Long story short, working fast food, getting paid full minimum wage, is a CAKEwalk compared to working as a waiter or waitress, who doesn't even make that much.

Hmmm: Let us say 30 years ago you paid 10% on tips which was the standard at that time. On a $10.00 meal that would be a $1.00 tip. In 2008 that same meal cost $30.00 so their tip would go up to $3.00 with inflation. Yet, not only has the price of meals gone up but the percentage for tips has doubled. Instead of $3.00 they get $6.00. Why? Why should I now pay 20%? When will this stop.... when the tip EQUALS the cost of the meal so we are paying DOUBLE on each meal out?

Tyler Style
[www.nirdvana.com]

Sitting hunched over tattooing someone for several hours (with a decent amount of people squirming around, complaining tattoos hurt (duh)), plus the fact that you could potentially be dealing with people who have communicable diseases (I personally am VERY picky about how sterile my work area/equipment is), paying the shop for your rental space, buying your own supplies and maintaining your own equipment........ you hit the nail on the head.

I love tattooing period, I've been drawing since i could hold a pencil, I'd do it for free if I didn't have bills to pay... but that's also a profession that should be tipped.

There's a sit-down Thai restaurant in town that has $3.45 lunch specials. That $3.45 gets me a water, a chicken leg, a bowl of soup, one of 10 entrees (eg, shrimp with noodles, rice on the side) and a fortune cookie. I leave at least $7 each time (yes, a tip of ~90%+ or so, after tax, every time), because that's what they should be charging and because I know that the money is going straight to the couple who run the place.

Housekeeping is the hardest job in the entire travel industry, IMHO. I generally leave at least $10 for 3-4 nights; those people deserve their tips far more than other people who perform less service, and I doubt that they get frequent tips.

I generally don't tip for taxi drivers, or might add on a buck or two (10% tops, average 5%). I feel like taxi rates are high enough that most drivers do okay. That was something I picked up from Argentina, where taxi drivers aren't tipped and where waiters get whatever change you have in your pocket (literally; over 8%-10% is excessive there).

Restaurants I aim for 20%ish, buffets half that, +/- 5%-7% and rounded up or down to the $ when I feel like it. OTOH, I was at a buffet yesterday that was SLOW and which had insanely good service. He got 20%. If the waiter lets my water glass stay empty for 8 minutes, odds are good they'll get the lower end of the spectrum.

For everyone else... I like to tip random people occasionally if they impress me or really going out of their way, or give them a gift somehow. You better believe I gave a nice note and an overpriced box of chocolates to Career Services once I accepted a job offer, as I was insanely impressed with that department.

The economy hasn't affected my tipping at all, but then I'm a government employee, so...great job security.

15% - or more for the holidays - is pretty steep for a hairdresser, though, if you're female. I just can't agree with that.

However, in places like China they (at least act like) they need to do that so its border-line pestering so you wont be seen with your bag in their hotel.

They suggest 20% at "Fine" restaurants where the prices are jacked up even more ?

I think the exact reverse.... 18-20% at a local joint and 15% at a fine restaurent.

Although I could never undestand why "I" am expected to pay for the help, why doesn't restaurant just pay their employees a reasonable wage to begin with ?

I have a real problem tippng someone more than I make an hour. Geez.... at a "Fine" restaurant, a 20% tip could easily be $40 for a dinner for two. I don't come anywhere close to making that even if you figure in my benefits.

I REALY REALLY Hate these automatic additions to the bill. And it seems more places now are starting to add a surcharge to use a credit card too.

I have had to cut back on eating out... so it is a snowball effect.

Please don't waste our time in the first place then, because we'd rather lose money than deal with assholes all night long... good tippers when they're drunk are usually irritating enough already.

I don't think she was being a jerk by not leaving a tip.

Normal service would be to place it in your cart.

Also, she says pregnant women are absolutely the best clients. They don't mind tipping well since it's a special time in their lives, and are willing to treat themselves properly.

They should have listed "washroom attendants", those guys who camp out in the washrooms at dance clubs in such away that there's no choice but to let them turn on the water, pump the soap, hand you a towel, and give you the stink eye when they don't get a tip.

If massage therapists were covered by insurance, they would probably receive more of a living wage and therefore not be anticipating tips. Again, having a private practice and specializing in select areas can improve your earning capabilities but many therapists struggle if they don't have 5 roommates or a primary wage earner as a spouse.

