Should we tip servers in fancy restaurants more than servers in cheaper ones?

Makes your eyes glaze over, doesn’t it? :wink: I just have a few things to add here: I trained servers who were accustomed to reporting only the required 8% of their total receipts, and it was mildly amusing to me that their reported tips always added up to exactly that. Because I hate spending time training servers only to have them whisked away by The Untouchables, I pointed out to them that I was holding, in my hot little hand, proof that they had made more in tips than they were claiming; proof that the dreaded IRS would have automatic access to: their credit card slips. Just a heads-up to anyone who is considering under-reporting - there is often a paper trail that can trip you up.

That said, it may be of interest to undertippers that it is common practice* for the “house” to take a portion of a server’s credit card tips as a usage fee for taking credit cards. No foolin’. And that percentage is routinely as high as 5%. So let’s say a server makes $100 in verifiable credit card tips in one night - he or she has to report it. Even though he or she will then be giving $5 to the house, about $20 to be split between bussers and bar staff, and (in some places) an additional $5 or so to the hostess or sommelier or whatever. Leaving the server to take home $70, but paying taxes on the entire $100. Taxes are taken out of the paid wage of $2.13 per hour, which is why servers who do decent business often get those wonderful $0.00 paychecks.

*common practice - the AMERICAN EXPRESS CARD charges businesses a fee to accept the AMEX card, and to the best of my knowledge it is legal for the restaurant to pass these charges on to the servers. However, I know of plenty of establishments that make their own bookkeeping easier by charging servers a percentage of ALL their credit card tips - even though they can not legally charge for accepting MasterCard or Visa. Restaurant owners count on the fact that most servers don’t know this … but now you do.

I hope you don’t go back to the same place all the time, because they WILL remember you if you only tip 5%, which is shockingly, disgustingly inadequate. 15-20% is STANDARD.

Is it just me, or are the waitresses at the fancy-schmancy eateries prettier? All this talk about the skill levels involved with waiting tables, and the reasons why some waitrons find themselves at Tavern on the Green, while others at TGI Fridays got me wondering what’s really going on. I’ve had some shockingly incompetent service at some very nice restaurants in Boston, and found paying even 15% on my enormous bill essentially adding insult to injury. But I paid it. Wouldn’t want to appear gauche and all that.

Skill? Do looks always correlate? Tell you what, I’ll take a plain jane who can remember my order and give me the entrée I asked for over a pretty face and a nice (but not oversized and cheap-looking) rack any day.

What’s with the tip inflation, anyway? In the 70s and 80s, 10% was standard. Somewhere along the line, that became 15%. Now I occasionally hear people throw around the figure of 20%. Enough is enough. I’ve accepted 15%, but I’m drawing the line. Tipping has the cost-of-living automatically factored into it, since it is a percentage of the bill. There is no earthly reason for the percentage to keep creeping up over time. I’ll tip more if the service is good, but I absolutely refuse to make 20% my baseline.

I do tend to agree with you on that issue, blowero. After all, restaurant prices go up, so, as you say, this increase should, by itself, result in a commensurate increase in the income of wait staff. Increasing the prices, and increasing the percentage over time, seems a little ovewr the top. Will we some day arrive at a situation where the tip is expected to be 80% of the bill?

When i worked for tips in a casual lunch place in Vancouver, Canada about 12 years ago, we tended to consider 10% the absolute minimum. If we got this much, we weren’t exactly thrilled, but it also was no cause for major whining. In general, 12% seemed to be about average, 15% was good, and anything over that was a real bonus.

Of course, the place where i was working tended to cater to a lot of tourists, who are notoriously cheap-ass with their tipping. This applied not only to Brits and Aussies and Kiwis and Germans (who at least had some sort of excuse, in that tipping is not part of their normal experience), but also to American tourists, some of whom seem to believe that tipping is no longer required once they cross the border. And, of course, tourists know they will likely never return to eat at that place again, so their incentive to keep the staff happy is pretty low. The best gigs at that restaurant were the pre-booked tours, where tips were already factored in to the cost and were distributed to the staff at the ned of the shift.

When i moved down the road a bit to a higher-class place that mainly served locals, tips tended to be quite a bit better. 12% became the minimum, and 15% was more like the norm.

A 5% tip is an insult. I had to give a tip around this low recently due to very bad service from the waitress. She glared at me while I left and spat out a “Thanks a lot!” as I walked out the door.

