"Add a Tip"

[EastHorn 281]

The only time I ever got annoyed by the POS system was at DKR stadium in north end zone bar.  The girl selected the 25%.  I selected 0% and signed as "fuck u" on the bill.  Preselecting something and trying to scam people is a little shady.  

[conVINCEd 21,469]

15 minutes ago, Focht Up said:

To me, if they bring your food out to your car, they should get a tip.  That's why I don't go to Sonic unless they have a drive through. 

If they skate they get a tip.  If they’re cute as well they get a better tip.  If they just walk that shit out, no tip.  It’s fast food.  I’m not gonna tip for fast food because they designed their restaurant in a way that requires there employees to walk 15 feet to bring me my order.

[Al_4_ISU 12,475]

18 minutes ago, Deej said:

BIg spenders up in Iowa. 

Small town Midwest is a tight wad’s wet dream

[closetohumping 17,455]

3 hours ago, HRSchenker said:

Only for mixed drinks or beers on tap. Never for opening a bottle. 

Always tip your bartender

[Underdog 28,761]

1 hour ago, Js1 said:

Lol ain’t been to Sonic in over a decade. Closest one to me closed and was drive-thru only. Do they still skate? 

Buncha Tara Lipinskis/Johnny Weir up here in NY during winter. 

[Borachio 416]

My American brain is programmed to tip all the time. smh

The craziest is at the Moody center for a concert at one of their snack bar kiosks.  You grab your own food/ drink and you even check your own self out like at HEB and they ask for a 15-25% tip.  Seriously? It needs to stop.

[wild_turkey 3,177]

5 years ago, it seems lots of places that didn’t normally receive tips had started adding a tip line to the credit card receipt. It annoyed me, but I realized it cost them nothing to add that line and it might pressure 5-10% of customers into tipping.

In the past 2-3 years, that’s mostly changed to the POS tablets which also allows the business to add a tip option at no cost to them. The difference is that leaving a tip is now the default option at many places, and often times the 3 preselected options are fairly high percentages.

I personally think it’s ridiculous for counter service places. It’s nothing more than the business owner passing on their labor costs to the customer. I realize margins are thin in the restaurant industry, but if a place like Torchy’s or Chipotle can’t pay their employees a fair wage without incorporating tips, then maybe they should raise menu prices.

I get guilted into occasionally leaving a tip in these situations, but typically more at local businesses that I feel a stronger need to support. I hardly ever leave the default 20% or more. I typically lower it to $2-3 unless I feel the counter employee is busting their ass or doing something beyond the ordinary expectations.

On the barber tangent, I tip my girl $8-10 for my haircut every 3-4 weeks. It’s a $40 haircut, takes her ~25 minutes, and she has 3 kids. I give a little more around the holidays. I also tip my mail lady at the holidays.

[Ghost of LL 15,539]

7 hours ago, texasdago said:

That's not what I'm calculating.  I'm trying to put together the puzzle pieces.  

I unequivocally deny being Evil Mopac.

2 hours ago, EastHorn said:

The only time I ever got annoyed by the POS system was at DKR stadium in north end zone bar.  The girl selected the 25%.  I selected 0% and signed as "fuck u" on the bill.  Preselecting something and trying to scam people is a little shady.  

That's bullshit.  It's in the vein of auto-gratting and not telling me.  If you add an auto-grat to my bill and don't tell me, you get nothing additional.  And don't give me a cop-out bullshit story that "it says on the menu that parties of six or more . . . ."  Fuck you.  Tell me when you're dropping the check.

And that's a real penalty, because it seems the standard auto-grat is 18%.  My default is a little over 20% (usually around 22%), but I recognize that a large party is going to take more time.  So my default for a 6- or 8-top is going to be around 25-30%.  So if you don't tell me you're auto-gratting, then you're penalizing yourself something serious.

1 hour ago, Borachio said:

My American brain is programmed to tip all the time. smh

The craziest is at the Moody center for a concert at one of their snack bar kiosks.  You grab your own food/ drink and you even check your own self out like at HEB and they ask for a 15-25% tip.  Seriously? It needs to stop.

Shit--I remember seeing that, too.  Whom exactly would you be tipping?  Nobody does anything there.

[Anastasis 23,481]

A lot of this is correlated to the shift to cashless payments. Fuck that shit, I am going to try to go back to cash when at all possible. But I am very lazy, so I will probably fail and just rack points. 

[WBT 20,649]

I still pay cash a lot of places.  It's funny watching people not know how to make change.

