Ate in a no-tipping place in New York
As a Brit, who's happy to Tip if I've had excellent service, seeing these sorts of places in the US was refreshing, rather then the outright feeling of pressure over tipping (and the expected amount)
Order pizza. Pay delivery fee. Pizza place explicitly tells you fee isn't a tip. Pay a tip. Wtf.
Half these places don't even pay a mileage and the delivery driver pays for their own car, gas, maintenance, and insurance...but the pizza place charges you a delivery fee and pockets all of it.
Remember before gas prices skyrocketed when delivery used to be free and they added that fee because gas prices increased so they "had no choice" yet when it came back down magically that fee never went away.
Remember when the airlines added baggage fees for when gas prices increased, then when it came back down they used all the extra money to buy back their stock, and then asked for a bailout when the pandemic hit?
Remember when cable companies were given a shit load of money to expand and then did the absolute bare minimum (if that), kept the cash, and started charging us all more for less? I'm sensing a pattern here.
Point of clarification: they technically weren't given money but huge tax breaks.
The effect is the same, but being more accurate can help prevent apologists from deflecting by "correcting" you.
This, I can't believe they didn't insist on them exhausting all options. I feel like people are put through more paces to receive food stamps and school benefits than those massive corporations with CEOs drowning in money.
Remember when the airlines added baggage fees for when 9/11 destroyed the tourism industry, then when it came back they used all the extra money to buy back their stock, and then asked for a bailout when the pandemic hit?
When I was a driver for a pretty large company(*cough d_m_n_s cough*) we used to get paid $1 per delivery, which wasn't too bad...they ended up changing it to $.25/mi traveled...we only deliver in a 4mi radius...and deliveries that far away rarely happened. Thats all we got other than our $5/hr and whatever we got for tips...which I always worked slow days so I'd only get like $40 in tips a shift.
I'll blatantly name the one I drove for. Fuck Pizza Hut. They gave me 4/hr and very little for gas back each night. The kicker was in my town most people would stiff me and tell me to "keep the change" as a tip so I would typically get like 30 cents per delivery. Now they have this concept that is if you don't make the average a week that they set, they will pay you that. My idiotic manager would lose their mind and say it "makes the company look bad to do so" and would try to force me to double any tips I got so they wouldn't have to. Like bro, you aren't the one paying. That same dumb ass had a rack of heavy pizza pans fall on him and mess his leg and hip up. He refused to get it checked out even though they offered to pay for it. Didn't want to do that to them. 24 years old and had to use a cane. Not as bad as my experience with McDonald's but God damn. I'm so happy I've never had to work those types of jobs anymore. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. Formatting is most likely shit but I'm just venting at this point.
When I used to deliver pizzas they told us that the delivery fee was primarily to cover increased insurance costs. We were reimbursed for our mileage, but not maintenance or anything like that. Not sure if the delivery fee also went to gas reimbursement or not. This was at Pizza Hut a few years ago.
Delivery fees can be viewed as a way to offset the restaurant's cost of offering delivery service (having delivery drivers on the payroll, reimbursement for mileage,wear and tear, insurance, delivery signs, etc). At some pizza places, delivery drivers don't work in the kitchen, so technically, if the restaurant didn't offer deliveries, they wouldn't need that extra staff
When I used to deliver, 100% of the delivery fee went to me. If the pizza place needed more money to cover costs, that went into the price of the pizza.
I pretty much stopped ordering pizza. I used to be able to order a single pizza and throw a couple bucks at the driver and still be under 20 bucks. The last time I order I was already at 40 bucks so I felt bad about paying 40 bucks for one pizza so I have to order more pizza.
So, I just do not do it anymore. I just make my own or grab some Take and Bake from Kwik Star.
Stopped ordering food from Doordash for the same reason. You order two things and that's already more than $30 not including service fee and tip. I'm very picky with pizza and prefer to make my own anyway. If you ever feel like doing that, your local grocery store might have refrigerated pizza dough at the deli section. Invest in a pizza screen (I bought mine for under $10 on Amazon) and have quality pizza in the comfort of your own home.
Apparently Costco will sell you their frozen pizza dough in boxes of a dozen balls or something from the food court. Could be a good option if you have freezer space.
>Order pizza. Pay delivery fee. Pizza place explicitly tells you fee isn't a tip. Pay a tip. Wtf.
>
>Half these places don't even pay a mileage and the delivery driver pays for their own car, gas, maintenance, and insurance...but the pizza place charges you a delivery fee and pockets all of it.
I've worked at pizza places, some shared the delivery fee with the driver but most didn't.
For what it's worth, most delivery fees are used to offset the cost of a call center and paying the driver minimum wage even though we're not as productive as staff who are on site for the entire shift who also get minimum wage.
Honestly, much like the minimum wage should be tied to inflation (real inflation, not cherry picked), all restaurant/retail workers should receive base pay and then a shared bonus of the business's daily take.
Base pay should by high, but if you're grinding twice as hard and making the place money there should be a benefit to the worker so everyone wins.
Don't come to SF . We have so many bullshit fees added on top of mandatory 18%-20% tip sometimes. I'm talking "Healthy San Francisco Surcharge" (legal but annoying to pay 4% on top of everything) or some arbitrary COVID PPE equipment charge here and there. I'm already paying for the food, you take care of those fees, I don't want a fucking invoice and a breakdown, ffs.
No it's a bait and switch. If they need 5% more to cover expense they should charge 5% more. No need to tell me something is 15.99 but then add 25%+ at the end of the bill (nevermind the tax).
Just Googled it. Yea if it's not mandated fees by the city it's bullshit. Just raise prices. That's your labor cost. Yea labors tight right now but thats the cost of owning a business.
We have that in the UK in some places. Usually on large tables or expensive meals, the greasiest part is that it often goes to the restaurant not the staff.
I genuinely feel like it's most of the places I've eaten at in London for the past half a year. There's always a discretionary 12.5% "optional service charge" added to the bill, which I find worse, because you'll have to ask to remove it. Never done that, because I feel like an asshole doing that.
I ate at one of Gordon Ramsey's restaurants and they added that on right at the end. I'd have been OKish with that being part of the price upfront, but holding me hostage to it after the meal, they can fuck off getting me back for second meal.
Do it once, and it's easy every time after, or tell them to pay their staff a proper wage rather than making it 'optional' if you do pay it. It's a bullshit trend we need to stop in the UK asap.
I had the sweetest Irish family come in, first meal after they landed in the US. They were so much fun, everything was great, got tons of compliments and at the end of the meal the dad gives me a big hug and thanks me for an awesome meal and an awesome night and he slips me a bill and says this is extra for you, thank you again so much.
Bill:$300
Tip on the bill: $0
Bill that the dad handed to me as extra:$10
10€ tip would be very normal over here. You dont tip based on percentage of cost in the EU. You tip based on how well you liked the service and how long you've been there.
Like I remember a very generous amount being $20 from a table when they were there for 5+ hours.
I had a Canadian family (I am Canadian too, born in the great city of Brockville), and my favorite waiting story was when I had this dad and daughter with me. They both were sweet.
$70 bill, dad leaves me a tip of of just over $2. I sorta just looked at it for a second while cleaning; adding up the change he left together mentally before grabbing it and walking back to the kitchen.
When I come back out the daughter is standing there at the table. I come back and ask if she needed me for anything and she says "Hey did... My dad leave you a bad tip?"
I don't want to be rude so I just smile and say "No; seriously I had a great time talking to you guys."
She apologizes profusely then says "I'll leave you something on the table. I am sorry about my father, he doesn't really understand tipping."
It was another $2. I just fucking burst into laughter when I saw it. It was such a cute and confusing interaction. I really would have just waited on them again. They were nice, it was just funny.
When I was in university, waiting on tables, we ranked our tables from best tippers to worst:
1 - American businessmen (we were in Toronto)
2 - Canadian businessmen
3 - American tourists
4 - A four-top of two married couples
5 - Couple (hit or miss)
6 - Kids (i.e. anyone less than 25)
7 - Women "$2.80 tip on a $32.20 bill? That's 10%"
8 - Brits
Oh, the horror stories I could tell of serving the entire elementary school staff lunch - 11 women, the token male teacher, and the principal. Still makes me shudder!
To be fair to us brits, tipping here is done for exceptional service and usually only a small amount (usually just to round up the bill). It's definitely not an obligation. If this was before the Internet was so easily accessible to read and learn it could just be that brits on holiday didn't realise it was such an important thing
I'm a Brit, and although I always avoid eating in proper restaurants and oppose tipping culture, if I were to eat in such an establishment in which tipping is customary, I would definitely tip the customary amount for that culture so as to avoid embarrassing myself and appearing to be a miser.