When you say, "In Japan...blah blah blah does this and this," all you can do is make the observation. Applying some random customs to US culture is pointless.

@JPropaganda:

I've confirmed twice that is correct to NOT tip the owner of a salon. The owner does my hair, I don't tip, but I do give a $100 xmas "tip" which works out to about 13% of what I spend a year with her.

As far as the other salonepeople - I tip the amount of the serive at xmas time (ex: $50 haircut, $50 tip instead of the usual $8) because that is what I've always heard is the "rule".

If you tip 10% on a $100 tab you're lucky if the bartender doesn't throw it back in your face with an angry gesture.

At which point, I pick up the money he just threw in my face and leave. If he doesn't want my money, fine, he can pay the tab.

My biggest problem is when I get the tip line on the receipt right after I order something, but before anything has actually happened. This has only happened a few times, but I'm not going to tip anyone unless I think they deserve it. It is kind of the point after all.

I tip 20% for great service less for normal service and tip very poorly for poor service (like if I'm ignored).

I don't tip at fast food, counter service, or take out places. I tip $1 per drink at a bar, not a percentage of the cost of the drink (some of which are ridiculous). I don't think waiters and waitresses are automatically entitled to their tip, whether it be 15% or 20%. They have to work for it. If they don't work for it, they don't deserve it.

if you are a really bad tipper, they will NEVER forget you

Most bartenders make around $4 an hour, and you don't even really make that (at least not in my state). If you declare tips over that amount, it's credited towards that minimum hourly wage. 90% of the bartenders I know walk with a paycheck that says VOID every two weeks.

Dollar a drink people, please. Most bartenders would prefer you leave them alone if you're going to tip less than that. If you tip 10% on a $100 tab you're lucky if the bartender doesn't throw it back in your face with an angry gesture.

@muddgirl: Actually, at crowded bars I usually frontload my tips. The bartender doesn't know if you're a good tipper or not, and odds are he/she is going to be distracted by other groups (or pretty girls & boys).

The key for me is to usually buy the first drink(s) with cash, throw the guy a $5 bill, then give him my card to start a tab. This way he remembers me, and is more likely gives me better service throughout the rest of the night in expectation of a good tip on the tab (which I always leave).

Works almost every time, in every bar I've gone to.

@swedub: Ahhh, so Wayne Huzienga is a lousy tipper, eh?

Hardly surprising, given how badly he's screwed up the Dolphins.

In Japan you don't tip. Things run really smooth and everyone is prompt and helpful. They get paid well and everyone is generally much better at their job than in America. I don't like the idea of tipping 20% because from the few restaurant workers I knew... on good days they could make over $15 an hour in tips alone. When I worked retail and though that was a much harder and more demanding job I was paid far less than wait staff can earn. Tips are very outdated.

I have always lived by tips are for above and beyond, like raises. If you treat me like any other person would, you don't get a tip. If you do great service or try really hard when I notice it's busy, tip. This is why I am not allowed to pay at restaurants though.

My wife and I have a cleaner that comes in every other week to clean our apartment. We usually give hera Christmas bonus that's the equivalent of one week's pay, and gave her a raise about six months ago.

And I'm not even going to touch upon you equating your retail job with my career. You couldn't do my job with the 3 days of training you probably recieved at Verizon.

@swedub: Yeah, I've seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I HATE valet parking service. Why do I need to pay for something I can do myself with no effort?

@ObtuseGoose: Right! Or having our conversation interupted every five minutes with "How's everything tasting?" My favorite is the pictures of the kids on the back of the order pad.

In Europe the waiters are snobby assholes but they are professional. They don't bother you but are always available if you need them. If you tip them they will laugh at you and call you a stupid American behind your back because they are probably paid more than you are.

@wgrune: i hate the tip sharing system too. It's another example of how perverted the whole system has become.

I didn't realize how crazy the whole system was until I tried to explain it to my European girlfriend.

Now to the one worried about house keys and gps, we really couldnt care less about your house and your GPS, it would be much easier to just break into a random house then go through the trouble of copying your key/address/whatever, infact we wish you would not use the valet key because of how long it takes you to take that key off the keyring, some people are so bad they give me there whole set and ask me to remove all they keys but the car/valet key.

Also i never valet my own vehicle, its mine and i dont want anyone else touching it even though its a old truck with well over 200k miles on it

I agree. I'm sick of servers pushing expensive appetizers on me the second I sit down. Most of the time the appetizer costs as much as the entree.