[rage-a-holic 4,431]

6 hours ago, Al_4_ISU said:

I've never ordered a $300 bottle of wine in my life, and I doubt I ever would.  But I don't think you should have to tip more for that bottle than the $30 one.  Fuck, you shouldn't tip more for that than a bottle of Charles Schwab.

Schwab makes wine now? They are really branching out.

[wild_turkey 3,177]

On 7/24/2023 at 3:42 PM, Post Oak said:

I tip all the time.  These people aren't making a lot of money and if they get my order correct and are friendly enough Ill throw them a few bucks. 

I'm not trying to bust your balls or single you out, but I have honest questions about the logic here.

The suggestion by the bolded part is that you feel they deserve a tip because they are underpaid for the job they are doing. How do you make the determination that they are underpaid, and do you also extend that same financial gratuity to other people in life who are potentially underpaid?

Suppose you walk into Torchy's and your meal comes out to $20, the iPad suggests you tip 20%, 22%, or 25%, you pick the middle number for simplicity and give them $4.40 because they don't make a lot of money. How do you know what their hourly wage is and whether or not that's a fair wage for the work they do? Are they making less than other people with similar qualifications in similar jobs? Suppose they are making $15/hr. Is that a fair wage for ringing up food orders? If you knew they made $20/hr would you be less inclined to tip?

If you think back to 10 years ago before iPads prompted you for a tip on every transaction, would you have still tipped that same employee? It's not like Torchy's employees in 2013 were making a lot of money, so what made them less deserving of a tip then, or more deserving of a tip now?

How you apply that to every other industry you interact with? Do you tip employees in a retail clothing store? the guys that pick up your trash? Your mail person? The Amazon delivery guy? Your kids' teachers? The school lunch ladies or janitors? Flight attendants? The receptionist at your doctor or dentist office? Do you tip the person at Target or HEB that guides you to the next available self-check kiosk? The people who carry out groceries if you do drive-up?

Many of those people also don't make a lot of money, yet they aren't getting tips. Is it simply because they work in a situation where it isn't customary to stick an iPad in your face and have the audacity to ask for more money? Should we be rewarding fast food establishments for crossing that line? Is the person at Torchy's more deserving of a tip than the guy on the trash truck in 108F heat?

All honest questions, not trying to be obtuse, but it seems like tipping has expanded arbitrarily and it doesn't seem entirely rational to me.

[Judge Roybeanbag 11,819]

Thank god this tip epidemic hasn’t reached the domestic household.  My wife refuses my tip 99% of the time.  

Edited July 26, 2023 by Judge Roybeanbag

[NWBuck 8,577]

9 minutes ago, Judge Roybeanbag said:

Thank god this tip epidemic hasn’t reach the domestic household.  My wife refuses my tip 99% of the time.  

Huh. I give her the tip, and only for two minutes work. 

[Judge Roybeanbag 11,819]

1 minute ago, NWBuck said:

Huh. I give her the tip, and only for two minutes work. 

That’s why you’re the buck.  

[Brisketexan 105,190]

Also, it’s a solid move to tip your stripper, on top of the $20 per dance. That way, she’ll genuinely fall in love with you. It’s true.

[Judge Roybeanbag 11,819]

6 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Also, it’s a solid move to tip your stripper, on top of the $20 per dance. That way, she’ll genuinely fall in love with you. It’s true.

Doesn’t matter how much you tip, you can never believe them when they say they can lick all the glitter off of you.  There are always a few glitters that sneak through.  Fuck those glitters.  

[Armybrat 40,860]

9 hours ago, CooterBrown said:

Many of the tips in those POS screens go to the company and not the workers. Always ask the cashier. They’ll be happy to tell you if they actually get the tips or not.

When the server at the restaurant is using the electronic gadget machine as the check, I always mark it no tip and put the tip cash directly into their hands, usually 25%.

[Armybrat 40,860]

2 hours ago, Ghost of LL said:

I unequivocally deny being Evil Mopac.

That's bullshit.  It's in the vein of auto-gratting and not telling me.  If you add an auto-grat to my bill and don't tell me, you get nothing additional.  And don't give me a cop-out bullshit story that "it says on the menu that parties of six or more . . . ."  Fuck you.  Tell me when you're dropping the check.

And that's a real penalty, because it seems the standard auto-grat is 18%.  My default is a little over 20% (usually around 22%), but I recognize that a large party is going to take more time.  So my default for a 6- or 8-top is going to be around 25-30%.  So if you don't tell me you're auto-gratting, then you're penalizing yourself something serious.

Shit--I remember seeing that, too.  Whom exactly would you be tipping?  Nobody does anything there.

What about the guy who wraps your sandwich up nicely after dropping it on the floor?