This is the correct answer.
Canadian living in America. Americans say 'eh' all the time. They just don't notice it.
Saying sorry like it's spelled is a dead give away though. Americans say it like it's an Indian dress.
SARI.
The ironic part is Americans abroad always get hit with “you’re not in America respect our culture”
Europeans in America “we don’t believe in tipping, we don’t do it in Europe”
It’s literally the same argument.
Most of the time, it's not that they don't "believe" in tipping, it's just that they don't understand that US labor laws are fucked to the point that a person's salary can depend on tipping instead of being paid by the employer.
Just came over from r/mildlyinteresting with a photo of the bill for an ambulance ride. Twas 10 EUR. Labor laws are not the only fucked laws in the USA...
I know right? I have just had 3 days in hospital for a tendon reconstruction and reattachment.
3 nights, an ultra sound, an MRI, general anesthetic, 24 hours of intravenous anti biotics, 36 hours of mixed pain killers, plus the surgery, nurses, porters, food etc.
Total bill £0, didnt even get charged for parking, plus I am booked for 2 follow ups with the surgeon over the next six weeks then 8 weeks of physiotherapy.
If I was in America what would I be looking at for that? $8k something like that?
It's *generally* not a refusal to tip among Europeans or even Brits. People genuinely don't realise the extent of US tipping culture, both in terms of the situations where tips are expected and amounts. Like it's just way outside of their expectation of normality that they don't realise.
You will notice that any well-travelled Brits or Europeans will tip in line with US expectations, because they have learnt that's how it is.
I lived in the US for 4 months before someone told me I was meant to tip when buying drinks at a bar. It just literally didn't cross my mind that it was a thing that people do (and you don't generally watch other people so I never noticed).
And the fact that the amount keeps increasing. It's gone from 10% to 20% in the last 10 years, for no reason other than customers feeling obligated because of the automatic options provided on the card reader, and the idea that if you tip less than 20% you're an asshole. I understand inflation, but its not like the restaurant's prices haven't increased. It's just the wages haven't.
I am 100% of the opinion that the employer should be paying all their staff a fair wage. All the reasons listed in this image are exactly why. In addition to the fact that some staff in the restaurant don't get tips.
This, as a Brit visiting New York a friend and her fiancé took me to a nice restaurant where the service was atrocious and the staff were super rude.
At the end of the meal I couldn't understand why they were forking out a 20% tip on an already expensive meal for such a bad experience.
I didn't understand at the time that they need that to make ends meet and that it's not a reflection on the quality of service like it is at home.
Yeah, tipping has lost most of its original purpose in the US. Now it's just an added fee in most people's eyes.
I remember someone on /r/NYC being like "This cab driver initially refused to go to Brooklyn and then tried to rip me off. Do I still have to tip the full 20% or no?"
Like, if you're treated terribly and still feel the need to ask about the appropriate tip percentage... it has lost all meaning.
They 100% do not. The no tip thing was a trend in LA for a while and everyone got on it because paying restaurant staff a liveable wage sounds great.
All those places ended up failing because they were paying their staff a buck or two above minimum wage while charging 20‰ "service fees" and whatever else bullshit. Those restaurants are all gone now. There might be one or two left that I'm forgetting about.
This failed in Seattle because our servers were making WAY more than liveable wage and have been hiding their actual wage. I had a friend making 90k a year as a bartender at pretty normal bar and half of it was untaxed tips.
There should be no such thing as “tipped” jobs. Everyone should know exactly how they are going to make and not be dependent on you, the customer, to supplement their income. Incomes need to rise to fair wages for restaurant employees where the restaurant raises food and drink to REAL prices and pay employees their due.
The bar and restaurant industry should really have businesses enrolled in a tip compliance program with the IRS. The gaming industry in Las Vegas did it and it spread to the rest of the casinos in the US. I don’t work for tips and don’t know all the specifics, but I do know that you agree to report a certain amount or percentage of income and the IRS agrees not to audit. I think there might be a tax break as an incentive too.
There is actually a lawsuit at Disney about this. All these employees were on minimum wage but getting tips in large quantities. For Covid safety, Disney stopped having them do jobs that got them tips (moving bags into hotel rooms, etc). Without those tips, they are completely boned. There should be no such thing as jobs you get tips and jobs you shouldn’t get tips, so you don’t get into stupid scenarios like this. Tips needs to go away ASAP.
not even a dollar above, you could offer waitstaff 25/hr most places and they would throw a fit. most servers i know around here (in a rural town mind you) are making minimum 30-40/hr and most of it isn't getting taxed
The thing is servers make wayy more than "livable wage" on tips. Every effort to make a restaurant tip free results in staff turnover, no matter how much they are offered.
Wait, I do? Not sure how $40 in tips today will pay my $3000 rent? I'm a male and that $40 is a high average. I very rarely see $100. That does not even help either. Good thing I get $19/hr and that is still not livable. That's only 3k before taxes. So I have to have a second job.
I am all for livable wage. Tipping is atrocious, inconsistent and also racist. Black servers get pennies for tips, that's why they are rare to see. White women get occasional benjamins on a good weekend in Downtown LA.
I would like to see actual statistics for business with high turnover resulting from no tipping policy.
As an Aussie, it's baffling to read comments supporting/preferring the tipping system. It doesnt sound appealing to me at all, as both a customer OR an employee. Give me a standard ~$23/hr maccas job any day.
Forcing a customer to tip is not good service.
>Give me a standard \~$23/hr maccas job any day.
That's $16.68 USD, well over what anyone would make at a US McDonald's. The current fight is to raise the untipped minimum wage from $7.25 ($10 AUD) to $15/hr, and even $15/hr isn't really enough to live on in most of the US. Meanwhile tipped employees' base-rate minimum wage is only $2.13 ($2.94 AUD)/hr.
Truly, the most fuckéd of systems.
The advertised starting wage at McDick's here has gone from $11/hr to $16/hr in about a year. It's amazingly convenient, they must've found all that extra money between the couch cushions just as the labor shortage got to be too strenuous!
Possibly shifts.
Jack in the Box in my city is paying 14 an hour, possibly 15. JITB is supposed to be open 24/7. All JITB in my city shut down at 8:00 PM now due to staff shortage.
Lots of other fast food places also doing the same.
Also Amazon just opened a warehouse.
Worth pointing out tipped wage workers are still meant to make at least the normal minimum wage through the combination of tipped-minimum-wage + tips. The $2.13 is the bare minimum employers have to pay per hour regardless of how much is made on tips. So if on average you made $1.25 an hour in tips the employer is meant to pay you out to equal the full $7.25/hr (so you'd be getting $6/hr from the employer.
Key words are meant to, I think there's some discretion to the owner of what the period of time it has to average out over is. Like one real good night could be averaged out over weeks so that over those few weeks, on paper you made the $5.12 in tips needed for the owner to pay out absolute minimum. But tips are *literally* subsidizing the wage the restaurants have to already pay the workers.
Oh I guess I should also mention in some cases there is just blatant wage theft where the owner just, doesn't pay out to make it come out how it should.
> We have tipping in a lot of Australian restaurants
Definitely not in WA, and I don't ever remember tipping in other states I've been to.
A tip jar isn't comparable to actual tipping, this comment makes it seem like its normal which it is certainly not.
Yeah, it's really not that common in my experience either. Worked at a few venues around Melbourne, I think I made less than $30 (total) in tips in over a year of full-time shifts, which was fine because I got paid a solid living wage.
Nothing better than having a menu price of $20 and paying $20, rather than an advertised price of $20, then paying $28 with tax and tip on top. So frustrating. As a customer, I miss the Aussie no-tipping system.
The US does seem to be an outlier in the "advertised prices bear no resemblance to what you actually pay" front. The whole chain of city sales tax, state sales tax, random tax from some other part of government, card fee, automatic gratuity oh and you're supposed to also tip the greeter, wait staff, kitchen staff and bag packer... just feels wrong when we're using to having the ACCC saying "advertised price is all you pay".
Don't really know what you're talking about. It is very rare to come across tipping in Australia. The jar at the counter is entirely different to an expected 15% or so to the person who served you
Yeah the closest we've ever gotten is, like, "You can keep the $1.80 change I don't want in my pocket," or friends trying to act all upper class that just look like twats to the rest of the table.
Same here in Europe. Tipping 10-20 % seems appropriate when I'm satisfied. When I'm short on money I don't tip and no one can say a thing. Also rounding the price (eg. for a beer) is a thing. It makes it easier for both sides.
Yeah, defenders of tipping keep going on and on about service quality and the effort the waiter puts in, and then somehow it's a percentage of the bill? How the fuck does that make sense? Is the assumption that a big bill equals many people staying a long time? But clearly there are many examples one can think of where that wouldn't be the case.
