The impetus for this is actually this post. The connection will become clear later.
So for waitstaff everywhere (they travel a lot) I’d like to apologize for my father in law.
I know that you realize shortly into your experience with us that it’s going to be painful. I appreciate your efforts to get through it with good humour. I hope the outrageous tip I leave helps make up for the horror. He’s the guy who is never satisfied with the table, he wants that one across the room. Something is not hot enough, something else is overdone and that new thing he tried… that was terrible.
I know you have to take things off the bill for him to make your life today easier, but god every time his sad face disappointed look works it makes me want to stab him with a fork so there is some negative reinforcment too.
It used to be worse, I used to have to leave my glasses on the table EVERY single meal so I could slip more money into the tip since he always insisted on paying. It got to the point where my concerned mother in law would check if I had everything before we left the table. Since I’ve begun contracting I’ve been able to convince him that the meals are a tax write off and I can finally just pay. (Note to Revenue Canada, I’m lying to him, not you, KISSES!)
So in short, I’m sorry he makes your job more difficult but hey at least he’s not around enough to be a regular, and I’m thanking his misconception for finally not looking like an airhead who can’t keep track of her things.
These are the kind of people I stop dining out with. Period. Is there nobody around who can shame him into being more considerate (like his wife, ffs?). Sorry anyone has to put up with that crap.
If I were a judge, I’d sentence him to forced labor as a waiter for 9-12 months. People who’ve worked in the industry know better.
Oh yeah, I know how you feel. One of my friends is a huge drama queen at restaurants and the littlest thing absolutely ruins his meal. Not the right amount of bread before the meal? RUINED. The server is surly/obsequeous? RUINED. And nothing will make it right. He wants his (not so little) tantrum more than he wants the “problem” fixed.
A few years ago I found out how awful a diner my mom could be in a douchey way. She won’t complain during the meal. Just withold all tip. So the restaurant doesn’t even get a chance to fix anything. Dad always goes outside to smoke before we leave and leaves the card for mom to pay. So he doesn’t know that she’s shorting the tip. The first time I realized this was happening, mom was withholding the tip because the thing she ordered wasn’t as good as she remembered from the last time. That’s right, it’s the waitress who’s to blame for the taste of the meal not meeting my moms nostalgic expectations. And of course, for not knowing because mom told no one other than me. And only in passing. Keep in mind that mom liked it a lot. It just wasn’t the siblime experience that she had built it up to be. I put down $30 bucks as we left. I only hope that it was enough because the meal was great for me and dad and the service was great too. I have no idea how often she’s done this when they take me out to dinner.
God, people like that make me want to hide under the table. If something is actually wrong with your order, it’s fine to point it out, but please, for chrissakes, do it nicely. Flies/honey/vinegar, and all that.
I stopped going out to eat with my father-in-law for all but the big family celebrations because of his demanding, assholish behavior. What a relief. He expects waitstaff to be psychic to his expectations of exactly when he does and doesn’t want them there (bring coffee early but do not expect him to even have glanced at the menu for at least 15 minutes after seating, because he’s busy talking, dammit - but you better know exactly when he is ready), and will bitch to a manager and stiff on a tip with the least provocation. Not to mention ethnic stereotyping in his comments to people. I stopped regular going-out trips after I had to zip up to the register at a diner and tell the owner to ignore whatever he said, the waitress was lovely, he’d been the jerk, and to give her this tip.
The OP’s experience sounds like the ones I’ve had with my brother. He doesn’t usually complain about food and service, but the comments he makes to female wait staff are embarrassing to the point of wanting to hide under the table. He used to be able to pull off what he considers humorous and cute, but the guy is an overweight 74-year old man who says whatever crude thing pops into his head. In addition, his idea of a good tip is to leave a dollar on the table. I usually palm some bills and wait for everyone to get up from the table. While he and his wife are distracted with getting on coats and grabbing purses, I slip the cash under the lip of a plate. :rolleyes:
The worst part of those type of folks, for me, is the fact that they’ll get offended at you trying to leave a larger tip. Look, jerks, just because you think the waitstaff deserves to get stiffed doesn’t mean we agree with you, and it’s none of your business if I wanted to stack Benjamins on the table like a bad mob movie.
Which post in that thread is the one you’re talking about?
My dad is a lot better than the people talked about in this thread. He always tips. 15%, down to the penny. No rounding up to the nearest dollar for him. If the check comes to $71.83, he’ll tip $10.77.
He’s not being deliberately stingy; he’s just stuck in an earlier age when movies cost a quarter and a kid would mow your lawn for a dollar. He actually thinks that a dollar is a generous tip.
Yeah, I took my 83-year-old dad out to dinner this past weekend. God bless him, he’s a saint. Never a complaint, never a cross word to anyone. He’s just still stuck in the mindset that $1 is an acceptable tip. I gently told him that it’s really not much of a tip these days, and thanked him for wanting to cover the gratuity, but ended up covering everything myself (which was fine. I had intended to do so all along.)
My 69 year old mom is like that, too - she’s not difficult or anything, she just doesn’t like to tip very much. We usually kick in a few extra bucks to make up for her shortfall, but I don’t worry too much about it; at least she isn’t making lots of extra work THEN shorting them.
He’s always challenging but restaurants are definitely worse. My mother in law keeps him mostly in line but she’s less likely to correct him in public and I think that contributes. He acknowledges corrections but his reactions is more like “Oh yeah you’re giving me a hard time again” than actually accepting it.
We minimize the time we spend in restaurants and while they’re traveling my mother in law deals by sticking mainly to fast food restaurants and keeping his expectations low. The more he expects the more ridiculous his demands get.
The discussion about the fallacy that items being tax deductible make them essentially free. It’s made my life easier and while I’m all for fighting ignorance I’d appreciate it if none of you enlighten my father in law.
A couple of years ago I saw an elderly lady having trouble putting her groceries in her car and lifted them in for her. She then reached into her purse. I was about to tell her that a tip wasn’t necessary (she may have thought that I worked there), when she carefully placed a quarter into my palm and closed my fingers around it, saying, “This is for you.”
If my maternal grandfather weren’t dead, I’d think you were talking about him. I once literally saw him try to send back a cold lamb dish because it was cold. (He had been warned, in case you were wondering.) Drove us all insane, it did.
Whenever my mother takes one of us out for lunch or dinner, my siblings and I always leave an extra tip. She’s a Depression baby, and her tips are never adequate.
My mom is not a good tipper. Her usual M.O. is to start picking at and finding fault with the waiter, starting around halfway through the meal – probably around the time she starts thinking about the upcoming bill, I’m guessing. Suddenly the waitress who had previously seemed friendly, attentive, etc. “isn’t refilling my water often enough,” “seemed a little short with me,” “rolled her eyes when I asked for the bills to be split,” etc. Most of these faults are completely imagined. So by the time the check comes, my mom has convinced herself that the service has been absolutely terrible, and tips accordingly. And then I way over-tip to make up for it.
I sometimes wonder if it ever strikes her as strange, how she gets uniformly bad service at every restaurant she ever goes to.