[WBT 20,649]

27 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Also, it’s a solid move to tip your stripper, on top of the $20 per dance. That way, she’ll genuinely fall in love with you. It’s true.

[Armybrat 40,860]

34 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Also, it’s a solid move to tip your stripper, on top of the $20 per dance. That way, she’ll genuinely fall in love with you. It’s true.

Well, even community college tuition has gone up like everything else, so don’t be stingy.

[Armybrat 40,860]

In Tuesday’s AAS (online):

 

[Texzilla58 4,741]

I ate a Korean shabu (hotpot) place today.  Upon receiving the check the tip options started at 19%.  The waiter did serve me but i cooked the food myself.  Surly, please help me decide how to feel inside.
-confused    

If it’s truly authentic Korean there ain’t no tipping over there. Nor in most Asian cultures. Tell ‘em that. “Is this authentic Shabu?”

[Texzilla58 4,741]

https://fortune.com/2023/07/24/gen-z-boomers-tipping-fatigue-inflation-culture-restaurants/amp/

Not tipping by youth. No surprise. No wonder we are getting hammered with tip requests everywhere.

I’m a good tipper to servicers in a traditional tip position. I grew up in service work, and then commissioned retail sales. I respect those that truly understand great customer service.

My standards have changed a bit. In the past I tipped a base of 20% of pretax total for average service, and rarely paid less unless they had awful attitudes. Service work ain’t for everyone and I won’t blindly pay you to be in a career you suck at. I have the greatest respect for the longtime wait staff of old fancy restaurants who deliver an experience that exceeds just the quality of the food, and have no issue handing them a c note on a $300 tab.

If you’re a server and I see you on your cellphone instead of working I have a problem because I’m looking for a refill or for the lemons you promised. Worse is seeing you pocket it without washing your hands. Server cell phones should be banned from service areas if you’re touching food. They are MRSA farms.

I don’t tip mechanics, trade service guys, med technicians. I don’t tip counter folks. I tip the sonic kid skating to my car…no more than a Buck. I tip carry out folks. I tip valets, car wash girl, hair cutter, skycaps (they got fucked when airlines started charging)

The way to tip at Torchy’s? Don’t fucking eat there.

[Scary Stranger 1,715]

Don’t even get me started on valet parking.

[Deej 76,875]

1 hour ago, Scary Stranger said:

Don’t even get me started on valet parking.

You don't want to pay extra to the company who bought all the public parking for a pittance just so they could charge you to park there? 

[dcbc 14,497]

I tip a little at Torchy's because despite the fact that I order my food at the counter (or more often, at the bar with a drink), someone is bringing the food to my table.  

[Biff Tannen 45,697]

6 hours ago, Scary Stranger said:

Don’t even get me started on valet parking.

But it's "complimentary".  And compulsory.  RAGE.

Also, how does one tip a trash guy?  Do you wait outside on trash day and flag them down or something?

[sidis 9,832]

i generally am just a "whatever" kind of guy on all that and try to be generous with my exceedingly fortunate life outcomes but i took my daughters to see mario at the movie theater a few months back, grabbed a water from the cooler, carried it to the counter myself, checked out, and the thing was like 20, 22, or 25% tip?

that made me feel like the theme of this thread.

[Ghost of LL 15,539]

6 hours ago, Texzilla58 said:

https://fortune.com/2023/07/24/gen-z-boomers-tipping-fatigue-inflation-culture-restaurants/amp/

Not tipping by youth. No surprise. No wonder we are getting hammered with tip requests everywhere.

I’m a good tipper to servicers in a traditional tip position. I grew up in service work, and then commissioned retail sales. I respect those that truly understand great customer service.

My standards have changed a bit. In the past I tipped a base of 20% of pretax total for average service, and rarely paid less unless they had awful attitudes. Service work ain’t for everyone and I won’t blindly pay you to be in a career you suck at. I have the greatest respect for the longtime wait staff of old fancy restaurants who deliver an experience that exceeds just the quality of the food, and have no issue handing them a c note on a $300 tab.

If you’re a server and I see you on your cellphone instead of working I have a problem because I’m looking for a refill or for the lemons you promised. Worse is seeing you pocket it without washing your hands. Server cell phones should be banned from service areas if you’re touching food. They are MRSA farms.

I don’t tip mechanics, trade service guys, med technicians. I don’t tip counter folks. I tip the sonic kid skating to my car…no more than a Buck. I tip carry out folks. I tip valets, car wash girl, hair cutter, skycaps (they got fucked when airlines started charging)

The way to tip at Torchy’s? Don’t fucking eat there.