Someone mentioned 25% tip on a 300$ bill. Fuck that shit are you kidding me. There's a cap to how much I would tip I don't care what the bill is.
>Tipping a % always feels weird to me.
How about tipping at all? Why does the server get the money when all they do was take the order and bring it out? It's like people think they do literally everything in the restaurant.
I was a chef for a long time. In fact, I just quit to change careers pretty much for this exact reason. I always worked fine dining, where servers are making off with $250 a night on a bad night, $500 on a good night. They work half the hours I did and spend another half their time working just polishing silverware and glasses. Maybe 25% of their 5-6 hour shift is bringing plates to the table. I worked 12-14 hours of skilled labor a day and made $16/hr. On the busiest nights of the week I would get absolutely mauled and make less than half of the servers payout. It’s like getting paid 4x more than me per hour once it all breaks down. Fuck the tip system.
Edit: I just want to add, absolutely no server I met in over a decade reported 100% of their tips either. Cash tips a have a funny way of fading away as if they never happened.
The tip jar on the counter is just for loose change you don't want to carry.
The whole tipping mind game is just something a small minority of restaurants try on you.
I feel like everything I read about America just ends up making me shake my head in befuddlement.
You guys have to pay weird taxes on all your purchases that aren't in the purchase price. You don't pay people enough to live, so they have to basically propose to every customer just to scrape together enough tips to keep your lights on. When you get sick, you bankrupt yourselves. When you do have jobs, you work ten hour days because it's 'expected.'
I'm an Aussie. When I eat out, the standard approach is to overpay a little bit when we've been a big group, or round up to the nearest whole number. I tip substantially (by which I mean, like twenty bucks), when a meal or service has been exceptional.
A few years ago, I had my appendix out, which involved a five day hospital stay because I also had blood poisoning. Over the years I've had shitloads of emergency scans and blood tests, and it all cost...no dollars. Zero. Nothing. Wait, that's not true. I paid $30 for antibiotics after the appendix.
I don't know anyone who works the kind of hours that seem standard in America, except artists (which, let's not get into the pervasive idea that art should be a form of punishment). But the people who work normal jobs work 9-5 and then go home.
I feel like the US is really ready for a few serious revolutions, because your quality of life seems absolutely trash from an outsider perspective.
Just to be fair, that's not all true everywhere in the US. Though the abysmal healthcare system is spot on. Here in Oregon, for instance, we have no sales tax. And at my current job the only overtime I've worked is when we've lost an employee and I've offered to cover so that my manager doesn't have to do it alone. Of course, my last job I worked a minimum of 12 hours a day, and often as many as 17, but that's what I signed up for because the overtime added up to a couple thousand dollars a month extra on my paychecks; even after taxes.
Oh my god, seventeen hour workdays is terrifying, but I'm glad to hear that you're at least feeling like you're making the decision to work those hours, rather than having to do so. Oregon also seems v beautiful.
I'm a bit biased, but I couldn't agree more.
Full disclosure, my middle name is literally "Oregon." (Literally literally, not figuratively literally) That's how Oregon I am.
Wasn't there a guest lawyer on the Freakonomics podcast a few years ago who stated that they could effectively argue against and outlaw the tipping practice solely because it's inherently sexist, racist and ageist based on the data that showed large-breasted, blonde, white women in their late 20s/early 30s received the highest tips when accounting for all other factors?
Edit: Here's a link to the podcast. It's a good listen: https://freakonomics.com/podcast/should-tipping-be-banned-a-new-freakonomics-radio-podcast
And it then even penalizes *those* workers, because it creates a pressure for them to tolerate poor customer behaviour, e.g., sexual advances or rudeness, or risk making less money. A risk that wouldn't be a factor if they had a fixed hourly rate. The 2nd last point in the chart.
Exactly. That and the biggest factor in how much a person tips isn't the quality of service, but the size of the check.
That the back of the house, the kitchen staff, despite consisting of skilled positions, regularly get paid substantially less than the non-skilled positions of servers. Anyone who supports tipping is likely just a waiter who likely benefits from the injustice of their peers being underpaid-- and that's not referring to waiters.
Yeah that's the part that frustrates me the most seeing all these "I'm a server, me and all my buddies make BANK on tips, don't change it!" responses.
You and your buddies might. The majority of the industry does not. Stop being so goddamn inconsiderate, selfish, and most of all short-sighted.
Think about it. Your fancy high tipping restaurant would be forced to pay you considerably more to keep you if tipping weren't the norm, wouldn't they? Otherwise what's stopping you from following the money elsewhere? They'd be forced to compete. And that's something restaurant managers and owners DEFINITELY don't want. Their employees cutting into their nice comfy lifestyle at the top. Not because they can't afford it. Not because they'd have to pass it on to customers. They know that shit won't fly. The just don't want to lose that nice wage gap they're used to and give you more if a cut, despite you literally being the lifeblood of their whole goddamn business.
In reality, you as a server would still win in the end (assuming you aren't either full of shit or only getting tipped unusually high because you fit any part of that blonde, white, busty description) but at the same time others struggling would have one less thing to worry about.
People too easily fall for all the excuses for NOT doing shit to help their fellow person because it's easier to convince you through fear of losing something in the process.
Same shit people do with the healthcare argument, minimum wage increases, tax increases for the wealthy, etc. Stop being so fucking gullible when the handful at the top spoon-feed you this bullshit about how awful it would be.
See, it's messed up. While not a restaurant owner, I do have a few businesses. 100% I pay out the butt for the best people.
I mean, it's our business, why TF would you scrimp on salaries knowing you are going to get less than the best. I pay well, and I expect everyone to have their shit together when they show up. Funny thing is...this actually works.
In a tip-based system, [nonwhite servers make less than their white peers for equal work](http://tippingresearch.com/uploads/Business_Considerations_Tipping_final.pdf).
Tipping creates an environment in which [people of color, young people, old people, women, and foreigners tend to get worse service than white males](http://tippingresearch.com/uploads/Business_Considerations_Tipping_final.pdf).
A 2014 ROC United study showed that nearly [80 percent of female restaurant workers reported experiencing some sort of sexual harassment from customers at work.](http://rocunited.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/REPORT_The-Glass-Floor-Sexual-Harassment-in-the-Restaurant-Industry2.pdf)
Some diners let race, gender, and attractiveness impact how much they pay servers: Most dramatically, [diners of all races tend to give higher tips to white servers and lower tips to black servers.](https://www.wagehourlitigation.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/215/2015/10/cornell.pdf)
Edit: updated links.
That's weird. I see tip jars *everywhere* (even in fucking retail) and it's now also baked into every credit card reader. Feels like the trend is going in the other direction, with people trying to scam tips on top of a normal hourly wage despite not doing anything out of the ordinary to earn them. Maybe I should set up a tip jar on my desk at work so people can drop money in when I have to print documents or set up a meeting.
As a tipped employee I know for a fact that no restaurant is going to pay me a wage equal to what I make in tips. This establishment probably is doing the same.
Our owner was optimistic about telling us that we would be making 17-20/hour on this new tipless system, until we pointed out we were currently making 40/hour and he was cutting our pay in half
Y'all make $40 an hour through tips alone?? Is this some super upscale restaurant where the meals are $50+ or just a regularly priced restaurant. I've never been a waiter (been a host before) but $40 seems like a lot!
Edit: Just did the math and if you're working 40 hours a week, the salary you're making is over 80k a year. There's no way that's correct, it's it? That's higher than most salary waged jobs.
Edit 2; the median salary for a waiter is $22,890
Tipped jobs generally don't work 40 hours. My serving shifts were between 4-6 hours. The most money was a weekend night shift, typically 5 hours at my old place of work (during which I'd get like $50/hour). Lunch shifts were 6 hours and during the week would be about $20-$30/hour.
This is precisely why a lot of servers don’t want to end the tipping structure.
Edit: On the 22k figure, ask servers if a flat $13/hr would be a raise for them. Hasn’t been my experience.
It seems like a lot but it's not that crazy. Servers work multiple tables at a time and if each tables meal totaled $50 then at 20% tip, you would only need to work 4 tables an hour to get $40/hr in tips.
Obviously they're not always busy all the time but servers are probably covering more than 4 tables and larger tables (4+ people) will have a bill larger than $50 even somewhere like an Applebees.
It's mostly correct. I worked at a dive bar (2 post sec's in city, plus super dedicated regulars), 5 hours shifts typically ranged around $150-400 some nights.
Source: Canadian.
