Get with this people

[pujimeng]

In Canadia we tip 15%. It's the law.

SO then explain to me why Canadians tip 10% or less when they come to America.

OMG, are you a Las Vegas card dealer? LOL

LOL, nope, but it's good to know it's not just my restaurant.

[Michael]

Well, for anyone who doesn't like waiting tables and wants a change of scenery, I'd suggest teaching English or any other topic in East Asia. It's pretty darn awesome if you avoid the melamine.

[DeusTrismegistus]

I tip based solely on the service. Server has nothing to do with food quality. If something gets messed up and the server offers to comp part of my bill or give me a discount unpromted, the difference goes toward their tip. I usually tip 15-20% and unless they do something terrible never less than 10%. Excellent service will get you an excellent tip from me. I have tipped 50% on lunch before.

When my ex waited tables she had to do anywhere from 1 to 4 hours of untipped labor. By law the establishment has to make up any difference between their overall take that night and what minimum wage for untipped labor would have to pay them, most places don't though. When my ex worked at red robin she would get scheduled doubles (even though she had a bad back and told them when she got hired she couldn't do doubles) and she would work 12 hours straight and 4 hours of it would be untipped. On bad days where she only worked lunch at another place she might bring in $30. At the first place she waited tables she had to "tip out" the runners, the bartenders, and someone else. So as much as 30% of her tips could go to these other people. The bartenders got tipped based on the amount of alcohol bought, even though 21 yr old waitresses usually poured the beer themselves.

Being a waiter or waitress is thankless job where you get treated like shit half the time, depending on where you work. I would end up beating the tar out of someone if I had to do that work.

[shawnsegler]

Being a waiter or waitress is thankless job where you get treated like shit half the time, depending on where you work. I would end up beating the tar out of someone if I had to do that work.

I almost threw a guy off a balcony once for both stiffing me and then telling me how unhappy he was with the service. It was New Years Eve and it was SLAMMMED. This guy and his wife got their bottle of wine and I gave them as much service as I could but it was balls to the walls busy and guess what..this guy was an ignorant fuck who had no idea that he'd got the best service available. He had it in his mind what he was supposed to get without taking anything else into consideration when he took out his old lady on one the busiest serving nights of the year.

Anyway..he leaves me a dollar on 80 and I follow him out to the balcony and I'm like "was there a problem with your service, sir" He proceeds to do the sticking his finger in my face and telling me about how all I did was bring the food and shit even though I'd given him wine service and basically the best he could have got that night at that place.

So it occurs to me then that I'm going to throw him off the balcony. Not just kind of...I was really going to do it. I managed to deflate myself because it was a pretty scary feeling...not like the feeling you get when you're in a fight but kind of...like I was going to do violence on this guy. I quit waiting for about 6 months because I just wasn't in the right head space for it after that.

True story.

S

[Michael]

You should probably slightly edit that story and tell your customers just before you give them the bill.

[Walter Joyce]

People and visitors forget/don't know that in US America servers get far below minimum wage as base pay and truly live on tips. Tips aren't fun money or a reward, they are the wage. There are also quite a few hours of "side work" like cleaning, etc... to do when no paying customer is in the restaurant so the server gets that lovely $2-3 an hour to do work that under normal rules would cost more like $7-8 per hour at the very least.

How do restaurants get away with paying less than minimum wage? Is there a special exemption made for restaurants? Is there no labor organizing among waiters?

Just curious.

-pete

As I understand it they can pay below minimum wage so long as the reported tips by the server bring their wage to the minimum.

As for not tipping at a percentage when the bill is over $50, that ignores the reality of service. If it is a less expensive restaurant and the bill is greater than $50 that means the server went beyond the amount of time or effort you think they did, and they have earned the tip based on a per centage. If it is fine dining, the level of service is higher, there are usually teams of servers, and again the tip is earned.

If you've never worked in the hospitality industry its easy to ignore the difficulty. For every decent tipper there are 2-3 cheap skates. For every diner who treats the server like a human being there are 2-3 that treat them like servants and ther are actually people who go out to dine merely to have the opportunity to fuck with the staff. And the point about the side work that every server does that you don't see is also an important factor.

I'm with the group that thinks if you can't afford to tip, then don't eat out in a full service establishment. After 30 odd years in the business before I became a lawyer, and a wife who was also a server when we met, I tip at least 20% and try to give the server the benefit of the doubt when things go wrong. Although, if I'm over hungry it is hard to deal with being ignored by the staff.

[Jake]

LOL! You guy's crack me up! Especialy because I just watched the movie "Waiting" with Ryan Reynolds and Justin Long last week.

Watch that and think about it the next time you go out to eat!

[Teazer]

So maybe you can explain why the system is set up so the tip size is more a function of how expensive the food is, rather than how much work gets done by the waiter?