I can guarantee I am a better server when I'm waiting on someone I've had before and I know they tip well, and I will completely ignore you if you've tipped me shitty in the past (I'm talking less than 15% on good service).

If you can't afford to tip, or you simply don't want to tip because you don't think its fair (boo freaking hoo), then don't go out to eat.

@MyPetFly: 15% they get your drinks and clean your plates.

I tip a set amount per person.

The whole idea of tipping in restaurants has got to be one of the weirdest things about western (or American/Canadian) society.

The cost of your food includes the labor for cooking the food, the ingredients, the upkeep of the building, advertising etc.

Oh, but the girl who carries your food 25 feet from the kitchen to your table? You have to pay her directly.

Well, you should pay her. Tecnically you don't have to pay her if she doesn't do a good job but you better make sure it was her fault if you don't want to have an argument in the parking lot.

The worst part of this system is the horrible cloying behaivior of some waiters and waitresses who are angling for a big tip.

@Annewhodidntlikeproflowers:

If I order a mixed drink, I will tip. I am not giving someone a dollar (on a $4 beer) to twist the top off and hand it to me.

@YaleLentulus: There a lot of different charities... Some actually tech people to ''fish'', instead of donating them ''fish''.

Basically I am tipping just to show my happiness with the service compared to a non owner who I tip to show my happiness and help pay for the stall rent\time I took up.

My main problem with tipping is that in many places all the tips are split between the waitstaff. This neither rewards good service or punishes poor service. Pay a decent wage, remove the stigma of tipping and tip in cases of extremely good service. I'v had a waiter follow me out of a restaurant before for ONLY tipping 15% or his standard service. A yelling match ensued in front of said restaurant...couldn't have been good for business.

[www.catastrophegirl.com]

at the top of that page are some of the things hotel guests gave me as tips at work.
if you don't want to click through, the top three that astounded me were a sweater vest, a sealed package of 6 'happy birthday, mom' cards and a christmas ornament dated 2002 {in 2004}

Finding logic in a social custom is always going to be a challenge; the custom of tipping servants goes back a long way (it was quite the burden for visiting guests in eighteenth century England), and it's essentially an outgrowth of that--hence the tipping of service jobs and not owners or what would have been considered "professionals" such as your pharmacist or your librarian.

I don't see any particular reason to tip somebody just because s/he wants a tip or puts out a tip jar or argues that they're performing hard work. I get that we all would like more money, but that's between us and the people who pay us. But I also don't see any particular reason to buck the custom in areas where it is historically customary and where salaries are limited as a consequence.

At restaurants, if I'm given good service, I give a good tip. I don't follow that "you should give this much percentage" bull. I tip what I feel they deserve. If they did and extraordinarily good job, by being attentive, making sure our food is right, and not being over-attentive, I'll generally give a good tip. I've left $20 tips for $30 meals. I won't leave anything if I didn't get good service.

And fast food employees shouldn't get a tip at all.

For those of you that might say "But if it's a slow night." or "What if they only have 2 tables." or "What if the customer stays longer."

Who's problem is that? The restaurants?

To me that sentiment only makes sense if the boss is ripping off the wait staff by not bringing them up to the real minimum wage when tips don't get them there but I've heard this from an employee at a Jimmy Johns. (For those who don't know Jimmy Johns is a place that serves cold subs.)

Actually, I'm surprised someone hasn't made that comment in this thread yet. Usually at least one person says something to the effect of, "If you can't/won't tip then stay home."

@rndmideas: Sometimes in a fit of generosity I'll tip at coldstone -- and I'm more likely to tip if someone in front of me in line has tipped. I think there's a psychological experiment waiting to be hatched there...

But my favorite ever coldstone tip, I didn't even order anything. My roomate was having her Bachelorette and we stopped to get her a massive bowl of ice cream. As another friend paid, I told the staff that I knew they had to sing for tips... and that I would appreciate it if they sang -- anything -- appropriately embarrassing for our bride-to-be. They stood her on a chair, made a huge announcement, and said that although they had no "bachelorette song" they would deffinitely sing and sang "Happy Birthday" to her, along with the entire store.

... hehe. In hindsight, I probably should have tipped them more.

@Oranges w/ Cheese: i think they would fall into the category of "don't want to be the bad tipper". They're not an asshole for not wanting to tip, but if they don't tip, and they're the only one, they'll look like as asshole.