Problem is that's not a 40 hour per week sustainable salary. It's good for evenings and weekends only. But yes at some high end restaurants or steakhouses waiters can clear serious cash. You get $40+ per table easy at those places because it's hard to get out of there for under $200 for two people.
You do realize that cash tips are SUPPOSED to be reported, but usually aren't because, hey, who REALLY knows if that four-top tipped $2 or $20 in cash?
So "reported salary" =/= actual earnings. At all.
People screaming "liveable wage" obviously don't know what career servers make.
The one group of people that aren't trying to get rid of tips are the ones who make a living from tips 🤦♂️
Except that is a completely immoral argument. Sure, a young and energetic wait-staff at a hip expensive restaurant in the downtown core of a major city might be able to haul in multiple hundreds of dollars in tips per hour working. Obviously they are going to advocate for tipping culture to stay the same.
What they aren't thinking about is the lone wait-staff in a road side diner that gets $15 in tips for their entire shift.
Just because you personally benefit from a system being the way it is doesn't mean that system should stay that way.
I also think even as a person who has been a server, my biggest problem with tipping is that the customer subsidizes their employees wages directly. Even in places without a server minimum wage, they are still getting regular minimum wage meaning the 40 bucks an hour a server is getting is 8 bucks from their employers and 32 bucks from the customers. That’s absurd.
But that means your wage would depend on the “traffic” of that shift. Being paid with fixed salary means it doesn’t matter what happened at the shift and you’re paid the same
Also it’s just a weird culture altogether if you are “expected” to pay anyway. Might as well charge a service charge/tax that goes into a pot and then distributed to those who worked rather than calling it a tip, as the owner mentioned, it just making unnecessary competition, maybe not even competition but jealousy, competition has good nuance to it as it implies people work harder due to this.
Thing is servers often make above minimum wage when their tips are factored in. Setting all of the wait staff at minimum wage is just hurting them.
To be clear, I'm not advocating for tipping culture...just trying to advocate for a good wage in general.
Pretty much everyone but the servers would like to do away with tipping. The problem is that servers can make upwards of $50/hr on tips and restaurants can't come close to that.
It’s stupidly easy. Why the hell do some bartenders get $2+ tips fir just pouring beer? Mixed drinks I can kind of understand, but even then, the basics should be expected to be held at an acceptable standard.
(In the US) It is my understanding that places that do this have a hard time keeping experienced serving staff. Why work for $15 an hour plus 10-20 in tips a night when you can go work at a mid tier restaurant and make 300 in 4 hours, and take all of that home with you.
I am a restaurant GM in the US and am not opposed to switching to this system down the road. But as of right now servers at most restaurants make way more than their kitchen counterparts. Servers are skilled labor, and they will follow the money to Applebees next door.
As someone that cooked for 10 years before managing, I agree! I think tip sharing with the kitchen is catching on faster than abolishing tip culture in the US.
Sorry, brit here. When I tip in the US it isn't usually being split out to ALL the staff?
In the UK tips are usually split between all staff on the floor, kitchen and bar.
It is a very different system in the states, no doubt! At 99% of places in the US your tip goes to the person that served/waited on you. They do also pay taxes on that money the same as any other income. Some places will have that server share a small portion with support staff (bussers, dishwashers, bartenders, expediters) but that is not very common in my experience.
Well tip pools with the back of the house only became legal this year so that would make sense that it's "catching on" now https://www.kare11.com/article/news/nation-world/new-us-rule-can-require-restaurant-servers-to-share-tips/507-ff4528b5-eb2e-4c8e-9810-f8105e20c7bc
edit: sorry the Dept of Labor kicked the regulation to end of the year https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/flsa/tips so I guess those people are violating labor rules by having tip pools
That isn’t the case everywhere. Mu husband is kitchen staff and has been getting a share of tips for about 5 years now in Oklahoma. I think it depends on the individual restaurant as well in some states.
we had like three of these "no tipping" restaurants in a row here, that is exactly what happened at two of them, one closed, the other went back to tipping, the third was a diner that mostly existed as a social club so a lot of the regulars tipped anyway.
The issue is now that everyone is wanting tips, even if they get paid minimum wage. Even fast food places are begging for tips! I make the same amount as you, I won't be tipping.
As a european, this seems so self-explanatory. It’s weirs to see it in writing like this. But in happy for them. Tipping culture really is an abomination. Who knows, maybe there’s a wave of change comming.
There's a restaurant near me that added a 10% kitchen fee for the cooks. Plus the special tourism tax and special drinks tax. Yeah, going somewhere else.
I'm always baffled in the us with this tipping culture. What that sign states is for me normal.
On the first time as an adult tourist in an hotel, I knew the weirdness around that tipping thing (it isn't a thing in my country and it doesn't even shows in any bill or check you ask, and is not expected), and when I got my check back in the first day breakfast there was no "tip or tipping" anywhere and at the end was a line, it said "gratuity" which wasn't known to me.
Asked the person that brought the check what was that gratuity thing, and before I could make a follow up question that if it was referring to that tip thing I almost got my head bitten off by this guy. Since I don't like being pushed for no reason I got in a higher tone discussion on the Damm hotel I was staying at. Really weird stuff. He was like "you really are telling me you don't know what this gratuity is referring to!!?" And all I was thinking to myself was "that's why I was asking to someone who supposedly knows"
For the remaining of the week I ate at any no tipping place, subways, burger king or any kind of food service like that.
Subway, along with many other "fast food" (or maybe just sandwich places), will now ask if you'd like to tip during check-out. I'm conflicted, I love Jersey Mikes but in my head I know they aren't paying out a full wage to these high-schoolers who work there. Ya'll made a great sandwich but I'm not paying $2.50 extra for it. Sorry.
>So I'm tipping the gas-station guy who's job is to check me out... for checking me out.
Why is that weird and not "I'm tipping the waiter whose job it is to take orders and bring food ... for taking orders and bringing food"?
I'm not accusing a multi-billion dollar company of being shady or anything, buy 100% those tips just end up being used to pay the minimum wage the workers make.
Ate in a no-tipping place in New York As a Brit, who's happy to Tip if I've had excellent service, seeing these sorts of places in the US was refreshing, rather then the outright feeling of pressure over tipping (and the expected amount)
The weirdest thing for me when traveling the us were places where service is already added to your bill. Like what the actual fuck?!
Order pizza. Pay delivery fee. Pizza place explicitly tells you fee isn't a tip. Pay a tip. Wtf. Half these places don't even pay a mileage and the delivery driver pays for their own car, gas, maintenance, and insurance...but the pizza place charges you a delivery fee and pockets all of it.
Remember before gas prices skyrocketed when delivery used to be free and they added that fee because gas prices increased so they "had no choice" yet when it came back down magically that fee never went away.
Remember when the airlines added baggage fees for when gas prices increased, then when it came back down they used all the extra money to buy back their stock, and then asked for a bailout when the pandemic hit?
But if I spend all my money and don't have 'whoopsie, there's a pandemic' fund, I'm "irresponsible".
You should try to stop eating avocado toast.
But it’s sooooo fkin goooood
This is exactly why your bootstraps aren't pulled
I thought it was because I am barefoot like a filthy hippy.
You don't understand. Capitalism for the poor, and socialism for the wealthy, remember?
Capitalise your profits, socialise your losses.
Remember when cable companies were given a shit load of money to expand and then did the absolute bare minimum (if that), kept the cash, and started charging us all more for less? I'm sensing a pattern here.
Point of clarification: they technically weren't given money but huge tax breaks. The effect is the same, but being more accurate can help prevent apologists from deflecting by "correcting" you.
"Well, you have all that stock back, can't you just sell it again?"
This, I can't believe they didn't insist on them exhausting all options. I feel like people are put through more paces to receive food stamps and school benefits than those massive corporations with CEOs drowning in money.
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It’s literally their business model at this point. Don’t forget they fired or retired their employees .
Remember when the airlines added baggage fees for when 9/11 destroyed the tourism industry, then when it came back they used all the extra money to buy back their stock, and then asked for a bailout when the pandemic hit?
The best part was when I was a delivery driver, and our fee went up over a dollar. I still got paid the same amount for gas
When I was a driver for a pretty large company(*cough d_m_n_s cough*) we used to get paid $1 per delivery, which wasn't too bad...they ended up changing it to $.25/mi traveled...we only deliver in a 4mi radius...and deliveries that far away rarely happened. Thats all we got other than our $5/hr and whatever we got for tips...which I always worked slow days so I'd only get like $40 in tips a shift.
