Where in the hell do you people eat?
I would have no idea why service people would assume that you are sharing your dinner. I mean with a full meal you get soup or salad and most places bread. Do they bother asking you who gets that or how you want that split? Perfect time to tell them they are making a big mistake.
Opal, in one resturant that I worked in we served very big filling meals and alot of the people split them. In order for the resturant to make money off a table of two we would charge two dollars for an extra dinner platter.
I had a hard time charging people for the extra plate so I would bring them a smaller (not one of the tiny ones, just not a dinner platter) one and if they asked for a bigger one then I would explain that I was trying to save an extra expense and if they would prefer the bigger plate I would fix my mistake right away.
Could this be maybe the same problem you and your hubby are having? Or can you just tell these servers are daft? 
Don’t tip? Are you kidding me!? Do you know half of the shit that servers have to put up with? If you worked in a resturant for 3 months you’d never ever tip 10% again. If you don’t tip a server at all because something went wrong, well then you best watch your back in the parking lot, check under your car and backseat, and never ever return to that establishment.
We make $2.13 an hour which is nothing. Our paychecks are about $50 for 2 weeks worth of work, so if you don’t tip us you are considered worse than Hitler.
As for the OP, I don’t really understand why the server would assume that you’d split the entree. The only time I split an order is if they say: “we’ll be sharing/splitting blah blah blah.”
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My beef is with servers who take their sweet time bringing take-home boxes. When I eat out, I’m usually alone, and I like to get a large entree to take home and finish the next day for lunch. It’s not intended as an insult to their food, and I’ve even known to get dessert and coffee afterwards. So why do they assume it’s an insult?
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I for one don’t take it as an insult. I could really careless what you think of the food. If you have a problem with it let me know so I can tell a manager and have the problem fixed. Which goes back to tipping, if your steak was cooked a bit “too well done” then don’t take it out on me. I didn’t cook it.
Take home boxes are pretty low priority too. A good waiter will be able to consolidate by going into the kitchen, picking up a to-go box, print your check, get that side of sour cream for table 25, check on table 26’s food, and bring everything out. However, sometimes we just really busy and we either forget or we have “higher priority” things to take care of like running hot food. You wanted your food hot ASAP, well so do the people at the table next to you so your box may just have to wait a minute or two.
In closing, plate size, swans, the portions of food, and a shit load of other stuff is out of our control. We have bosses too. In fact we have 2-4 or even 5 all making sure we’re doing things their way. Trust me, making swans is just as sad for us as well as all the clapping and mummbling some version of “Happy Birthday” while you chow down on “Death by chocolate’s big brownie blast.” So don’t assume that everything is the server’s fault. Tip well (15% or more!) and be nice to us or we’ll spit in your food!
Care to back me up on some of this pezpunk?
I think the aluminum swan is easily fixed; just mush up the foil until it no longer looks like a swan. Now it just looks like a huge ball of crushed-up foil. Perfect.
Someone years ago told me to never go without leaving a tip at all. She said that if the service is that lousy, leave two cents. If you don’t leave anything, she claimed, then the server will think you have forgotten or that it may have been lifted by someone else at the restaurant.
I have used this advice once and only once. The server got two of the four orders wrong (I feel I must point out here that the restaurant was practically empty and we were her only table). We asked for a second cup of coffee. She said she’d get it immediately. She left and went to take a smoke break (yes, we saw her sitting at another booth). We asked the manager if we could have coffee. He said that when the waitress was finished with her cigarette we could have it. She never returned to our table. We went to the manager to get our check. We asked for a doggie bag. She overheard us, made a rude gesture, and left. We left two cents on the table and told the manager we would not be returning to the restaurant. It’s a chain restaurant, so we called and reported the poor service to the corporate headquarters. They didn’t seem to care. I have not returned to any of their locations.
I am willing to put up with a lot. Two of my dearest friends have been waitresses and I know how hard they work. But the service that night was horrible, and I feel totally justified in leaving the two cent tip.
This is another one of those weird threads where I have NEVER experienced what the OP is complaining about. You must be consistently phrasing your orders in a confusing manner.
Actually, in the most recent example, I had gone to the restroom when the waiter showed up. Javawoman and I had already both decided what we were going to order. She ordered for both of us while I was gone. Now get this: The waiter comes back over, after I return from the restroom, and says to me, “Sir, with the steak and scampi you have a choice of two sides, yadda yadda yadda”. Wife says she’ll have the broccoli and rice, I say I’ll have the same (What can I say, we like the same food). You would think, from the waiter asking this, that he realized we wanted two orders.
Please let me reassure my fellow Dopers, especially the ones who are waitpersons, that we don’t in any way try to retaliate against, or punish, the waiter. We tip the same as we would otherwise, since we realize that it’s only a misunderstanding.
In the last year or two, I really started to notice this phenomenon. It doesn’t really bother me, but I do find it interesting in an anthropological-study kind of way. Any time I go out to eat with a male (boyfriend, friend, brother, whatever) the check is placed by him. There have been no exceptions to this since I started noticing. When I’m paying, with my credit card, with my name on it, I usually hand it directly to the waiter when he/she comes back. Sometimes my dinner partner STILL gets the receipt to sign when it comes back!