I can’t imagine simply paying 5% tips all the time! You must have some interesting experiences, especially if you keep going back to the same places.

Speaking as a reliable 15 percent-base tipper, I just have to say that this is wrong, wrong, wrong. Unless and until restaurants start listing mandatory service charges on menus and bills, it is unfair to tell people that some random figure is the absolute minimum or you don’t belong here. Put it in writing, put it on the front door, put it on the check. Then you can start telling people when they don’t belong in a public establishment.

Ah. But over the last several years, food inflation has been less than inflation generally and the food-away-from-home index has been growing more slowly still – the result of enormous competition in the industry. So some percentage creep on the tip has been necessary to keep real server wages constant. We’re starting to see some indications that the restaurant cost index is now moving up more quickly than general inflation, primarlily as some of the quick serve and casual-dining chains finally give in and try to pass through higher protein costs. It’ll be interesting to see if the trend continues and what, if anything, will be the public’s reaction as regards a “standard” tip.

Why keep calling it a “tip”? It’s not really a tip if it’s mandatory. For servers who want to make a case, I would recommend referring to it as a “service fee.”

Because it’s not mandatory (except in some cases, as when a restaurant discloses and charges a service charge on large parties). Neither is it “mandatory” to bathe. Knowing the proper amount to tip and the proper frequency of bathing is just something which civilized people learn from their contemporaries.

Either it’s required or it isn’t. You can’t have it both ways. (Again, I emphasize that I always tip.) If it’s not mandatory, then you can’t go around calling people cheap and promising revenge. If it’s optional, then it’s optional.

Look, i understand your argument, and in principle i tend to agree with it, but i still think that, as manhattan suggests, tipping in North America is an almost universally accepted cultural practice. And the fact that the wait staff rely on tips to pay their rent and put food on their table means that i’m willing to forego any objections i have to the tipping system and do what is necessary and right to make sure that they can earn a decent living. And i think other people are—morally if not legally—obligated to do the same.

You are correct that what is considered an appropriate tip can vary from person to person, and from place to place. Some habitually tip 20% or more; you say you usually tip at least 15%, and some even tip 12%. Personally, i think the last figure is too low, but i’m willing to concede that reasonable people can differ on the issue. But, unless you’ve received outrageously bad service and are deliberately making an effort to show the waitron that he or she screwed up, 5% is beyond the realm of what can even be considered reasonable, IMO.

Fair enough. I withdraw my objection to percentage creep. Although i might revise my tipping framework somewhat if restaurant food prices take a strong upward swing relative to overall prices.

Tipping is just an example of how you can’t beat economics. Consumers can’t in general make waiters better off, because when you do, more people want to be waiters, and the effect evens out in lowered wages, which in turn lowers the menu prices, handing your tip right back to you. In other words, tipping helps no one, it just makes life more stressful and uncertain, although it does help people practice simple math.

You might want to argue that not tipping is doubly wrong, because the fact that we live in a pro-tipping society means that you are thus getting the benefit of lower menu prices and yet not playing into the system that gave them to you. And while that might be true on the first pass, the reality is that your tipping less contributes to a lower on average “real” tip rate which simply feeds back into the system again. You make your specific waitress unhappy, and waitressing in general less economically attractive, which means wages must rise to attract more waiters… and so on. In the end, in the large scale, not much real difference, and all the cries of selfishness and penny pinching are overblown and pretentiously meaningless.

However, you did make your waitress unhappy.

It might be interesting to ask why we don’t tip, say, doctors. I think my answer would be that because doctors have a monopoly control on how many people CAN be doctors, doctors would be far more able to just pocket the tips without a reduction in wages.

One thing I’ve found troubling about this thread is the general oppinion that it’s “Tip the waitron handsomely, or else”. I’ve gotta pony up, at the very least, 15%, or fear shit service if I ever return.

When did this happen?

Shouldn’t it be “Provide the customer good service, or else”? Are these people not in the service industry? If I tip parsimoniously, should that not be a signal that I’m dissatisfied, rather than I’m a cheap son-of-a-bitch who should be punished if I dare show my face in the establishment again? What, is a tip a kind of cultural tax or something? Is it, or is it not, my voluntary expression of gratitude for a good job done if rendered, and my legitimate indication of dissatisfaction if I choose to dole out something less than a fifth of the bill?

This argument is so stupid and childish that it boggles the mind.

There are all kinds of cultural norms that people agree to when the live in a civilized society. It may not be specifically forbidden to tip 5%, but that doesn’t make it OK.

