Regarding the stuff about T.I.P., I figured whoever posted it figured out that was an UL/UM and was too shamed to post a correction. Personally, IDGARA about the derivation of the term. All I care about is service.
There is a pub perilously close to the UVA campus which I frequent when I am down there for academic competitions. It must not be a chain because the service and hospitality is honestly the best I have ever received. I think it’s O’Malley’s Pub, but as I haven’t been down there in a month or so, I can’t remember. Great food, though.
I thought about it, but my friends all razz me for being a compulsive Urban Legend Policeman, so I let it slide, figuring somebody else would pick it up. Took a while, though.
(For anybody who cares, “posh” doesn’t mean “port outward starboard home,” either.)
What a great thread. It surfaces every now and again.
I’ve experienced:
Greasy fingernails from a waiter who let me know that he had to change his starter before coming in to work that day.
A simple order of Nachos (No peppers or beans, add a side of guacamole) made incorrectly THREE TIMES before they were made correctly.
A waitress telling me how if she wasn’t tipped well, she’d have trouble making her rent payment.
A waiter ask increduously if I really didn’t think I should have to pay for food that I found a rock in!
When answering “Yes” to the “Do you need any change” question, I had a waitress ask me “Are you sure?” I couldn’t believe it! Guess how much of a tip she got?
I’m sure there’s more. I’ve also had:
My meal tab paid for because a drink order was incorrect.
Buy-backs from a place I regularly visit. I wish everyone know about buy-backs.
Various other ‘free’ things because I’m somewhat known by the staff. (Think “Norm!!!” - not really)
Finally, I’m usually a pretty generous tipper, if the service is acceptable, or if I feel there’s a reason for the poor service. In the past when a friend of mine and I were “on the wagon”, and we would go to a local restaurant/bar on team trivia night and drink tea all night. We acknowledged that we were taking money away from the waitress by not ordering beer or food, so we made up for it with a $10 or $15 tip. When receiving a buy-back, I’ll usually try to tip enough extra to pay for the freebie beer that the bartender gave me.
You know what pisses me off most of all? When my father (when he was still alive) or my mother-in-law would go to a restaurant with us in their wheel chairs. The staff at restaurants are so un-intentionally demeaning. You’ll get one of several reactions:
Waitstaff talks baby talk to person in wheel chair.
Waitstaff doesn’t talk to person in wheel chair (“What will she be having?”
Waitstaff will talk louder to person in wheel chair.
(It would crack me up, my dad would loudly say back “I’m crippled, I’m not deaf!” or similarly to the baby-talkers “I’m crippled, not stupid!”)
I’ll give the tip to the person who DOES sit down and look my father (or mother in law) in the eye and and talk to THEM.
Most pertinent (and impertinent) points have been made, but hey…
I agree w/ Southern Style on ill-behaved children in restaurants. They tend to stand out, because the good kids don’t attract attention! But in my view, the parents are guilty of something close to child abuse.
Part of rearing a child is teaching how to behave in different settings. An out-of-control brat a misfit in the making. Parent/child tussels of will happen, but letting a child wreak havoc is permission-by-indifference. Those kids will have a damned rough road to travel, learning the hard way the lessons the parents should have taught early on.
The worst wait-staff story: got seated in a nearly empty restaurant. 10 minutes; no waitress. (She’s leaning by the door to the kitchen, chatting w/ a cook.) We trek to the bar, get glasses of wine, come back–and wait.
10 minutes later, she strolls over and gives us menus; leaves and resumes her chat. No amount of eye contact can lure her back. We go back to the bar.
She finally comes back, takes our orders, then says, “we’re out of…” everything we’d ordered. Wanders back to her chat.
Finally, after 40 minutes total, we look at our empty wineglasses (run on tab), and fatigued from semaphoring for the waitress, get up and leave–without paying.