About splitting entrees, this mystifies me, too. If we want the same thing (not to share), I say “We’ll both have the…” I’ve never had anyone construe this as us wanting to share. It seems totally clear to me. 
You say that now, but there will come a time, and a place, where some server somewhere will push you to your breaking point. And you will short – if not stiff – that server.
I am a little bit of an amateur gourmet who eats out often. I also waited tables for 4 years (after 3 years in retail), so I know the restaurant game intimately from both sides.
I used to be like you cykrider. I couldn’t bring myself to leave less than 20% on any bill, regardless of service. But since my waiting experience, I now am aware of what the server is doing on the floor. I can tell when they are hustling or coasting, whether they are experienced or green, when I am being conned or dealt with honestly, and when I am being denied an easily-available service – and I use that awareness to determine the waiter’s tip.
A tip should never be taken for granted.
All that said, it seems to me that an extra fork, a “misplaced” check, a tardy go-box, or a foil swan should be summarily blown off by a customer. Don’t sweat the small stuff.
MGibson’s advice is good advice. I would add “don’t stiff based on a minor offense.” But definitely a significant share of responsibility for enjoyment the dining experience belongs to the diner. The relationship between waiter & customer ideally is not a mutual kiss-ass session. It is a business transaction into which both sides would do well to carry reasonable expectations of BOTH parties’ role and responsibilities.
Jeannie - the server in your example should have been fired on the spot. That manager was a completely unprofessional lout. Let 6 months go by, then return to that restaurant (if you like the place otherwise). Chances are excellent that neither server nor manager will still be there.
When two lesbians go out to dinner it’s often “the butcher” one who gets the check. Make of that what you will.
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*Originally posted by bordelond *
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That was the first time I had ever been to that particular restaurant. It was suggested by a friend who said they had great coffee. After the experience I had there, I refuse to ever eat there again. The fact that the “customer service” person didn’t seem to care was what really pissed me off the most. That chain will never again get my business (yeah, like they give two shits, but it’s the principle that matters).
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*Originally posted by cykrider *
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Ever wonder if the attitude expressed in the second part of this quote could have anything to do with the consequence being lamented in the first part?
Note to serv…um, waiters and waitresses: Always bring a second plate when two diners say they want to share a meal/dessert. Intimacy is one thing. Sharing a trough is another.
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*Originally posted by Jackmannii *
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Prehaps you’re missing the point though. The food should not be associated with the server. If you have a problem with the food, don’t blame it on me, I didn’t cook it. Besides, I’ve never said that to a table and I hope that they both enjoy their food but if there’s a problem, it’s out of my hands. I’ll do everything I can, from telling the cooks to cook it longer if it’s over done, to telling a manager for you. So if I don’t do anything about it, then you can piss at me, otherwise back off.
So now I’m picturing two women sitting at a table, one of them with a bloodstained smock and a cleaver.
Solution:
You: I’ll have the Smoked Octopus on Clove Bread.
Wife: <mock anger> Hey! I was going to order that! <pause> Well, I guess I’ll have one, too.
You: <shaking head> Copycat.
Well, my summer job is as a cook…
Why on earth should i not tip, just because of small things like separate checks, and putting the tab on my dad’s side?
The service is usually stellar, the order is correct, my sodas and his coffee are kept full, and i can always get a box for whatever’s left.
FWIW, when me and my dad go out to breakfast, i will pay and he’ll tip, and/or i tip, and he pays.
I have stiffed a server exactly once. We were eating at a restaurants called Garfields, whose wait staff was chiefly college students. The four of us, me, my brother, his wife, and a friend of ours take our seats, and proceed to wait for 15 minutes to get menus. We peruse the menus and decide what to order, and then wait another 20 minutes for our waitress to return. We order, and the food comes out in a reasonable period of time, but only three of our orders. One of the orders was entirely the wrong one–wrong entree, sides, etc. I give my order again, and the wrong order is sent back. By the time that my and my SIL’s orders finally arrived, the other two are nearly finished. SIL’s order is correct this time, but mine isn’t. The waitress had brought the same wrong entree that she had to my SIL 20 minutes before. Finally, I get my order, over an hour after first taking my seat. The waitress neither shows us the desert cart nor asks if we want desert, and rolls her eyes at us when we ask for it. This waitress got no tip on a $60 check, and deserved none.
A couple of months ago, I went to eat at Denny’s and recieved perfectly adequate service. I pay for my meal and leave the change for a tip, which amounted to a 20% tip. The waitress scoops up the change without bothering to look and see how much it is, and I hear her comments, “What the hell kind of tip is this?”
I realize that waiting tables is a shitty job. When I was younger, 15% was considered standard, now it’s 20%. I don’t mind this, and routinely leave a 20% tip, but now we seem to have reached the point where this is not enough, at least in this waitresses’ eyes.
I once ate at a theme restaurant where the theme was poor service. Instead of plates, we were given a big roll of butcher paper to spread out and eat off of, and the silverware was literally thrown onto the table in a big hadnful. The food itself was served in an aluminum bucket A 20% service charge was automatically added to the bill, as no tipping was expected; the bill itself specifically said not to tip the server. The food was excellent, and even here the service was better than that in my first story.