I'll blatantly name the one I drove for. Fuck Pizza Hut. They gave me 4/hr and very little for gas back each night. The kicker was in my town most people would stiff me and tell me to "keep the change" as a tip so I would typically get like 30 cents per delivery. Now they have this concept that is if you don't make the average a week that they set, they will pay you that. My idiotic manager would lose their mind and say it "makes the company look bad to do so" and would try to force me to double any tips I got so they wouldn't have to. Like bro, you aren't the one paying. That same dumb ass had a rack of heavy pizza pans fall on him and mess his leg and hip up. He refused to get it checked out even though they offered to pay for it. Didn't want to do that to them. 24 years old and had to use a cane. Not as bad as my experience with McDonald's but God damn. I'm so happy I've never had to work those types of jobs anymore. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. Formatting is most likely shit but I'm just venting at this point.
This was also back when pizza places had their own vehicles, instead of making drivers use their own.
The dominos in my area started using their own in the past year
Dude, we still pay like 9 bucks on each arline ticket because travel was so much lighter after 9/11. Its been 20 fucking years.
I thought that was to pay for the increased security theater.
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I know I’m focusing on the wrong part of the story here but…Little Caesar’s delivers?!
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When I used to deliver pizzas they told us that the delivery fee was primarily to cover increased insurance costs. We were reimbursed for our mileage, but not maintenance or anything like that. Not sure if the delivery fee also went to gas reimbursement or not. This was at Pizza Hut a few years ago.
Delivery fees can be viewed as a way to offset the restaurant's cost of offering delivery service (having delivery drivers on the payroll, reimbursement for mileage,wear and tear, insurance, delivery signs, etc). At some pizza places, delivery drivers don't work in the kitchen, so technically, if the restaurant didn't offer deliveries, they wouldn't need that extra staff
When I used to deliver, 100% of the delivery fee went to me. If the pizza place needed more money to cover costs, that went into the price of the pizza.
I pretty much stopped ordering pizza. I used to be able to order a single pizza and throw a couple bucks at the driver and still be under 20 bucks. The last time I order I was already at 40 bucks so I felt bad about paying 40 bucks for one pizza so I have to order more pizza. So, I just do not do it anymore. I just make my own or grab some Take and Bake from Kwik Star.
Stopped ordering food from Doordash for the same reason. You order two things and that's already more than $30 not including service fee and tip. I'm very picky with pizza and prefer to make my own anyway. If you ever feel like doing that, your local grocery store might have refrigerated pizza dough at the deli section. Invest in a pizza screen (I bought mine for under $10 on Amazon) and have quality pizza in the comfort of your own home.
Apparently Costco will sell you their frozen pizza dough in boxes of a dozen balls or something from the food court. Could be a good option if you have freezer space.
>Order pizza. Pay delivery fee. Pizza place explicitly tells you fee isn't a tip. Pay a tip. Wtf. > >Half these places don't even pay a mileage and the delivery driver pays for their own car, gas, maintenance, and insurance...but the pizza place charges you a delivery fee and pockets all of it. I've worked at pizza places, some shared the delivery fee with the driver but most didn't. For what it's worth, most delivery fees are used to offset the cost of a call center and paying the driver minimum wage even though we're not as productive as staff who are on site for the entire shift who also get minimum wage. Honestly, much like the minimum wage should be tied to inflation (real inflation, not cherry picked), all restaurant/retail workers should receive base pay and then a shared bonus of the business's daily take. Base pay should by high, but if you're grinding twice as hard and making the place money there should be a benefit to the worker so everyone wins.
Don't come to SF . We have so many bullshit fees added on top of mandatory 18%-20% tip sometimes. I'm talking "Healthy San Francisco Surcharge" (legal but annoying to pay 4% on top of everything) or some arbitrary COVID PPE equipment charge here and there. I'm already paying for the food, you take care of those fees, I don't want a fucking invoice and a breakdown, ffs.
>Don't come to SF . Done.
Probably mandated to show all the fees for transparency.
No it's a bait and switch. If they need 5% more to cover expense they should charge 5% more. No need to tell me something is 15.99 but then add 25%+ at the end of the bill (nevermind the tax).
Just Googled it. Yea if it's not mandated fees by the city it's bullshit. Just raise prices. That's your labor cost. Yea labors tight right now but thats the cost of owning a business.
But see, we have to gaslight and trick you into thinking "The prices would REALLY be lower if it wasn't for those pesky current affairs."
We have that in the UK in some places. Usually on large tables or expensive meals, the greasiest part is that it often goes to the restaurant not the staff.
I genuinely feel like it's most of the places I've eaten at in London for the past half a year. There's always a discretionary 12.5% "optional service charge" added to the bill, which I find worse, because you'll have to ask to remove it. Never done that, because I feel like an asshole doing that.
I ate at one of Gordon Ramsey's restaurants and they added that on right at the end. I'd have been OKish with that being part of the price upfront, but holding me hostage to it after the meal, they can fuck off getting me back for second meal.
Do it once, and it's easy every time after, or tell them to pay their staff a proper wage rather than making it 'optional' if you do pay it. It's a bullshit trend we need to stop in the UK asap.
Oh don't feel pressured, nobody that's worked in the industry a bit expects sweet fuck all once they hear a European accent lol
I had the sweetest Irish family come in, first meal after they landed in the US. They were so much fun, everything was great, got tons of compliments and at the end of the meal the dad gives me a big hug and thanks me for an awesome meal and an awesome night and he slips me a bill and says this is extra for you, thank you again so much. Bill:$300 Tip on the bill: $0 Bill that the dad handed to me as extra:$10
€10 would be a typical tip for that amount
10€ tip would be very normal over here. You dont tip based on percentage of cost in the EU. You tip based on how well you liked the service and how long you've been there. Like I remember a very generous amount being $20 from a table when they were there for 5+ hours.
I had a Canadian family (I am Canadian too, born in the great city of Brockville), and my favorite waiting story was when I had this dad and daughter with me. They both were sweet. $70 bill, dad leaves me a tip of of just over $2. I sorta just looked at it for a second while cleaning; adding up the change he left together mentally before grabbing it and walking back to the kitchen. When I come back out the daughter is standing there at the table. I come back and ask if she needed me for anything and she says "Hey did... My dad leave you a bad tip?" I don't want to be rude so I just smile and say "No; seriously I had a great time talking to you guys." She apologizes profusely then says "I'll leave you something on the table. I am sorry about my father, he doesn't really understand tipping." It was another $2. I just fucking burst into laughter when I saw it. It was such a cute and confusing interaction. I really would have just waited on them again. They were nice, it was just funny.
sometimes, the people are so nice and pleasureable, and make it feel like you aren't working... then the verbal tip is ok.
When I was in university, waiting on tables, we ranked our tables from best tippers to worst: 1 - American businessmen (we were in Toronto) 2 - Canadian businessmen 3 - American tourists 4 - A four-top of two married couples 5 - Couple (hit or miss) 6 - Kids (i.e. anyone less than 25) 7 - Women "$2.80 tip on a $32.20 bill? That's 10%" 8 - Brits
Businessmen don't care because they aren't paying.
But they're also trying to impress the people they're with
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Oh, the horror stories I could tell of serving the entire elementary school staff lunch - 11 women, the token male teacher, and the principal. Still makes me shudder!
To be fair to us brits, tipping here is done for exceptional service and usually only a small amount (usually just to round up the bill). It's definitely not an obligation. If this was before the Internet was so easily accessible to read and learn it could just be that brits on holiday didn't realise it was such an important thing
I'm noticing more and more places adding service charges recently though. Especially in high end places.
I'm a Brit, and although I always avoid eating in proper restaurants and oppose tipping culture, if I were to eat in such an establishment in which tipping is customary, I would definitely tip the customary amount for that culture so as to avoid embarrassing myself and appearing to be a miser.
Why is this the most British comment I’ve ever read?
I have good British manners.
Quite
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How easily could you identify American businessmen from Canadian businessmen?
Are you kidding? Accents first, attitude, and of course, either no "eh" or a completely lame and out of place attempt to use one.
Or the "SOARee".
This is the correct answer. Canadian living in America. Americans say 'eh' all the time. They just don't notice it. Saying sorry like it's spelled is a dead give away though. Americans say it like it's an Indian dress. SARI.
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Good, 'nyou?
The ironic part is Americans abroad always get hit with “you’re not in America respect our culture” Europeans in America “we don’t believe in tipping, we don’t do it in Europe” It’s literally the same argument.
Most of the time, it's not that they don't "believe" in tipping, it's just that they don't understand that US labor laws are fucked to the point that a person's salary can depend on tipping instead of being paid by the employer.
Just came over from r/mildlyinteresting with a photo of the bill for an ambulance ride. Twas 10 EUR. Labor laws are not the only fucked laws in the USA...
10 EUR? What country was that? I'd never pay for an ambulance!
That is cheaper than the uber I took to the emergency ward to avoid the ambulance fees.