I’ve never done anything like that before or since. I called the owner the next day, and his response was, “we were busy!” Precisely 5 tables were occupied out of about 60. Needless to say (but I’ll say it anyway), I declined to return to pay for the wine or give the place another try.
Occasionally we go to the Chili’s here in town. I’ve had good experiences with that chain.
There was this one waitress there, that actually served us 3 different times. Usually I get a different waitress/waiter everytime. This woman needed to get fired.
I can’t remember each occasion, but I do know that she was bad on refills, checking in on us, and getting us our check.
I didn’t leave a tip for her the last time she served us. That night she seemed to be more interested in hitting on her friend or whoever across from us. Every time she’d walk by she’d stop and talk to them, sit down with them, hug that one guy when the girl was gone… man, I didn’t like that, especially when I’m really getting thirsty. Then, to top it off, when she’s clearing the plates, she hits my arm with one. I was thinking that I had my arm out in the walkway, but when I looked, my elbow was definately on the table. No tip, bitch.
I haven’t seen her since. Thank God.
Oh, and that guy at El Chico’s. I felt bad. Our dinner came to just under $25. I had 2 $20s on me. I say to my girl after he takes the money, “if he’s smart, he’ll bring back some 5 ones and a ten, not a five and a ten.” Sure enough, the guy comes out with a 5 and a ten. DAmn, I probably would have left a $5 tip, but he wasn’t quite worth $5. I felt bad, but only for a little bit. We went back later (months) and had a different server. We explained it to her and she knew that if you want a tip, you make it easy on yourself. She gets $5 from me everytime…
Both of our kids have eaten with us in restaurants since very shortly after they were born – five days old, in the case of my son. While they’re typically well-behaved, like all children they occasionally act up, get excited, whatever. We take quite seriously the obligation to ensure that our children’s behavior does not adversely affect other patrons – my wife and I have each spent quite a bit of time walking around outside restaurants or in lobby areas away from the dining rooms with our children when their behavior unexpectedly deteriorated. But children don’t have on/off switches, and often what a parent can do is limited to reacting to something inappropriate the child has already done. To hear you tell it, by that time your meal is already “ruined”. Is it “ruined” when a server accidentally drops a plate? (The resulting noise and mess are surely at least as unsettling as a child who squeals or yells for a moment or who drops food on the floor). Is it “ruined” when some putz in the next booth starts shouting into his cell phone to be heard over the noise of the TV and the other patrons? If the answer is “no” to these questions, then there’s something else, something particular to children that’s eating you. And if the answer is “yes,” then it seems to me you must have an awful lot of “ruined” meals. That might be considered evidence that you are a bit intolerant of the normal inconveniences involved in dealing with the rest of the world.
What could you have reasonably have expected to come of complaining to a waitress about the behavior of another customer’s children? Did you expect them to forcibly remove the family? In the unfortunate eventuality of a child misbehaving in a restaurant, one of two things is typically true: either the parents are basically competent and the child is behaving worse than usual (it happens to the best of us), in which case the parents are probably already attempting to deal with the situation, or the parents are incompetent and cannot handle their children. All parents are sensitive to criticism of their parenting skills, the worst parents most of all. Other than whatever satisfaction comes with righteous indignation at having your meal “ruined”, what could you possibly have expected to gain from publicly censuring someone for their child’s behavior?
Your recourse, if the mere presence of children is so offensive as to ruin your meal, is the same as that you suggest as the extreme option for poor service: go someplace else, someplace that discourages children. If enough people in the chains’ target markets stayed away for that reason, they’d change their approach. But I think you’ll find if you inquire that the chains mentioned elsewhere would be damned unhappy to do without the revenue realized from families with small children. Otherwise, they’d do a lot less to encourage them (no high chairs, no booster chairs, no kids menus, no crayons, no special cups for kids). Believe me, I’ve occasionally, through misunderstandings or accidents, ended up with my kids in an establishment where they were not welcome and there was no mistaking the fact.
