twicketface | The last poll for at least 20 minutes, promise.

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The last poll for at least 20 minutes, promise.

A question for those who tip at restaurants - I've noticed lately that sometimes, when dining with friends, said friends either don't tip or tip very poorly, even for good service. I always tip and it irks me when people (who have no problem with tipping) do so poorly. So, what would you do in that situation?

[Poll #311613]

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I would tip extra, then wonder aloud how often their food gets spit in, and then probably stop going out to eat with them. I used to have a friend that never tipped waitstaff or bartenders. I'd have to go behind him and tip everyone. Otherwise, the whole group of friends would have started to get bad service.

That said, I don't think you should tip well for bad service. I call that constructive criticism. I also refused to put money in the tip jars at ice cream parlors and coffee shops.

Yeah. If service is really shitty and I get the impression that they just simply don't care about me then they're gonna get a poor tip.

I also staunchly refuse to tip for coffee.
I don't think it's appropriate.

Exactly - I'm more concerned about places I go regularly (not that I eat out that much), but I've got a reputation to uphold!

Agree about coffee houses, unless all of her clothes would fall off or something.

Usually I will first wonder aloud. Then when nothing is done about it I will directly say "you haven't paid enough."

Then, when they raise their 0-5% tip to a 5-10% tip, I just pony up the extra cash.

I'm a real pushover at restaurants. Most people have a base tip of 15% and it takes a lot to shake them from that. If the "rounding to the nearest dollar" leaves them at 13%, that's okay with them.
I start the tipping at 20%. If the rounding leaves me at either 18% or 24%, I'll go with the 24%.

We're all in it together.
And nobody likes being a waiter.

I shoot for 20% and use that as a baseline. I think it's partially because I usually order things made 'my way' - no tomato, side of honey mustard, etc.

I do the same. Plus, tipping 20% takes one step out of the math equation.

tip extra to make up for your friends. or say something to them.

In addition to wondering aloud, I tend to overtip. So, I've probably got the light tippers covered.

i answered, "wonder aloud" in the poll, but usually i try that first-- if no one ponies up any more $, i then do the "out loud calculation." i look at the bill and figure out what 20% of the bill is, doing the mental addition out loud, so i can end up saying, "ok, it's a $30.00 bill, we need $6 for tip, we have only $3. can everyone throw in another quarter/dollar/etc.?" then they can throw in and hide their non-tipping-ways.

in high school, i would often go out with 3 of my friends. 2 of them tipped really poorly. the other friend, jeff, came up with a neat system: he'd refure to tip at all, saying "he didn't believe in tipping." then once our other friends were shamed into tipping 10% (all they would give, those cheapskates) and we all left the restaurant, he'd come back in and throw down the amount of tip he owed. the waiters ended up with a solid 15% and the cheapskates were made to pay.

That's a good system. I guess I should just start reading off the check and tell how much per couple it should be.

it sorta makes me feel ashamed to have to read the bill out loud (what- are we in elementary school?) but it does work. i'd resort to it if your dining partners are known to be tip-skippers and they're too dense to understand your previous, more genteel ways of asking them to pay up. : )

That, or stab them with a fork.

20%, you shouldn't even go out if you aren't prepared to tip 20%. If your friends don't know this, tell them. If they tip poorly, then ask them what was wrong with the service. If they say nothing, tell them it's rude not to tip their fare share of the total 20% tip, and that you will reconsider going out with them if they do it again.

Indeed, skulls should be cracked.

I work as a server at a local family restaurant. Tipping varies greatly. And THANK YOU for those of you who order stuff your way, (i.e. extra parmesan on your caesar salad, no croutons, just ONE sprinkle of paprika on your mashed potatoes, and of course, extra ice in your no lemon big glass iced tea) and then tip accordingly!! Just the other night I had to run back out to a table 3 times, they excessively asked for sides -- in 2 minute increments. BBQ, extra Caesar dressing, worscherstershire (haha, however you spell it), Soy, Malt & Vinegar, and refills! 4 people ate meals and 2 appetizers, and I got a measly $3 tip. Haha. Thanks for letting me bitch. And for those of you who tip well, thank you immensely, we praise you when we see it on the table, and your face means just that much more to us!

One more thing - in case anyone does not know, most servers get paid under minimum wage, and tips are our salary.

For example, I make a whopping $2.65 an hour. Tips are everything.

That's why I won't tip at Starbucks or other similar places that have tip jars. It's one thing to tip someone who isn't making anything to begin with. It's quite another to tip someone who is making a full wage. I think it is a slap in the face to waitstaff.

Waitstaff in some states make more than the Federal minimum wage. For the ones that don't, their employers are required by law to pay them up to minimum wage if the tips don't do it.

Something else most people don't know: if the tips don't bring an employee up to minimum wage, the employer has to pay the difference (http://www.dol.gov/dol/topic/wages/wagestips.htm). One could say that consistently having the employer do this would result in firing. If one consistently needs to invoke this law, however, I'm inclined to believe that one must not be very good at their job. One might wish to look for other means of employment.

That said, here's a list of the minimum hourly wages for tipped employees (http://www.dol.gov/esa/programs/whd/state/tipped.htm).

Or they could be working a really slow part of the day or the place doesn't do a lot of business to begin with....

Well, then, I think they should look for employment elsewhere. It shouldn't be the customers responsibility to pick up the owner's cost of doing business - not like that.

For the record, I wouldn't mind in increase in my dinner fare, if it meant that waitstaff would be paid a standard wage that wasn't dependent on tips.

You know how I feel about tipping - but, I still do it. I think tipping is one of those things that really doesn't make sense if you think about it (anybody that says that waitresses need the tip money - hey, what about other minimum wage slaves that don't get tips? I don't know why waitstaff got a deal on this), but, it sort of is a way to immediately let the waitstaff know how their service was.

I think I've done all of these on different occasions.

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