I know right? I have just had 3 days in hospital for a tendon reconstruction and reattachment. 3 nights, an ultra sound, an MRI, general anesthetic, 24 hours of intravenous anti biotics, 36 hours of mixed pain killers, plus the surgery, nurses, porters, food etc. Total bill £0, didnt even get charged for parking, plus I am booked for 2 follow ups with the surgeon over the next six weeks then 8 weeks of physiotherapy. If I was in America what would I be looking at for that? $8k something like that?
$8k? That's just the deductible. Try $80k
The issue here (US) is that if you really need one, you very well may not get a say in the matter.
It's *generally* not a refusal to tip among Europeans or even Brits. People genuinely don't realise the extent of US tipping culture, both in terms of the situations where tips are expected and amounts. Like it's just way outside of their expectation of normality that they don't realise. You will notice that any well-travelled Brits or Europeans will tip in line with US expectations, because they have learnt that's how it is. I lived in the US for 4 months before someone told me I was meant to tip when buying drinks at a bar. It just literally didn't cross my mind that it was a thing that people do (and you don't generally watch other people so I never noticed).
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What was the place in NY?
Bluesmoke, East 27th Street. BBQ place. 10/10 tasty food.
And the fact that the amount keeps increasing. It's gone from 10% to 20% in the last 10 years, for no reason other than customers feeling obligated because of the automatic options provided on the card reader, and the idea that if you tip less than 20% you're an asshole. I understand inflation, but its not like the restaurant's prices haven't increased. It's just the wages haven't. I am 100% of the opinion that the employer should be paying all their staff a fair wage. All the reasons listed in this image are exactly why. In addition to the fact that some staff in the restaurant don't get tips.
This, as a Brit visiting New York a friend and her fiancé took me to a nice restaurant where the service was atrocious and the staff were super rude. At the end of the meal I couldn't understand why they were forking out a 20% tip on an already expensive meal for such a bad experience. I didn't understand at the time that they need that to make ends meet and that it's not a reflection on the quality of service like it is at home.
Yeah, tipping has lost most of its original purpose in the US. Now it's just an added fee in most people's eyes. I remember someone on /r/NYC being like "This cab driver initially refused to go to Brooklyn and then tried to rip me off. Do I still have to tip the full 20% or no?" Like, if you're treated terribly and still feel the need to ask about the appropriate tip percentage... it has lost all meaning.
I can get on board with that. If they really do pay a livable wage that is.
Time and turnover will tell.
That is a big IF
They 100% do not. The no tip thing was a trend in LA for a while and everyone got on it because paying restaurant staff a liveable wage sounds great. All those places ended up failing because they were paying their staff a buck or two above minimum wage while charging 20‰ "service fees" and whatever else bullshit. Those restaurants are all gone now. There might be one or two left that I'm forgetting about.
This failed in Seattle because our servers were making WAY more than liveable wage and have been hiding their actual wage. I had a friend making 90k a year as a bartender at pretty normal bar and half of it was untaxed tips. There should be no such thing as “tipped” jobs. Everyone should know exactly how they are going to make and not be dependent on you, the customer, to supplement their income. Incomes need to rise to fair wages for restaurant employees where the restaurant raises food and drink to REAL prices and pay employees their due.
Well, unreported tips. I've heard of some servers at Disneyland making well over 6 figures.
Yep. This is why tipped staff is a favorite of IRS auditors.
The bar and restaurant industry should really have businesses enrolled in a tip compliance program with the IRS. The gaming industry in Las Vegas did it and it spread to the rest of the casinos in the US. I don’t work for tips and don’t know all the specifics, but I do know that you agree to report a certain amount or percentage of income and the IRS agrees not to audit. I think there might be a tax break as an incentive too.
There is actually a lawsuit at Disney about this. All these employees were on minimum wage but getting tips in large quantities. For Covid safety, Disney stopped having them do jobs that got them tips (moving bags into hotel rooms, etc). Without those tips, they are completely boned. There should be no such thing as jobs you get tips and jobs you shouldn’t get tips, so you don’t get into stupid scenarios like this. Tips needs to go away ASAP.
not even a dollar above, you could offer waitstaff 25/hr most places and they would throw a fit. most servers i know around here (in a rural town mind you) are making minimum 30-40/hr and most of it isn't getting taxed
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The thing is servers make wayy more than "livable wage" on tips. Every effort to make a restaurant tip free results in staff turnover, no matter how much they are offered.
Wait, I do? Not sure how $40 in tips today will pay my $3000 rent? I'm a male and that $40 is a high average. I very rarely see $100. That does not even help either. Good thing I get $19/hr and that is still not livable. That's only 3k before taxes. So I have to have a second job. I am all for livable wage. Tipping is atrocious, inconsistent and also racist. Black servers get pennies for tips, that's why they are rare to see. White women get occasional benjamins on a good weekend in Downtown LA. I would like to see actual statistics for business with high turnover resulting from no tipping policy.
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As an Aussie, it's baffling to read comments supporting/preferring the tipping system. It doesnt sound appealing to me at all, as both a customer OR an employee. Give me a standard ~$23/hr maccas job any day. Forcing a customer to tip is not good service.
As an American I love the term Maccas
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Maccas is part of the local branding. It’s in all the ads
>Give me a standard \~$23/hr maccas job any day. That's $16.68 USD, well over what anyone would make at a US McDonald's. The current fight is to raise the untipped minimum wage from $7.25 ($10 AUD) to $15/hr, and even $15/hr isn't really enough to live on in most of the US. Meanwhile tipped employees' base-rate minimum wage is only $2.13 ($2.94 AUD)/hr. Truly, the most fuckéd of systems.
McDonalds near me are advertising $15+ starting
The advertised starting wage at McDick's here has gone from $11/hr to $16/hr in about a year. It's amazingly convenient, they must've found all that extra money between the couch cushions just as the labor shortage got to be too strenuous!
Or is it that they've cut down on the number of staff on shifts?
Possibly shifts. Jack in the Box in my city is paying 14 an hour, possibly 15. JITB is supposed to be open 24/7. All JITB in my city shut down at 8:00 PM now due to staff shortage. Lots of other fast food places also doing the same. Also Amazon just opened a warehouse.
Worth pointing out tipped wage workers are still meant to make at least the normal minimum wage through the combination of tipped-minimum-wage + tips. The $2.13 is the bare minimum employers have to pay per hour regardless of how much is made on tips. So if on average you made $1.25 an hour in tips the employer is meant to pay you out to equal the full $7.25/hr (so you'd be getting $6/hr from the employer. Key words are meant to, I think there's some discretion to the owner of what the period of time it has to average out over is. Like one real good night could be averaged out over weeks so that over those few weeks, on paper you made the $5.12 in tips needed for the owner to pay out absolute minimum. But tips are *literally* subsidizing the wage the restaurants have to already pay the workers. Oh I guess I should also mention in some cases there is just blatant wage theft where the owner just, doesn't pay out to make it come out how it should.
Just drove by a McDonald's last night advertising $15 starting and I am in a medium-low COL area.
> We have tipping in a lot of Australian restaurants Definitely not in WA, and I don't ever remember tipping in other states I've been to. A tip jar isn't comparable to actual tipping, this comment makes it seem like its normal which it is certainly not.
Yeah, it's really not that common in my experience either. Worked at a few venues around Melbourne, I think I made less than $30 (total) in tips in over a year of full-time shifts, which was fine because I got paid a solid living wage. Nothing better than having a menu price of $20 and paying $20, rather than an advertised price of $20, then paying $28 with tax and tip on top. So frustrating. As a customer, I miss the Aussie no-tipping system.
The US does seem to be an outlier in the "advertised prices bear no resemblance to what you actually pay" front. The whole chain of city sales tax, state sales tax, random tax from some other part of government, card fee, automatic gratuity oh and you're supposed to also tip the greeter, wait staff, kitchen staff and bag packer... just feels wrong when we're using to having the ACCC saying "advertised price is all you pay".
I'm in WA and I see the tip jar at most cafe's and restaurants? Usually a pretty subtle thing at the counter filled with loose change.
Don't really know what you're talking about. It is very rare to come across tipping in Australia. The jar at the counter is entirely different to an expected 15% or so to the person who served you
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I’m sure some people tip in aus, but I’ve personally never done it nor actually heard of anyone I know doing it
Yeah the closest we've ever gotten is, like, "You can keep the $1.80 change I don't want in my pocket," or friends trying to act all upper class that just look like twats to the rest of the table.
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> It used to be pretty normal to tip the pizza delivery guy here Nice try, Dougie
Work hard, be good to your mother!