If I need to tip every Moe, Larry and Curley that pours me a cup of coffee then it's only reasonable to assume that my services services aren't any less deserving.

One night, a guy handed him a $50 for 1 pizza and didn't ask for change. Granted the guy was high as a kite, but he was exstatic about it when he got home.

(Nothing against valets in general, I just had a very strange car that I didn't trust anyone to drive but myself.)

@vitaminmax: Um, don't you mean Yahoo? It's their list, Consumerist just linked to it.

vermontwriter told them why the waitress wasn't getting a tip. I don't think you look like a jerk if you tell them why.

--Frank Zappa

But in general tipping is like extortion...

With food service it's initially extortion for the server--they may be thinking "if I don't do a good job, the customer will withhold the money that I rely on to make up my income" ... but after you become a regular if you're a BAD tipper it could become extortion for the customer--"if you don't tip better I'll ignore you the entire night and you will stare at that blob on your burger and wonder if it looks like spit"

With car valet I always throw the guy a $4-5 before he takes the car in the thin hopes that maybe he won't beat the shit out of it or park it next to the garbage truck in the lot. When I leave, esp if it's the same guy I tipped earlier, I either give them nothing or $1-2... but this is maybe a handful of times per year, I'd change my rates if it was weekly or more frequent :)

I usually leave $5/day every morning at a hotel... what's funny to me if when I started traveling w/ my girlfriend she said "I usually tip at the end of the whole stay"... and I said... "ok, but if you're there for 3-4 days then the maid staff will probably think there is no tip coming and treat your room like dirt, if they see the $5 today then they're more likely to do a good job in the hopes of $5 tomorrow if they actually change the sheets" ... she started tipping at the end of the day too...

This all said I never tip for take out and it does bug me that their slips often have a "tip" line, though I understand that it's just because they use the same mechanism for dine in and take out.

I also tend to not tip at chain coffee places like starbucks where they have those little cards you put money on... it sucks for the servers at those places, but they at least are paid a full wage unlike restaurant employees... the only time I tip at those places is when they give me something free, a few times if the coffee took more then 30 seconds, I give em $2, or on election day this past year I got a free coffee so I gave them what it would have cost me

Tipping nothing just makes you look like a jerk. I prefer to leave a penny for bad service, and write a frowning face on the bill. Gets the message across, at least.

Now if we could only get an explanation of the lyrics to "Like a Virgin".

T - to
I - insure
P - proper
S - service

The worst tip I ever left - there was no money at all. The waitress took 10 minutes to get our drinks and 40 minutes to get our food. I asked the manager to intervene thinking maybe she was just busy. When he found her, she was outside having a cigarette and had "lost track of time." She was only responsible for three tables, so she wasn't overworked at all.

When our food did come out, she'd forgotten to put in my son's order, so we had another 15 minute wait. While all this was going on, the table near us waited for their bill and finally left without paying. Her response to that was to add their meals to our bill and hope we didn't notice. Of course we did and called the manager again. I made it clear that I was not leaving her a tip and that her lousy service was the reason why.

A

Waste Management Inc & AutoNation

yess! i worked at a Quizno's for a while, and there was usually only one person working up front at a time and someone in the back doing dishes. It was a bitch to put those damn gloves on, make your sandwich, put it through the oven thing, take the gloves off, take your money and ring you out, put on a New pair of gloves, take your sandwich out of the oven, put lettuce or whatever on it, and then wrap it up and give it to you.
One of the girls put a tip cup out one day and no one ever moved it and I never expected tips but I would have Never guessed how comfortable people are with shoving their hand in there and fishing around for exact change and not even like bat an eye.

I worked a few months as a bagger at Kroger. Mad minimum wage, less union dues. I fill 20 bags, take them out and load them into someone's car-never once did anyone offer me a nickel.

Musician/Singer: $35-75 per person.

Huh? Shit no. Unless you mean if I own a business and get some cheap talent to promote the place. If it's music for a wedding, sorry, they're overcharging already.

Massage Therapist: 10-20 percent of the total, 20 percent if it is a really great massage.

Again, what? Maybe it's just because I don't get massages very often. I guess I'd tip if I liked the service, as a way of saying "I'll probably schedule you again sometime," but it seems so superfluous. I only tip my barber because my dad did it and the habit stuck in me (most of them don't deserve it, and I'm very easy to please).