However, if it’d mean I’d never have to put up with some other patron scowling at me and complaining in an obvious manner to the waitress/manager about the fact that my son was a little too loud for a few seconds or dropped a french fry on the floor, then I suppose I could come around to supporting “no children” sections as well.
Sorry bout the typo. Kinda tired when I posted and I know better than that.
The servers you all are mentioning wouldn’t last through training with me. You can usually tell right from the start who is going to make it and who isn’t.
Tipping has never been an issue with me. There have been times where I know I didn’t deserve a tip because of one thing or another.
Server sob story comming at you so be prepared!
Last year at Halloween my youngest two decided to become ill and run 102 for temps. My manager wouldn’t let me have the nite off. Why, because it was a holiday and of course instead of everyone going to parties, they were going to be eating at Miss Mamies.
Holiday for who? Not her. It is one of my holidays. Sam Hain.
So, I went into work looking terrible and with a not so nice attitude towards her. Well, I guess it kinda followed me out to the floor, which I preach about being a big no-no.
The resturant was dead, and here I was with two sick kids and three who could not go out because dad had to take care of the babies.
Shortly after I got to work my manager informed me to let so and so go home because she is “sick” and needs to leave. Then they cut the floor to two because of lack of business.
I didn’t expect to make any money that nite, and I really didn’t either. I quit shortly after.
Did get a $98 tip once just for fixing a gentleman a perfect martini. I actually cried. He was gone when I went to bring him his change. Came in twice more and did the same thing to one of my other servers.
As for kids, there is a time and a place. Speaking as a server, if you can’t control them please don’t bring them. I get so worried about dropping hot food or drinks on small children running around uncontrolled.
When my hubby and I do get to get out by ourselves we have actually waited for a table not around children. I left mine at home, I don’t need to deal with any others.
So far as restaurants having crayons, coloring books, cups with lids etc. Maybe they provide those thing not to encourage people to bring their kids but to make it easier for the other patrons because they know that people are going to bring kids anyway.
If a restaurant wants it’s adult patrons to enjoy their dinner at a bar/restaurant etc., of course they are going to try to provide some distractions for the inevitable children who will eat there. By not having crayons and colorful toys, a restaurant is just opening itself up for having screaming, bored children drowning out other patrons’ conversations.
(Also, the cups with lids aren’t so much for the parents’ convenience as they are for the servers and bussers who have to clean up after the kid.)
The thing about management stealing Credit cards tips is completely bogus. The server just does not want to pay tax on the tip. CC tips can be checked easily, $$ tips have to be estimated & checked on averages for that restaurant.
I hate & will not pay “mandatory” tips, UNLESS our party is so large there are multiple waiters.
My friends and I got free drinks all night and a free appetizer once at a TGI Fridays here, years ago.
We went in and ordered drinks. I asked for a Kahlua and cream, which is made, amazingly enough, with Kahlua and cream. When the waitress brought our drinks, she said what each one was as she set it down. “Scotch and soda for you, White Zin for you, White Russian for you…” I stopped her right then and said, “No, I asked for a Kalhua and cream, not a White Russian.”
She replied that they were the same thing. I explained that no they weren’t, a White Russian is Kahlua, cream and vodka. We went back and forth like that for a minute or two, when luckily enough a manger walked by and heard us. (The waitress was getting kind of snippy) Our whole bill was paid for…no charge…and no tip, either.
Are our husbands related? Oh man, that was hilarious!
Worst situation I’ve encountered was in a restaurant attached to a comedy club in San Francisco - both were managed by the same people. The food was overpriced gourmet (tiny portions, beautiful presentation) and the service was terrible. We left a 5% tip and went to the comedy club. A half-hour later, the server came into the comedy club , interrupted the show and demanded that we tip at least 15%. She told us that it was the law. We told her that the service sucked and we would not pay. She left and brought the manager back, who also insisted that it’s the law. The comedian started making fun of us. We gave in. Mother truckers. This was seven years ago and it still pisses me off. Grrrrrrrr
Sorry, but I don’t think these accomodations for kids are instituted just to make the best of a bad thing. Believe me, there are plenty of restaurants that don’t offer them and that make it clear that bringing children there is frowned on. I’m sure there are some obtuse parents out there that still wouldn’t get the message (and their kids are more likely than not to be the ones who cause problems), but most of us know when we’re not wanted and choose our restaurants accordingly.
