<p>Sure, and a lot of luck. Same with being a server in a top restaurant.</p>
<p>It’s still beside the point. You’re not paying them for the work they do on your wine bottle one night. In all commission based business you are paying on percentage of the sale and in all cases sometimes they work harder and sometimes they don’t. The guy selling 100K homes in a small city may be working just as hard. it doesn’t matter. He makes less.</p>
<p>Seems like there is a lot of gripping among waitstaff, but in my experience these are pretty coveted jobs. My D is a carhop at Sonic and she makes tips hand over fist! It is a way better position at Sonic than cook or fountainer.</p>
<p>EK is correct-I know GMT tips well, but doesn’t seem to WANT to, so I was saying if it bothers them so much they could stop the illogical tipping to prove a point, but it wouldn’t make them many friends among waitstaff. As for D getting to keep her carside cash tips, there are no busboys involved in car delivery and the cooks are on salary. This is the ONLY tipping for anyone in any job at her restaurant where tips are not shared. Even credit card carside deliveries are shared. I don’t know why this is, but assume it’s because other than actually cooking the food, the carside employee does everything-takes the order, packages it up, brings it out to the car and runs the sale. And I recall from the previous discussion here that a lot of people think those the meals that should not be tipped at all, when actually, the carside person is doing more than the inside waitstaff, since they have the help of busboys, cooks doing the plating, etc.</p>
<p>
I visit the U.S. about every other month, and when I dine out I routinely tip at least 20% of the post-tax total, but it’s perfunctory. </p>
<p>I would prefer that restaurant owners in the U.S. would simply add the service fee to the price of the food and pay their staff decent wages. Most of the rest of the world does it that way, and I have no problems getting good service in restaurants.</p>
<p>Well, I agree with you there, and so would my daughter. She and her coworkers would also like to be allowed to work FT if they so desire, but that’s another issue altogether.</p>
<p>I hadn’t eaten out in many years and took it up again when my nest got empty I was so glad for CC or I wouldn’t have known to tip 20%. But I just heard on the radio that waitstaff is trying to get something passed for mandatory 25% in San Francisco. Seriously it would be so much easier if the restaurants just included the salary of the staff in their overhead and factored it into their prices so tipping wouldn’t be necessary. I’m not a big spender by any means so our tab is always low but I make it a point to never tip less than $5 even if that is more than 25% which it sometimes is. On the other hand you could make it a practice to never tip less than $50 if you could afford it and then think how good you would feel when you left that diner knowing you left the waitstaff so much more than they expected. I’m sure the fine dining place expected the $50 and the diner expected the $5.</p>
<p>I was in a bar recently for a music thing and no one was ordering much including me, but when I left I noticed I was the ONLY person who left a tip on the table. Maybe that was wrong or something but for heavens sake, someone had to come and clear off the glasses even if I did have to go up to the bar to get my diet coke.</p>
<p>Had dinner with two friends (my own age) last night and asked about the 15% vs. 20% thing. They both said they consider 15% to be the standard. My kids both advocate for 20%. But since the nature of the service hasn’t changed and menu prices have only gone up over the last 30 years, I can’t think of a good reason to change my habit of a lifetime. It actually doesn’t take much for me to be willing to push a tip to 17 or 18%–just a smile and prompt and accurate service. But it seems that half the time I eat out, I have to hunt down a server for something-- to get a menu, order, get a glass of water, have the dishes cleared or get or a check. Under those circumstances there’s no way I’ll tip more than 15% unless it’s obvious to me that the restaurant is understaffed and that the service issues are the fault of management.</p>
<p>Find it interesting that some of the same posters that are discussing being “full pay” parents are some of the same ones complaining about the 20% tip. With the exception of college students, the wait staff are working people who i’m pretty confident could you the extra 5% tip more than the people who are rich enough to be eating out in the first place. Yep $60,000 a year for college but what an outrage than I’m expected to tip 20%. I think the technical definition of that is penny wise, dollar foolish.</p>
<p>Maybe the reason some of those posters could afford 60K tuition is because they watch their pennies.</p>
<p>^ then perhaps they should only eat at restaurants where they can afford to tip.</p>
<p>Just because they could afford it, doesn’t mean they need to over pay.</p>
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I think restaurants should means-test their customers and go to a “High-Tip/ High-Aid” model where richer customers have to tip 25%, so poorer customers only have to tip 15% </p>
<p>None of it is logical. Here’s a state by state breakdown of minimum wages for tipped workers.
<a href=“Minimum Wages for Tipped Employees | U.S. Department of Labor”>http://www.dol.gov/whd/state/tipped.htm</a></p>
<p>I realize that really good waitstaff at high end restaurants are probably getting more, but at average spots most are probably getting minimum plus sharing tips.</p>
<p>Edited to add LOL to GMTplus7 above. If I have to fill out a FAFSA it will curtail my dining out by several hours!</p>
<p>Actually i agree with the original post and wait staff will either love me or hate me depending on the total tab…no it does not take “more work” to serve a $200 dinner for two as it does to serve a $30 dinner for two or a $10 breakfast for two at the local breakfast joint and I tip accordingly.</p>
<p>Ok…what about this? The prices at luch are usually less than at dinner at nicer restaurants. It requires the SAME amount of work on the part of your waitstaff, yet lunch tips are about half of dinner tips. </p>
<p>It’s based on percentage , not work. Like commission. That is the custom, and it’s not new or logical.</p>
<p>We don’t always get paid for effort. We get paid based on how scarce our service is.</p>
<p>I read about a month ago that franchise restaurants are planning on placing tablets on tables for patrons to order from and communicate their needs. That would be find with me, sorry to those in the industry. I find it annoying to be interrupted constantly, and at other times I am desperate to get the waiters attention. At more upscale, this is not a problem they seem to understand timing. I did like not having to tip in Europe and the service was good there so maybe we should go that route.</p>
<p>Maybe, but for those looking to save money that won’t happen. The 20-percent will be factored into the total cost and you’ll be paying it good service or not. So, it makes no difference, really. Robot waiters is interesting. LOL!</p>
<p>If you think tipping for service is crazy, take a cruise and educate yourself on what the staff gets paid and how they get paid. All cruise lines include a $13-15/day/passenger ‘auto tip’ plus everything chargeable on board includes gratuity on top of that, and you’re supposed / expected to tip various entities at the beginning of the cruise, etc etc. </p>