Anybody who touches your luggage gets a tip.  And it's certainly worth your time with skycaps if you have oversized luggage (and traveling with my wife, I always have oversized luggage), as a tip will often cause those extra fees to get overlooked.

Bellman get tipped, and for chrissakes use the goddamned bellman.  That's what they're there for.  If you're staying at a hotel that is nice enough to have bellmen, then you have enough money that you can afford to throw a guy a few bucks/bag for carrying your bags.  After all, that's how they make their money.  And why do you want to look like a schlub humping your own bags as you walk into the Westin?

[Brisketexan 105,190]

1 minute ago, Ghost of LL said:

Anybody who touches your luggage gets a tip.  And it's certainly worth your time with skycaps if you have oversized luggage (and traveling with my wife, I always have oversized luggage), as a tip will often cause those extra fees to get overlooked.

Bellman get tipped, and for chrissakes use the goddamned bellman.  That's what they're there for.  If you're staying at a hotel that is nice enough to have bellmen, then you have enough money that you can afford to throw a guy a few bucks/bag for carrying your bags.  After all, that's how they make their money.  And why do you want to look like a schlub humping your own bags as you walk into the Westin?

I have found that I have no such trouble when schlepping my rolling duffle bag full of unfolded clothes into a Days Inn located next to the interstate (although the entrance is actually via a random, pointlessly winding road that you have to take a sharp turn onto 50 feet after exiting the interstate, for some fucking reason).  But now I wonder....should I be leaving a tip for the Days Inn breakfast "attendant" who occasionally brings out pitchers of waffle batter for the group of rugrats from room 204 to pour all over the scalding hot waffle iron, and then each of them in turn whines and complains about how it's not done yet?

[DalTxHornFan 3,111]

25 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

I have found that I have no such trouble when schlepping my rolling duffle bag full of unfolded clothes into a Days Inn located next to the interstate (although the entrance is actually via a random, pointlessly winding road that you have to take a sharp turn onto 50 feet after exiting the interstate, for some fucking reason).  But now I wonder....should I be leaving a tip for the Days Inn breakfast "attendant" who occasionally brings out pitchers of waffle batter for the group of rugrats from room 204 to pour all over the scalding hot waffle iron, and then each of them in turn whines and complains about how it's not done yet?

The answer is "Yes."

[Brisketexan 105,190]

1 minute ago, DalTxHornFan said:

The answer is "Yes."

What about if it's a shitty Red Roof Inn and they don't even have the waffle option?

[DalTxHornFan 3,111]

9 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

What about if it's a shitty Red Roof Inn and they don't even have the waffle option?

That might just be the point of inflection that would cause you reconsider some of your prior life choices.

[Horn Dogg 3,937]

On 7/24/2023 at 6:07 PM, Deej said:

Fuck it. I'm putting a tip jar on my desk at work. 

You might be able to earn enough to buy a Tele with the right number of holes in the pickguard.

[Deej 76,875]

Damn straight!

[Horn Dogg 3,937]

On 7/24/2023 at 9:09 AM, Ghost of LL said:

A couple months ago, @Brisketexan and I were at Velvet Taco.  I order a couple of tacos.  NBD.  I really like Velvet Taco.

So I tap with my Visa--you know the drill.  And I get the now-ubiquitous screen: "Add a Tip?"  And the default is 25%.

Fuck that shit.  You get zero because I was so offended that it would default to 25%.  But then I sat down, and it occurred to me--why would I be tipping anything?  This is a counter-service place.  You order at the counter; you pick up your order at the counter; you pour your own drink; you clear your own table when you're done.  There's literally nothing that a waiter/waitress does at a sit-down restaurant that is done at Velvet Taco.  All of which is to say that none of the employees should be tipped workers.  So why are they asking for tips?

And now that I'm sensitized to it, I can't help but observe the bizarre and absurd proliferation of the "Add a Tip" screen to every transaction.  I'm now asked to add a tip at food trucks and tire-repair shops and newsstands.  It seems about the only place that has the decency not to solicit a tip is the fucking McDonald's.  

This seems to be a post-pandemic phenomenon.  But whatever the cause, I'm fucking sick of it.  And I've become pretty reactionary in my posture on it.  Counter-service places get no tip.  They're almost certainly not compensated as tipped employees.  And I have very serious suspicions that they're not actually getting the tips anyway.

But am I way off on this?  Is there some new societal norm that I'm alone in rejecting?  And if so, what's the basis for this new clause in the social contract?

Just pay cash, problem solved.

[scottsins 1,968]

Why wouldn't you tip fast food workers? They're doing the exact same job for you that the to go people at the restaurant are doing. Packing food into bags, drinks into cups, and handing them to you while taking your payment. 
It should either be tip both or tip neither. 