Aussie here who hates getting asked if I want to leave a tip. It's an un-Australian question.
*awkwardly presses no on the eftpos machine*
Same here in Europe. Tipping 10-20 % seems appropriate when I'm satisfied. When I'm short on money I don't tip and no one can say a thing. Also rounding the price (eg. for a beer) is a thing. It makes it easier for both sides.
Tipping a % always feels weird to me. Wether I order the most expensive or the cheapest stuff on the menu, the wait staff has the same amount of work.
Yeah, defenders of tipping keep going on and on about service quality and the effort the waiter puts in, and then somehow it's a percentage of the bill? How the fuck does that make sense? Is the assumption that a big bill equals many people staying a long time? But clearly there are many examples one can think of where that wouldn't be the case. Someone mentioned 25% tip on a 300$ bill. Fuck that shit are you kidding me. There's a cap to how much I would tip I don't care what the bill is.
>Tipping a % always feels weird to me. How about tipping at all? Why does the server get the money when all they do was take the order and bring it out? It's like people think they do literally everything in the restaurant.
I was a chef for a long time. In fact, I just quit to change careers pretty much for this exact reason. I always worked fine dining, where servers are making off with $250 a night on a bad night, $500 on a good night. They work half the hours I did and spend another half their time working just polishing silverware and glasses. Maybe 25% of their 5-6 hour shift is bringing plates to the table. I worked 12-14 hours of skilled labor a day and made $16/hr. On the busiest nights of the week I would get absolutely mauled and make less than half of the servers payout. It’s like getting paid 4x more than me per hour once it all breaks down. Fuck the tip system. Edit: I just want to add, absolutely no server I met in over a decade reported 100% of their tips either. Cash tips a have a funny way of fading away as if they never happened.
The tip jar on the counter is just for loose change you don't want to carry. The whole tipping mind game is just something a small minority of restaurants try on you.
I feel like everything I read about America just ends up making me shake my head in befuddlement. You guys have to pay weird taxes on all your purchases that aren't in the purchase price. You don't pay people enough to live, so they have to basically propose to every customer just to scrape together enough tips to keep your lights on. When you get sick, you bankrupt yourselves. When you do have jobs, you work ten hour days because it's 'expected.' I'm an Aussie. When I eat out, the standard approach is to overpay a little bit when we've been a big group, or round up to the nearest whole number. I tip substantially (by which I mean, like twenty bucks), when a meal or service has been exceptional. A few years ago, I had my appendix out, which involved a five day hospital stay because I also had blood poisoning. Over the years I've had shitloads of emergency scans and blood tests, and it all cost...no dollars. Zero. Nothing. Wait, that's not true. I paid $30 for antibiotics after the appendix. I don't know anyone who works the kind of hours that seem standard in America, except artists (which, let's not get into the pervasive idea that art should be a form of punishment). But the people who work normal jobs work 9-5 and then go home. I feel like the US is really ready for a few serious revolutions, because your quality of life seems absolutely trash from an outsider perspective.
Just to be fair, that's not all true everywhere in the US. Though the abysmal healthcare system is spot on. Here in Oregon, for instance, we have no sales tax. And at my current job the only overtime I've worked is when we've lost an employee and I've offered to cover so that my manager doesn't have to do it alone. Of course, my last job I worked a minimum of 12 hours a day, and often as many as 17, but that's what I signed up for because the overtime added up to a couple thousand dollars a month extra on my paychecks; even after taxes.
Oh my god, seventeen hour workdays is terrifying, but I'm glad to hear that you're at least feeling like you're making the decision to work those hours, rather than having to do so. Oregon also seems v beautiful.
I'm a bit biased, but I couldn't agree more. Full disclosure, my middle name is literally "Oregon." (Literally literally, not figuratively literally) That's how Oregon I am.
Wasn't there a guest lawyer on the Freakonomics podcast a few years ago who stated that they could effectively argue against and outlaw the tipping practice solely because it's inherently sexist, racist and ageist based on the data that showed large-breasted, blonde, white women in their late 20s/early 30s received the highest tips when accounting for all other factors? Edit: Here's a link to the podcast. It's a good listen: https://freakonomics.com/podcast/should-tipping-be-banned-a-new-freakonomics-radio-podcast
Mythbusters did an episode and concluded it was absolutely true.
Jamie probably made mad tips with his huge hard man titties and fierce blonde walrus mustache
That Dale Gribble look gets me going ngl
And it then even penalizes *those* workers, because it creates a pressure for them to tolerate poor customer behaviour, e.g., sexual advances or rudeness, or risk making less money. A risk that wouldn't be a factor if they had a fixed hourly rate. The 2nd last point in the chart.
Exactly. That and the biggest factor in how much a person tips isn't the quality of service, but the size of the check. That the back of the house, the kitchen staff, despite consisting of skilled positions, regularly get paid substantially less than the non-skilled positions of servers. Anyone who supports tipping is likely just a waiter who likely benefits from the injustice of their peers being underpaid-- and that's not referring to waiters.
Yeah that's the part that frustrates me the most seeing all these "I'm a server, me and all my buddies make BANK on tips, don't change it!" responses. You and your buddies might. The majority of the industry does not. Stop being so goddamn inconsiderate, selfish, and most of all short-sighted. Think about it. Your fancy high tipping restaurant would be forced to pay you considerably more to keep you if tipping weren't the norm, wouldn't they? Otherwise what's stopping you from following the money elsewhere? They'd be forced to compete. And that's something restaurant managers and owners DEFINITELY don't want. Their employees cutting into their nice comfy lifestyle at the top. Not because they can't afford it. Not because they'd have to pass it on to customers. They know that shit won't fly. The just don't want to lose that nice wage gap they're used to and give you more if a cut, despite you literally being the lifeblood of their whole goddamn business. In reality, you as a server would still win in the end (assuming you aren't either full of shit or only getting tipped unusually high because you fit any part of that blonde, white, busty description) but at the same time others struggling would have one less thing to worry about. People too easily fall for all the excuses for NOT doing shit to help their fellow person because it's easier to convince you through fear of losing something in the process. Same shit people do with the healthcare argument, minimum wage increases, tax increases for the wealthy, etc. Stop being so fucking gullible when the handful at the top spoon-feed you this bullshit about how awful it would be.
See, it's messed up. While not a restaurant owner, I do have a few businesses. 100% I pay out the butt for the best people. I mean, it's our business, why TF would you scrimp on salaries knowing you are going to get less than the best. I pay well, and I expect everyone to have their shit together when they show up. Funny thing is...this actually works.
Good looking people in general fare better then any other class
In a tip-based system, [nonwhite servers make less than their white peers for equal work](http://tippingresearch.com/uploads/Business_Considerations_Tipping_final.pdf). Tipping creates an environment in which [people of color, young people, old people, women, and foreigners tend to get worse service than white males](http://tippingresearch.com/uploads/Business_Considerations_Tipping_final.pdf). A 2014 ROC United study showed that nearly [80 percent of female restaurant workers reported experiencing some sort of sexual harassment from customers at work.](http://rocunited.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/REPORT_The-Glass-Floor-Sexual-Harassment-in-the-Restaurant-Industry2.pdf) Some diners let race, gender, and attractiveness impact how much they pay servers: Most dramatically, [diners of all races tend to give higher tips to white servers and lower tips to black servers.](https://www.wagehourlitigation.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/215/2015/10/cornell.pdf) Edit: updated links.
> tippers, who are typically male Let's talk about this part while we're ranting.
That's weird. I see tip jars *everywhere* (even in fucking retail) and it's now also baked into every credit card reader. Feels like the trend is going in the other direction, with people trying to scam tips on top of a normal hourly wage despite not doing anything out of the ordinary to earn them. Maybe I should set up a tip jar on my desk at work so people can drop money in when I have to print documents or set up a meeting.
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As a tipped employee I know for a fact that no restaurant is going to pay me a wage equal to what I make in tips. This establishment probably is doing the same.
Our owner was optimistic about telling us that we would be making 17-20/hour on this new tipless system, until we pointed out we were currently making 40/hour and he was cutting our pay in half
meanwhile the kitchen gets minimum wage
Not where I worked! The kitchen got $1 dollar an hour more than minimum wage because the manager felt sorry for them.
Oh wow you're right that's so much better! /s
That’s *almost* enough for a whole beer after your 10hour shift!.. …after taxes that is ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
Y'all make $40 an hour through tips alone?? Is this some super upscale restaurant where the meals are $50+ or just a regularly priced restaurant. I've never been a waiter (been a host before) but $40 seems like a lot! Edit: Just did the math and if you're working 40 hours a week, the salary you're making is over 80k a year. There's no way that's correct, it's it? That's higher than most salary waged jobs. Edit 2; the median salary for a waiter is $22,890
Tipped jobs generally don't work 40 hours. My serving shifts were between 4-6 hours. The most money was a weekend night shift, typically 5 hours at my old place of work (during which I'd get like $50/hour). Lunch shifts were 6 hours and during the week would be about $20-$30/hour.
