Tipping at restaurants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:20 per cent pre-tax. less if service was bad.
I hate tipping. Hate it.

Why? The way they pay the servers is factored into the price of the food. If servers got paid directly by the restaurant, food would cost more. If you understand the system, what is the problem?

[Anonymous]

The only person I've ever met that didn't tip including the drinks was at a very high end restaurant where a patron and his wife regularly ordered very, very expensive bottles of wine or champagne ($250+). I think they added like $5 per bottle for a tip, not the $50 to $200 it would be at 20%.

[Anonymous]

If there is truly bad service, I still tip almost 15% or maybe slightly less (usually I tip 20%), but I will complain to the management. I think complaining is more effective than just leaving a bad tip. If you just leave a small tip, the server has no way of knowing whether you're doing it to complain about them or whether you are generally just cheap.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:20 per cent pre-tax. less if service was bad.
I hate tipping. Hate it.

Why? The way they pay the servers is factored into the price of the food. If servers got paid directly by the restaurant, food would cost more. If you understand the system, what is the problem?

So many reasons.
1. Where I come from it is included automatically so I am not used to it.
2. I don't like having to do math at the end of a meal.
3. It is always socially awkward when you are with friends who want to tip more/less than you when you are splitting the check.
4. When the service is somewhat bad do you really want to make a deal about it?
5. it puts you in a weird kind of big man/little person relationship with the server that I find unpleasant and embarrassing.
6. It leads to horribly officious service, with wait staff giving you phony smiles and taking away plates before everyone has finished in an attempt to prove how attentive they are.
7. It leads to wait staff being overpaid in expensive restaurants compared to the kitchen staff who really add the most value.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"if you are a regular 10% tipper at any place, you definitely get bodily fluids in the food"

Does this really happen? You also hear about how waitstaff do these things but it sounds quite unbelievable. Are waiters really that vengeful they would do something that could harm someone?

Well, you'd have to be a regular repeat customer, right? The servers don't know what your tip is going to be until after the meal is over.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

And yes, I have witnessed wait staff do bad things to food to obnoxious or notoriously cheap people. This includes spitting in drinks, pulling out dirty forks/glasses/plates instead of clean ones when refilling the drink or something of that sort, and something else I won't even mention, because its so disgusting. I saw it happen and shrugged my shoulders b/c I know how awful "customers" can behave and assumed they deserved what they had comming. I myself have had such a-holes that I have forfeited my tip and gone completely out of my way to make their experience as horrible as possible in the hopes that they follow up on their threat of "never returning" when they complain to the manager.

There was an article in the Post a few years ago about what happened when food got sent back to the kitchen. If the steak was not cooked long enough the customer sent it back to the kitchen; the cook would throw the steak on the floor, stomp on it, cook it a little longer than send it back to the customer.

I try to be pleasant to the servers because I don't know what they will do to my food or drinks in the back.

[Anonymous]

"Family of five . . . accused chefs of serving human excrement in their gelato after they complained about noise during a football match." Wow, that is kitchen revenge. http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSTRE49S4Y520081029

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The only person I've ever met that didn't tip including the drinks was at a very high end restaurant where a patron and his wife regularly ordered very, very expensive bottles of wine or champagne ($250+). I think they added like $5 per bottle for a tip, not the $50 to $200 it would be at 20%.

I can't but form the opinion that the richer they are, the stingier and more selfish. My friend who used to wait tables in college complained that the rich people tipped less or didn't tip. Her mother responded, "How do you think they got rich?"

[Anonymous]

We usually tip 15% if service was good. But if service was totally crappy (we had a bad experience at an italian restaurant in Mclean where the waiter was fooling us), we decided to tip 0 (cero).

[Anonymous]

Has anyone left like 5% or 7%? (I'm not talking about the 0%, which I assume occasionally happens when the waiter is positively rude to you or does something so upsetting you refuse to leave them even a dime). How many have left seriously bad tips when the waiter is just incompetent?

Yes, I have stiffed the waiter maybe 3 or 4 times in my lifetime. And it was because the waiter was an out of control, insulting, beligerant asshat.

And no, we never went back so I didn't have to worry about urine in my soup the next time. (because, with so many restaurants to choose from, why would you return to the one with an affirmatively churlish waiter? why give them your business?)

I waited tables for ~ 15 years, and so I feel I have a very good understanding of whether my meal experience is going bad due to something the waiter can control, or whether the problem is the kitchen, the host, etc. Often, as many of you waitrons already know, the problem is the *kitchen's* f-up, not the waiter's.

[Anonymous]

Poster 13:21 again. We are a gourmet young couple, not rich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We tip 10% on total (before tax). If the service is good we tip 15%, and if it is exceptional, 20%.

I promise you that your friends die of embarrassment when dining with you and throw extra cash on the table as they leave the restaurant. or, maybe people have stopped going ot restaurants with you. THIS IS WHY.

OR

if you are a regular 10% tipper at any place, you definitely get bodily fluids in the food.

My DAD is a horrible tipper. My husband always hangs back and puts cash on the table to counter it. As to "the rich are bad tippers theory", yes, my parents are quite well off. It is MORTIFYING when he pasy the bill. My husband and I both worked a summer in college as wait staff so we get the whole tipping thing. My Dad has been in corporate America his entire career and has no appreciateion of wait staff. His tipping methods also make no sense at all. For instance, he tips $1 per person for lunch, always. i asked him once why, as its just as much work to serve lunch as dinner. he just harumped and said, "no its not." Wierd. And TOTALLY embarrassing. I will not go out to eat alone with him.

We have also dropped friends (or at least going to dinner with them) who are bad tippers. Bad tippers are usually very selfish, self-centered people. They are more worried about their pocketbook/wallet than the wait staffs efforts/hard work. If you can not afford a decent (that's 20% in my book) tip you should not be eating out, except at fast food chains.

[Anonymous]

The waiter is not a beggar woman, but a salaried employee, if prices are exorbitant, then the cost of service is included in the price.

[Anonymous]

We typically tip 15 for decent service and upwards for better. Since moving to this area, if we have great, personable service we'll leave above 20. I only once left a penny tip, this was after extreme patience on my part and complete disregard on her part...she certainly knew the reason she lost a tip that night.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If there is truly bad service, I still tip almost 15% or maybe slightly less (usually I tip 20%), but I will complain to the management. I think complaining is more effective than just leaving a bad tip. If you just leave a small tip, the server has no way of knowing whether you're doing it to complain about them or whether you are generally just cheap.

Actually, if it is truly bad service DON'T tip at all. Leaving a small/stingy tip will make the server think YOU are the one that is lousy because it is interpreted as you being a cheap skate. If the server says something - then speak up and state your case. Don't pay for a service if it is not rendered.