Parking Attendant: $1-2, depending on how far they travel to get your car.

Whew. I thought I was being cheap giving them ones. Now that I know that's the norm, I'll try quarters.

Taxi Drivers:

Maybe for you posh New Yorkers, but here in Atlanta, taxi drivers get no tip, and maybe no fare. Consider it hazard pay... given to the passenger. I could have sworn, though, that the standardized pricing stickers on the cabs actually say not to tip. I tip if they load or unload my bags, but it's the same scale as van drivers, and only ever up to $3. Seriously, a dollar a bag is pushing it, but the act itself is deserving.

Next time an article like this comes out, one would think a little research would be involved.

IMHO, the only times that tipping at a coffeehouse is absolutely mandatory are:

-If you go in and act like it's a full service restaurant. For example, if you order seven drinks and each of them have to be made just so, especially if the staffing is clearly not sufficient for difficult orders.
-If you have extremely detailed specifications, such as an exact degree that you want your milk steamed to.

In general, anything that goes above and beyond the call of duty should be an automatic tip, even if it's just chucking your change in the jar.

Why should we be tipping?

Before anybody jumps me, I do tip. Waitresses. And all of my hooker friends. And my barber. And the lawn guy. Shoe shine girl. Paper Woman. The girl delivering my Girl Scout Cookies. And anybody I pass in the street.

But nobody tips me. Or my employees. Or the clerk at Walmart that just spent 20 minutes trying to find a product that was suppose to be on the shelf.

Which brings me back to the original question. Why should we tipping at all?

I hope someone can give me a good answer for this.

Why tip hair stylists? I'm a male. When I got my hair cut, she usually buzzed my head and snipped ten hairs with her scissors. She does not get paid $2.50/hr like a waitress. It is her job to cut my hair, which took about ten minutes.

I used to work in retail at Verizon Wireless. I was a salesman and have sometimes spent an hour with a customer teaching them things, selling, ringing out, transfering contacts, pictures... you get the point. I would spend more time and effort than a hair stylist would, but is it expected to tip me? Not at all.

I work in health care and haven't received a tip for giving good service, why does a waiter get a tip who is just merely handing you food that someone else worked hard to make and I get no tip for something that I feel is a real service?

Tipping is a nonsensical tradition that we have that makes no sense and should be done away with!

You tip a parking attendant? Like, in a parking garage, where you pay to park? It's not my fault if he's parked my car two floors away.

Maybe I should put a tip jar on my desk at work. Hmmmmm......

@Pylon83: I usually dump whatever change I have leftover from the transaction into the tip jar at the take out places that I frequent. The owners and employees recognize me, they work hard, they put up with my silly requests, they've never screwed up my orders, and while these businesses are getting by, they are by no means raking in the cash. I don't feel obligated to tip; I do it to reward the good service and don't mind giving them something extra.

Now tip jars for a run-the-mill transaction at Starbucks or another chain place? I don't understand it unless the employees goes out of their way to help you.

I dunno, I've been at a few bars and the $1/drink didn't help, even when I tipped it every time. I kept having to stand there waiting for drinks. But the insane price of alcohol has kept me from drinking out lately, and I've stuck to drinking casually with friends lately.

My thought is this: tipped staff gets paid less. If they're getting full hourly wages, you're not obligated to tip, though there are certain industries where tipping is considered good business practice in order to protect your goods (hotel staff, skycaps, valets etc).

Ice cream servers get full wages, and you're not asking them to, you know, not steal your stuff or bang it up in any way, so you're not obligated just because they put a tip jar out.

Admittedly, it's been a while since I ordered pizza, but we used to tip according to current gas prices. Never less than a dollar, but if gas gets up to $4-5 again, definitely tip more, since it's costing more to deliver that pizza to you.

I've not heard of this. I always get the owner of the place I go to for my hair, and I always tip him, extra when I hit the free cut on my frequent cut card.

That's how I tip when things are unexpected like that. There was a time when I was at a Bennagan's (I miss that place) and I ordered their steak. The one I got was over cooked and tasted of rotten fish (quite disgusting, I'm not one for garrum on my steak). The waitress was also appalled at the condition of the steak, she took it back, promptly brought out another, and comped it. Well, when I ordered I had intended to pay, and because she was so nice and quick about it, I still paid for the steak and tip in the tip, all in cash too. :)

America is a tipping culture. Certain service providers get tipped. But that's fine if you don't want to. Either A) refrain from visiting establishments/utilizing services where tipping is customary or B) expect each member of the kitchen staff at your favorite restaurant to drag their scrotums across your steak before it's served to you.