Because people are notoriously ignorant of how much work is being done by the people who are waiting on them, and people when they are dining out are just like the internet...full of peeps with no social skills.
I think the invisible hand of the market has found a good median line with that policy.

I can see that the amount of actual work done by the tip recipients is hard to measure by customers, which means the pay would be better decided between the worker and restaurant owner, rather than relying on a system based on threats or charity.

I tip 15 percent when the service is stone cold bad, because you never know what's going on. I wouldn't come back though.

So there goes a lot of the incentive effects of tipping, right?

If you think otherwise, guess what? You're a cheap fucker and maybe you shouldn't go out to eat.

Disagree with you = cheap??

[Teazer]

As for not tipping at a percentage when the bill is over $50, that ignores the reality of service. If it is a less expensive restaurant and the bill is greater than $50 that means the server went beyond the amount of time or effort you think they did, and they have earned the tip based on a per centage. If it is fine dining, the level of service is higher, there are usually teams of servers, and again the tip is earned.

That maybe the case in some places, but more often the waitresses in diners are working way harder for less money. Why? I'd like to think it's because the most skilled wait staff end up in the best jobs but I've found getting into a high end place is more based on who you know.

If you've never worked in the hospitality industry its easy to ignore the difficulty.

I've worked in it, I just stayed away from the tipping end.

For every decent tipper there are 2-3 cheap skates. For every diner who treats the server like a human being there are 2-3 that treat them like servants and ther are actually people who go out to dine merely to have the opportunity to fuck with the staff.

So you'd agree it's a pretty stupid system, right?

[shawnsegler]

Disagree with you = cheap??

Nah, it's not disagreeing with me that makes you cheap.

Best,

S

[fuga]

As I understand it they can pay below minimum wage so long as the reported tips by the server bring their wage to the minimum..

It seems to me like it is a systemic problem then. Basically, the tip is the wage versus actually being a tip for service. Though a google search showed me that servers in California gets $7.50 per hour and in SF $9/hour versus $2-3.

Why does such a wage loophole exist for the benefit of restaurants? It allows them to pass on the cost of their employees directly to the customer, and the restaurant owner skirts full taxes on that employee.

I would rather that the servers get paid a fair wage and the price of food on the menu went up, and then a tip would be a bonus for excellent service.

But I guess things are just as they are and, on the rare occasion that I do dine out, I'll continue to tip at 20%.

-pete

[chud]

I almost threw a guy off a balcony once for both stiffing me and then telling me how unhappy he was with the service. It was New Years Eve and it was SLAMMMED. This guy and his wife got their bottle of wine and I gave them as much service as I could but it was balls to the walls busy and guess what..this guy was an ignorant fuck who had no idea that he'd got the best service available. He had it in his mind what he was supposed to get without taking anything else into consideration when he took out his old lady on one the busiest serving nights of the year.

Anyway..he leaves me a dollar on 80 and I follow him out to the balcony and I'm like "was there a problem with your service, sir" He proceeds to do the sticking his finger in my face and telling me about how all I did was bring the food and shit even though I'd given him wine service and basically the best he could have got that night at that place.

Shawn, I understand how you felt. I had an identical thing happen to me when I used to wait tables at a 2-story restaurant on the RiverWalk in downtown San Antonio. One night there was a Paul McCartney concert. I was working the upstairs section of the restaurant (which was usually the slow section) by myself because the other waiter who was supposed to be upstairs with me called in sick. All of a sudden the pre-concert crowd rushed in and I went from having no tables to having to serve the entire upstairs by myself. I was in the weeds big time. One guy actually complained to me, and then the manager. He chilled out once the manager explained that I was stuck handling the whole floor by myself, and even came over to me and apologized. Complete reversal, because he had been super-pissed five minutes before.

[shawnsegler]

I was in the weeds big time.

hehe...I know what that's like brotha.

My first waiting job years ago was at a pizza place across the way from the university of utah. One lunch I go in and out of the three cooks that are supposed to be there one showed up, of the three servers...I showed up. Also no one had planned that there was going to be some symposium that all these professors from all over the country were at and they descended on us. I had the whole restaurant like 16 tables full, all by myself for 2 hours. It was brutal.

When the owner showed up I was drinking beer in his office and the place was trashed. He was like what are you doing? I'm like go look at the till before you say anything. He let me have my beer and another.

S

[Darth Rock&Roll]

don't be so hard on the melamine michael. I mean come on! mmmmmm melamine! Tastes great and keeps the babies quiet! real quite...kinda purple too, hmmmn.

[Teazer]

Nah, it's not disagreeing with me that makes you cheap.
Best,

I'm beginning to see why so many people might not want to tip you. People in many industries feel threatened by change. Your food service career must be very important to you.