by a patron for an employee. A mandatory service charge is an amount that a patron is required to pay based on a contractual agreement or a specified required service amount listed on the menu of an establishment. An example of a mandatory service charge that is a contractual agreement would be a 10 or 15 percent charge added to the cost of a banquet. Such charges are considered as amounts owed by the patron to the establishment and are not gratuities voluntarily left for the employees. Therefore, when an employer distributes all or part of a service charge to its employees, the distribution may be at the discretion of the employer and the service charge, which would be in the nature of a bonus, would be included in the regular rate of pay when calculating overtime payments.
My employer deducts my tips from my paycheck. Is this legal?
|A.|No. Your employer can neither take your tips (or any part of them), nor deduct money from your wages because of the tips you earn. Furthermore, your employer cannot credit your tips against the money the employer owes you. Labor Code Section 351
My employer pays me less than the minimum wage because he includes my tips in my hourly pay. Is this legal?
|A.|No. Unlike under federal regulations, in California an employer cannot use an employee’s tips as a credit towards its obligation to pay the minimum wage. California law requires that employees receive the minimum wage plus any tips left for them by patrons of the employer’s business. Labor Code Section 351
Interesting that if a place charges a mandatory service charge than they get to keep it and not share it as a tip.
Apologies if I shouldn’t be posting a link to this website …. I don’t know if it’s forbidden on CC or not!
But well worth the view 