I saw a new one today--there was a tip jar in the optician's office when I went in today to pick up my son's glasses. Should I be looking for one of the ubiquitious jars at the pediatrician's office or the pharmacy next?

Fuck you consumerist.

I work as a bartender in MI, where very few make an hourly wage. If I get 10% from everyone, I'm not making shit all night.
Here is a better way. Dollar a drink until you get to $25. Then 15-20%

All they do is serve breakfast and it's hard for two people to get more than a $20 check.

I don't mind tipping. I just wish it was done up front so I knew I was getting my money's worth in service. Tipping only seems to pay off for repeat customers.

I have heard the same about valets. Luckily my car isnt that awesome, so its not a big deal. Usually I tip 3-4 on the way out and in.

I have heard if you have a really nice car, the best thing to do is actually tip the valet 10-20 bucks to let YOU park your car in the valet lot next time the valet drives out there, and then get a ride back, and do the reverse when you leave. Win for you, and win for them (2 tips for one trip). If I could afford a performance car, I'd care about it, and I'd pay to do that. If none of the valets played ball I'd be out of there. You can also chip some cars to have a valet mode and limit RPMs.

Dive bars are always better--I go there to drink, not to be seen.

Heck, if they really want to rake in the money (at least from me), they'd change it to "a dollar or more and we stop singing".

those in the know tip bartenders a buck a drink. if you don't believe me, try it and watch your service skyrocket.

10-15% tippers in a bar are people who go to crowded night at the roxbury-type places.

From talking to the maids, I learnt that the worst tippers were NBA players (this was in a city with a great NBA team). When the away players came into town, the maids felt sorry for whomever got to clean their rooms. They made a helluva mess and tipped nothing. Only the coaching staff tipped. :(

I also live in a college town, so I know how broke most servers, barristas and icecream scoopers are. I tip a buck at starbucks and coldstone or any other counter service place. If you cant afford an extra dollar for your coffee or icecream..make it yourself or buy it at a store.

$1 per drink at any bar, or 20 % of the tip, whichever is more. If you take care of your server, they will remember you.

Tipping is something I generously put up with. When the revolution comes, I hope this outmoded idea will fly the way of the dodo.

"Why tip someone for a job I'm capable of doing myself? I can deliver food. I can drive a taxi. I can, and do, cut my own hair. I did however, tip my urologist, because I am unable to pulverize my own kidney stones."

-Dwight Schrute, The Office

I'm not saying that fast food workers don't work their asses off. My husband worked at a Taco Hell for years. But it's where I draw the line. The way I see it, they don't perform a service, they produce a good and sell it to me. Should I tip the factory workers that built my car, or the stock boy at the grocery store? They work to get goods to me, just like a fast food worker would, but I don't tip them.

Please explain, why must I tip a massage therapist? I'm paying around 120$ for a massage, and the massage therapist is NOT receiving minimum wage.

So why should I tip him?

please don't ever tip (or pay for delivery) in change. that's just wrong, man.

Back on topic, I rarely ever got a tip when receiving their car. I usually got tipped when giving their car back. This was 10 years ago but I would get anything from $1 to $5 usually. At a special event back then I parked a very rich mans top-of-the-line Mercedes. He owned several Fortune 500 companies and some sports teams. He only tipped $5.

@mtaylor924: i don't entirely agree on your 2nd paragraph. when i used to deliver pizza, i would bust my ass (& my car) to get it to you as fast as possible with the hope that piping hot pizza in 10 minutes was worth a couple bucks to you. even if you never used my service again, it wasn't about generating repeat customers so much as maximizing my potential earnings. i got satisfaction from repeatedly hearing "holy crap! didn't we just order that like 5 minutes ago?!?" & getting rewarded with an above average tip.

i think many employees that work for tips operate under a similar premise - good service equals a good tip. exceptional service equals an exceptional tip. obviously, there are some workers who don't understand this concept, just as there are certain customers who don't understand it. but that doesn't mean it doesn't work.

You say $1.00 for a van driver or doorman who helps with a bag? Nearly 30 years ago I got $1.00 per bag at a motel in a small Michigan town of 12,000 people. Wait staff were getting 10% tips then. So if you wait tables, you get 15-20% now, but a if you help someone with luggage, you still get a buck? Seems out of whack to me.