The fast food workers are getting paid 2x or more hourly than the bartender/waiter handling to-go orders. Also, they are declaring 8% of that order for tax purposes.

[Js1 85,462]

21 minutes ago, Horn Dogg said:

Just pay cash, problem solved.

Also don’t go to Velvet Taco. It sucks 

[Brisketexan 105,190]

That might just be the point of inflection that would cause you reconsider some of your prior life choices.

Well then. We shan’t speak of that night I spent in Parsippany, NJ. It was…interesting.

[WBT 20,649]

2 hours ago, Js1 said:

Also don’t go to Velvet Taco. It sucks 

And yet a vastly superior gringo taco place to Torchy's

[Brew 3,049]

On 7/25/2023 at 12:37 PM, HRSchenker said:

Only for mixed drinks or beers on tap. Never for opening a bottle. 

That’s BS for the record. The bartender and servers in restaurants always get tipped because they are making $2 an hour. To go, sit down, whatever, they get tipped something. If you frequent places like we do, tipping well makes a world of difference in service. The 5-6 places we eat regularly, service is great for the type of restaurant it is.

Fast casual places I’ll leave a couple bucks, valets always get tipped well (there for a few days and magically your vehicle shows up a lot faster), hair cut gets tipped well, etc. If it’s a low paid service based deal, then I just consider it the cost of doing business.

[gernblansten 3,197]

$53 tab. $100 bill placed on ticket. Waitress: “Do you want any change back on this?”

[NeverMarryAStripper 21,913]

On 7/25/2023 at 8:46 PM, Brisketexan said:

Also, it’s a solid move to tip your stripper, on top of the $20 per dance. That way, she’ll genuinely fall in love with you. It’s true.

50% is a fucking steep tip

[po elvis 2,076]

9 hours ago, gernblansten said:

$53 tab. $100 bill placed on ticket. Waitress: “Do you want any change back on this?”

Just give me $47 and you keep the rest.

[royiv 9,333]

31 minutes ago, BeardIP said:

Heck we even had a thread about it here in 2018 with some of you who posted on there and forgot about it! 

I thought you were new here?

[Ag with kids 581]

On 7/25/2023 at 3:22 PM, RollLeft said:

I ate a Korean shabu (hotpot) place today.  Upon receiving the check the tip options started at 19%.  The waiter did serve me but i cooked the food myself.  Surly, please help me decide how to feel inside.

-confused    

If your cooking was adequate, tip yourself 10%, if it was good 20%.  Deduct that from their tip.

[Ag with kids 581]

On 7/25/2023 at 5:20 PM, wild_turkey said:

5 years ago, it seems lots of places that didn’t normally receive tips had started adding a tip line to the credit card receipt. It annoyed me, but I realized it cost them nothing to add that line and it might pressure 5-10% of customers into tipping.

In the past 2-3 years, that’s mostly changed to the POS tablets which also allows the business to add a tip option at no cost to them. The difference is that leaving a tip is now the default option at many places, and often times the 3 preselected options are fairly high percentages.

I personally think it’s ridiculous for counter service places. It’s nothing more than the business owner passing on their labor costs to the customer. I realize margins are thin in the restaurant industry, but if a place like Torchy’s or Chipotle can’t pay their employees a fair wage without incorporating tips, then maybe they should raise menu prices.

I get guilted into occasionally leaving a tip in these situations, but typically more at local businesses that I feel a stronger need to support. I hardly ever leave the default 20% or more. I typically lower it to $2-3 unless I feel the counter employee is busting their ass or doing something beyond the ordinary expectations.

On the barber tangent, I tip my girl $8-10 for my haircut every 3-4 weeks. It’s a $40 haircut, takes her ~25 minutes, and she has 3 kids. I give a little more around the holidays. I also tip my mail lady at the holidays.

So, instead of them passing on their labor costs to the customer, they should pass their labor costs onto the customer?

Crazy...

[sidis 9,832]

https://www.npr.org/2023/07/05/1185160295/tipping-coffee-consumer-spending-inflation-tips

https://www.npr.org/2023/07/17/1187275511/tipping-minimum-wage-tips-tip-screen

Edited July 27, 2023 by sidis

[gofuckyourself 8,355]

I had cash in hand this week which is rarer these days, and so I paid for lunches several times with a palpable sense of satisfaction that the "Square Toast iPad Turn 'n' Tip" dance was thwarted at each location.

That said, I tipped cash jar at Leroy and Lewis because it's hot as fuck and I'd probably pay 20% more for it regardless.