When I was a kid, my grandfather rolled his red convertible up to a local gas station that still had people who came out and filled up your car’s tank. My grandfather tipped the guy who did it. I asked why and he said, “I tip for service.” He’d been a barber all his life, so he felt he deserved a tip when he took care of someone with a personal effort, and he paid for personal effort. Looking back, I recall the guy not only filled the tank, he washed the windows, cleaned the mirrors, and flicked a rag across the hood. He also just about leapt out of the station when he saw my grandfather’s car. I guess Grampa had been tipping for a while.
Too bad I never saw how much.
Anyhow, how’s “I tip for service” work as a general rule?
Normally you’d be correct in your understanding of tipping in the US. However, due to the poor state of the economy in the US, trickle down economics is in affect and, therefore, we’ve suspended all tipping at this time.
This happened about a year ago to my wife and I. I’m fine with this for a party of 6 or more… but for 2?
It irked me as well. I scratched out the 20% I’d intended to leave and he just got the 15% he’d tried to sneak in. Thing is if it weren’t for the fact we’d not received the appatizer we’d order and I hand’t checked to make sure it wasn’t on the bill, I’d likely never have noticed.
I didn’t say anything to the waiter but I did call the restaurant the next day to complain.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but most of the times when I’ve dealt with bellhops I’ve been at somewhat fancier hotels for conferences. The hotel frankly doesn’t want their guests shlepping bags on their own - it gives the appearance of poor customer service. And if you happen to be sharing your hotel room with someone else and you both have suitcase, garment bag, laptop/briefcase and have been traveling all day, it’s a relief to dump everything on the cart and have someone haul it up to your room in an orderly fashion. I don’t mind tipping for this.
I have more mixed feelings about porters at the airport, having run into some, how shall I say, rather agressive types who hinted that the bags might not make it on the plane sans gratuity. ::cough New Orleans cough:: Personally I’d rather just take care of my own bags. However, there have been times when I’ve had a lot of and/or heavy bags (traveling on business) and the porter’s help was welcome.
Unless you’re staying at a ritzyass hotel, don’t bother tipping.
In other words:
The Plaza in NYC: Yes. Tip.
Motel 6 in Topeka: Don’t bother because you’re gonna be hauling all your stuff around yourself. The only exception I’d make is if there was some kinda staff member that was over-the-top sweet to me and did lots of extra stuff they didn’t have to do. (At a place like Motel 6, this won’t happen anyway.)