That was when our kids were 1, 2, and 6. Now, they're older, aren't as messy, and we're back to 15-20% :).

I worked for many, MANY years at the same store, and I'll be damned if I remember any of my customers (unless they were especially insane). I like to tip, and I tip well if I like the service. If not... I'm a wuss and I tip at least 15%. But if I like a place and decide to make it my Sunday brunch joint, half of its merit is the service, so tips galore. I just don't think I'm memorable enough for someone to say, "Hey, there's unobservant! I'm going to stalk the crap out of her with my coffee pot."

It just seems like, unless I don't tip at all, my good deed goes unnoticed. Am I wrong?

If you don't make enough money, get a better job...don't take out your frustration on someone's property. It doesn't matter what a valet is paid, no one forced them to work there.

@Orv: very, very true.

I admit, I'm a jerk, tipping 20% gets ridiculous fast. I tip 15% if service is okay. 20% if exceptional; 10% if it was mediocre. And I round up to the nearest dollar if it sucks.

As for counter workers - I did that for a while, at minimum wage, I appreciated every tip I got. Nothing worse than the people that would put their hand in the tip jar and take some out . . . grr...

But really, you can easily tip too much in too many areas.

As for valets? My policy has always been tip at least half what you would have paid for parking.

Tipping doesn't ensure better service anyway. You tip AFTER you are served, it doesn't help if you are eating somewhere new, and it also doesn't help because you usually don't have the same server if you go to the same place.

I would argue that Australia is MUCH more similar to American culture than Asian countries. I think you could pretty easily expect service to quickly resemble Australia if you removed the tipping expectation.

It pretty much makes sense too. In America if you work hard as a waiter you can make good money. In Australia, as long as you don't get fired you make decent money. The service you receive reflects those incentives.

I consider my massage therapist a health care professional, and I don't tip those. She gets a holiday gift. But I do tend to tip a full 15-20% when I'm getting takeout from a sit-down restaurant, because I'm taking a tipped employee's time away from tip work (I'm particularly aware of that at places where the takeout is handled through the bar).

My best, though, was when I dropped in to buy a brownie from a restaurant counter. The price was fifty cents (it's back a few years), I handed over a dollar, and I was asked if I wanted my change. You mean as opposed to tipping 100% for you to reach below the counter at which you're standing? Sheesh.

(Cue Mr. Pink)

Where it doesn't work is for one-time services, like restaurants, taxis, etc. The service worker is not getting the tip until after providing the service, so if they think they will never see you again they have no incentive to improve their service after a bad tip. If we all started telling our servers up front what their tip is, then letting them know how it is rising or falling based on their quality of service, the tip would actually be worth something on a larger scale.

That's all great in theory...but I'm not gonna be the a**hole who slaps cash on the edge of the table and tells my waiter that it's up to him how much of it he ends up with when I'm done eating.

Try Japan or Korea or China.

This difference isn't about tipping or not tipping.

I'd think hotels could come up with a better option, but I haven't seen one yet.

People go out to dinner with the whole family and hand the valet the car keys. Which usually has the house keys on the same ring. So now a stranger has your house keys, your car keys, your car with GPS and your home address programmed in.

It really makes you think.

@Pylon83: If I have to drive down to a place and pick up my food, why the hell would I give a tip to the person who moves it from a shelf to the counter? The tip jar at the take-out counter is insulting at best.

Ha. Spoken like someone that has never been to a non-tipping country. Come to Australia. Experience the level of service here where the base wage is pretty good and tipping is not expected. It is FAR lower.

My aussie wife used to say the same thing about tipping being antiquated and unfair until she actually saw how much better the service is where tipping is expected for good service.

How about pizza delivery drivers?

But if the service is worth it, they deserve it.

You walk up to the counter to order, and when your food is ready, they yell out your name and you go pick it up. You also get your own drinks from a fountain as you need.

It irks me that places like these have a line for tip.

I don't tip for counter service or takeout (unless it's delivered).

At regular restaurants, I usually calculate 20% and then round up so the final bill is an even dollar amount, or for more expensive meals, maybe round up to the nearest $5 point.

It won't affect how much I tip, I'll just forgoe the services of the Concierge all together.

And how much to tip at a Buffet where the waitress just clears plates and brings drinks?