How do you tip the sanitation/garbage pick-up people? Here they come early in the morning, often before I’m up. Do you run out and hand a $20 to each guy-- the driver and two other guys on the truck? And do the same people handle the same routes all the time?
I bake cookies and give out plates of them to the mail carrier and garbage guys - yes I make a point of getting out there early to catch them.
I’m usually not organised enough for the garbage guys, although the first or second year we lived here, one actually knocked on the door for his Christmas tip :-0. Besides we have 3 pickups in the same day; garbage, recycling and compost…they could come at any time during the day…and like Thelma Lou says, I’m not sure it’s the same guys every week
The cleaning lady, usually £100 plus pay her for Christmas week. My hairdresser if I happen to have my hair done in December…usually wine. My guy at the gym…wine
Hand him a $20? What am I, an animal in the jungle? I write out a nice card for each of them, stick the $20 in and my wife goes out and hands them to them, except this year when I had a day off and was able to go out myself. I’m usually at work long before they show up. It’s the same guys each week, my wife recognizes them because she’ll hook them up with bottled water in the summer.
My newspaper delivery person sends a Christmas card with a pre-addressed envelope, but I don’t tip him, because it’s his job, isn’t it?
In December, my masseuse, pizza delivery dude, etc get a double gratuity. I add another 10% to waiters’ gratuities during the holiday season. I canceled the newspaper this year, but I wouldn’t have given him/her anything because he constantly tossed the paper into the street or the neighbor’s yard.
I see my mailman frequently when he serves me lawsuits via certified mail. I’m going to assume he will understand when I can’t tip him.
Rocky, our mailman, usually gets a pound of coffee. I don’t think they can take money. Paper delivery person gets an annual tip when we pay our subscription. That’s it.
I give a Christmas tip to people I use all year long, and the traditional guideline is the amount of one service. One housecleaning, one haircut, whatever. I tip the newspaper carrier $50 at Christmas because I don’t tip him all year long and I figure $1 a week is a good deal for me.
http://about.usps.com/postal-bulletin/2012/pb22349/html/cover_025.htm:
Hi Neighbor! 
That’s true of everybody who gets tipped. It’s their job. I also tip the waiter at Bazin’s and the barbers at Andy’s.
Newspaper delivery is not a particularly lucrative job, they work 365 days a year, and that Washington Post is in my driveway by 6:30 AM on days that the federal government decides that 2" of snow is too much to bother with to go to work. Damn right I’m going to tip him.