Please don’t take this wrong, but I’ve noticed since becoming a parent that one of the biggest differences between parents and non-parents is that parents have of necessity realized that things aren’t always going to go just as you expect them to. Kids are unpredictable in many different ways, and once it’s your job to deal with that regularly, you learn not to let minor inconveniences or annoyances make you nuts or ruin your enjoyment of an otherwise acceptable situation.
I just had to pop back in and respond to the idea that restaurants provide kid stuff out of apology to their other customers.
I know a several owners of restaurants, including the president of a restaurant chain. They provide kid stuff because they want the patronage of people with small children. Period. People with kids tend to be loyal customers who will return often to places where they and their children are treated well.
Cher is dead on! I was doing a search on highchair safety in restaurants (after a scary episode with our infant son) and ran across an article in an online restaurant marketing magazine.
It was talking about how much pro-family amenities and policies lead to increased sales. Presumably, given some of the posts here, a higher family quotient will drive some patrons away–but according to what I read, for many restaurants it’s more than worth the investment in highchairs, crayons, a welcoming attitude–even kids-eat-free deals. I don’t think it’s all about damage control.
One quick note for those who don’t like their servers who introduce themselves…
When I worked as a waitress, I always introduced myself to my customers. However, it was not because I wanted to be their buddy. Trust me, I couldn’t give a shit less about what their names were or how their day was. I just wanted them to know my name so they could call me Amanda instead of “Miss”, or the dreaded “Ma’am”.
Ah. But you see, that screws up a game we like to play (so do nametags, but that’s another matter).
Anyway, at the end of the meal, when the check is laid down, my friend used to put his hand over it and say “Okay, guess the server’s name.” He said he had been doing it for years–trying to guess, and then looking at the little note on the bottom where the server puts ‘thanks’ or the smiley face or whatever to verify… he said in 5 years of playing the game, always making his best guess as to what name the server “looks like,” no one has ever been right. His buddies used to have a running deal, whoever got it right didn’t have to pay, the others would chip in. No one ever got to take advantage of the deal
Yes, I guess it does ruin your game. Sorry about that!
{Total hijack} Why is it that women with really “preppy” names, like Tiffany or Barbie, always “look” like a Tiffany or Barbie? And a Myrtle always looks like a Myrtle? Are parents controlling their child’s fate with a name? {End total hijack}
To get back to the topic, I do agree that if you leave a lousy tip, it would be nice if you explained via a comment card or conversation with the manager exactly what the problem was. Believe it or not, there are servers who care about giving good service and what a customer perceives as poor service may be perceived differently by the server.
As a “Barbie” in real life, I can tell you I am not a blue eyed blonde halfwit. Nor am I preppy. I’m a software engineer. I drive a Harley on occasion. I did not choose the name “Barbie.”
In professional & social settings, I always introduce myself as Barbara. However, I have a HUGE family, and my mother’s name is also Barbara (that’s why I’m named Barbara, not because it’s a preppy name). When I was a kid, everyone learned to call me Barbie. Fine, when you’re 8. Bad, when you’re 30. Despite my own personal preference, everyone still calls me “Barbie.” They do it because they’re used to it, and also because there needs to be some way to differentiate between me and my mother in conversation.
My SO and I spend time with my family. He’s picked up the “Barbie” thing now, too. He starts to refer to me as “Barbie” when talking to friends. Now THEY all call me Barbie.
I’m fighting a losing battle. Sometimes you just have to give up.