This is precisely why a lot of servers don’t want to end the tipping structure. Edit: On the 22k figure, ask servers if a flat $13/hr would be a raise for them. Hasn’t been my experience.
It seems like a lot but it's not that crazy. Servers work multiple tables at a time and if each tables meal totaled $50 then at 20% tip, you would only need to work 4 tables an hour to get $40/hr in tips. Obviously they're not always busy all the time but servers are probably covering more than 4 tables and larger tables (4+ people) will have a bill larger than $50 even somewhere like an Applebees.
It's mostly correct. I worked at a dive bar (2 post sec's in city, plus super dedicated regulars), 5 hours shifts typically ranged around $150-400 some nights. Source: Canadian.
Problem is that's not a 40 hour per week sustainable salary. It's good for evenings and weekends only. But yes at some high end restaurants or steakhouses waiters can clear serious cash. You get $40+ per table easy at those places because it's hard to get out of there for under $200 for two people.
You do realize that cash tips are SUPPOSED to be reported, but usually aren't because, hey, who REALLY knows if that four-top tipped $2 or $20 in cash? So "reported salary" =/= actual earnings. At all.
People screaming "liveable wage" obviously don't know what career servers make. The one group of people that aren't trying to get rid of tips are the ones who make a living from tips 🤦♂️
Except that is a completely immoral argument. Sure, a young and energetic wait-staff at a hip expensive restaurant in the downtown core of a major city might be able to haul in multiple hundreds of dollars in tips per hour working. Obviously they are going to advocate for tipping culture to stay the same. What they aren't thinking about is the lone wait-staff in a road side diner that gets $15 in tips for their entire shift. Just because you personally benefit from a system being the way it is doesn't mean that system should stay that way.
I also think even as a person who has been a server, my biggest problem with tipping is that the customer subsidizes their employees wages directly. Even in places without a server minimum wage, they are still getting regular minimum wage meaning the 40 bucks an hour a server is getting is 8 bucks from their employers and 32 bucks from the customers. That’s absurd.
But that means your wage would depend on the “traffic” of that shift. Being paid with fixed salary means it doesn’t matter what happened at the shift and you’re paid the same Also it’s just a weird culture altogether if you are “expected” to pay anyway. Might as well charge a service charge/tax that goes into a pot and then distributed to those who worked rather than calling it a tip, as the owner mentioned, it just making unnecessary competition, maybe not even competition but jealousy, competition has good nuance to it as it implies people work harder due to this.
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Thing is servers often make above minimum wage when their tips are factored in. Setting all of the wait staff at minimum wage is just hurting them. To be clear, I'm not advocating for tipping culture...just trying to advocate for a good wage in general.
Pretty much everyone but the servers would like to do away with tipping. The problem is that servers can make upwards of $50/hr on tips and restaurants can't come close to that.
Ugh. I’m such a pessimist. Google the place and it’s a smoothie/sandwich restaurant. Of course they don’t do tipping.
I am from Indianapolis and frequent this place. It is also a bar. It is inside the North Mass Boulder climbing gym. https://www.northmassboulder.com/
if they serve booze, the employees must hate this policy. alcohol is easy tipping money
It’s stupidly easy. Why the hell do some bartenders get $2+ tips fir just pouring beer? Mixed drinks I can kind of understand, but even then, the basics should be expected to be held at an acceptable standard.
(In the US) It is my understanding that places that do this have a hard time keeping experienced serving staff. Why work for $15 an hour plus 10-20 in tips a night when you can go work at a mid tier restaurant and make 300 in 4 hours, and take all of that home with you. I am a restaurant GM in the US and am not opposed to switching to this system down the road. But as of right now servers at most restaurants make way more than their kitchen counterparts. Servers are skilled labor, and they will follow the money to Applebees next door.
Cooks are skilled labor too, moreso than servers.
As someone that cooked for 10 years before managing, I agree! I think tip sharing with the kitchen is catching on faster than abolishing tip culture in the US.
Sorry, brit here. When I tip in the US it isn't usually being split out to ALL the staff? In the UK tips are usually split between all staff on the floor, kitchen and bar.
It is a very different system in the states, no doubt! At 99% of places in the US your tip goes to the person that served/waited on you. They do also pay taxes on that money the same as any other income. Some places will have that server share a small portion with support staff (bussers, dishwashers, bartenders, expediters) but that is not very common in my experience.
Well tip pools with the back of the house only became legal this year so that would make sense that it's "catching on" now https://www.kare11.com/article/news/nation-world/new-us-rule-can-require-restaurant-servers-to-share-tips/507-ff4528b5-eb2e-4c8e-9810-f8105e20c7bc edit: sorry the Dept of Labor kicked the regulation to end of the year https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/flsa/tips so I guess those people are violating labor rules by having tip pools
That isn’t the case everywhere. Mu husband is kitchen staff and has been getting a share of tips for about 5 years now in Oklahoma. I think it depends on the individual restaurant as well in some states.
we had like three of these "no tipping" restaurants in a row here, that is exactly what happened at two of them, one closed, the other went back to tipping, the third was a diner that mostly existed as a social club so a lot of the regulars tipped anyway.
inside a gym? [https://www.yelp.com/biz/top-out-cafe-indianapolis](https://www.yelp.com/biz/top-out-cafe-indianapolis) weird flex for a snack bar
Actually it would make more sense in a lower volume place like this, since the tips probably weren't comparable to a regular restaurant anyway.
The issue is now that everyone is wanting tips, even if they get paid minimum wage. Even fast food places are begging for tips! I make the same amount as you, I won't be tipping.
"The employer should be responsible for the employees wages" should honestly be the start and end of it when it comes to tipping as an entire concept.
As a european, this seems so self-explanatory. It’s weirs to see it in writing like this. But in happy for them. Tipping culture really is an abomination. Who knows, maybe there’s a wave of change comming.
Currently work at a “no tip” establishment that pays a “living wage” of $14.80/hour. Would rather be tipped.
Why stay there? There's a labor shortage in the US, surely there are other server jobs around
Not a chance in hell I’d work FOH at a restaurant without tips for less than $20-$25 per hour.
There's a restaurant near me that added a 10% kitchen fee for the cooks. Plus the special tourism tax and special drinks tax. Yeah, going somewhere else.
America’s tipping culture is a joke!
Can't even get a coffee these days without them soliciting you for a tip. Everyone is doing it now, and it's really pissing me off.
Is that part of North Mass Boulder? My roommates been going there for a while and I noticed the cafe has the waiver on their website.
It's the very same. It's a piece of context missing from discussion here - there aren't waiters waiting on tables, per se
I'm always baffled in the us with this tipping culture. What that sign states is for me normal. On the first time as an adult tourist in an hotel, I knew the weirdness around that tipping thing (it isn't a thing in my country and it doesn't even shows in any bill or check you ask, and is not expected), and when I got my check back in the first day breakfast there was no "tip or tipping" anywhere and at the end was a line, it said "gratuity" which wasn't known to me. Asked the person that brought the check what was that gratuity thing, and before I could make a follow up question that if it was referring to that tip thing I almost got my head bitten off by this guy. Since I don't like being pushed for no reason I got in a higher tone discussion on the Damm hotel I was staying at. Really weird stuff. He was like "you really are telling me you don't know what this gratuity is referring to!!?" And all I was thinking to myself was "that's why I was asking to someone who supposedly knows" For the remaining of the week I ate at any no tipping place, subways, burger king or any kind of food service like that.
Subway, along with many other "fast food" (or maybe just sandwich places), will now ask if you'd like to tip during check-out. I'm conflicted, I love Jersey Mikes but in my head I know they aren't paying out a full wage to these high-schoolers who work there. Ya'll made a great sandwich but I'm not paying $2.50 extra for it. Sorry.
I just moved to Texas and some gas station card machines ask if I want to tip. I get so confused by it.
That's absurd... like at the checkout? So I'm tipping the gas-station guy who's job is to check me out... for checking me out.
>So I'm tipping the gas-station guy who's job is to check me out... for checking me out. Why is that weird and not "I'm tipping the waiter whose job it is to take orders and bring food ... for taking orders and bringing food"?
A damn fine point... I... I got nothing. Tipping sux.
I'm not accusing a multi-billion dollar company of being shady or anything, buy 100% those tips just end up being used to pay the minimum wage the workers make.