A restaurant might not have a rule specifically banning airhorns in the dining area, but you are still a jerk if you start blowing one at your table.

I do tend to bias tips towards the cheaper places. It is very rare that a $10.00 meal required 1/5th the waiting of a $50.00 meal. So for cheaper places I tip 20-30% for good waiting (usually $2-3.50) for more expensive places I might tip 15-25% for good waiting (usually $4-10).

I see the tip more in the form of ( $2.00 per main course +$1.00 for starters, drinks ,and desert, +$x for good service ) per person in the party
+$y for quality of the experience.

If the place is good it will have good quality (high y) and good service (high x) and so the tip will easily be in the 20% range.

Another way to think of it is that in the same restaurant you could order pasta at $8.00 or FIllet Minion at $23.00, for the server the pasta is more trouble since they need to provide parmesan, crushed peppers as well as the entre, whilst the Fillet Minion should at most require bringing a steak knife. Should the server earn only $1.60 for the pasta yet $4.60 for the Fillet Steak? What if the pasta is perfectly well cooked, but the Fillet comes medium when you asked for rare (as is very often the case)?

People are morally obligated to supplement someone else’s income because they “depend” on it? I don’t subscribe to this belief in the slightest.

Is the tip for actual service over and above what is expected, or is it to supplement wages?

If a restaurant puts a price on a menu, that price is inclusive of some basic things. If those basic things are met and no more, I say that a tip is generally unwarranted. Where people could differ is what is included in those basic things. I am a firm believer that a tip is for service over what is basic.

I have no problem paying the stated price for something, and even go to restaurants in large groups where often a “gratuity” is stated up front, somewhere in the neighborhood of >15%. I’m fine with that, because it is stated. In that case, I do not consider this a tip for service at all, but simply a fee premium when in larger groups. I am assuming that larger groups are less revenue generating due to either inefficiencies, or lower turnover time.

As a comparison, I pay less state and federal income tax than the percent tip that some people are saying is their “standard”. Does that strike anyone as odd? My taxes are to fund the entire federal and state government, my “fair” share, and it is less than what people would consider a ‘standard’ amount to tip.

If the IRS standard assumption for tipped employees is 8%, doesn’t that kind of speak to the fact that the so called “standard” may in fact be less than the 20% that has been discussed? That is what I am using as evidence thus far. Sure some people tip more, some less, but it’s hardly a fair characterization to say that 20% is standard and anything less means you are a cheap person deserving of some kind of server retribution.

I see nothing wrong with starting at 5%. This is taking an order and bringing food. That is the baseline, the minimum. If the server does more, they get more. I hardly ever end up actually tipping less than 10%, but I have occasionally left a very small tip to send a message that poor service was received. This is in contrast with no tip, because that may be interpreted as being forgetful. If you start at 20%, how high do you go for excellent service?

That’s a pretty poor economic analysis.

Firstly, no-one’s arguing that we can make waiters “better off.” I’m not arguing that we should ensure that waiters all get to live in penthouses and drive Mercedes. What we’re arguing is that a reasonable tip ensures that the wait staff receives a reasonable level of pay for the work that they do.

When you talk about fluctuating wages, what wages are you talking about? The wages paid to the servers by the restaurant? Because we’ve already established that most waitrons, even in high-class establishments, are paid the absolute minimum allowed by the law. They then make up the rest with their tips. So, an increase in the number of people wanting to be waitrons is not going to force those wages down because, by law, it cannot.

And the fact that wages cannot be lowered means also that menu prices aren’t going to come down. In fact, if manhattan’s earlier post is correct, many restaurants are currently succumbing to the vagaries of food prices and raising menu prices, even in an extremely competetive environment. The fundamental fact of economics is that the restaurant cannot stay in business if it sells food for less than the cost of getting it to the table (rent, equipment, supplies, wages, etc.), and no shift in the tipping scale is going to change that.

Also, even if you were right about the long-run economics of the issue—which you’re not—you try telling a server who makes less that 3 bucks an hour in wages that his or her desire for a decent tip is “overblown and pretentiously meaningless.”

Loopydude:

I agree that they are in the service industry, and that they should be expected to provide decent service. Every statement i’ve made in this thread is based on the assumption that you have received an acceptable level of service for the type of establishment that you are dining in. My criticism has been for people like Bone who, as a matter of course, tip poorly even when the service is fine. If you receive poor service, you are perfectly entitled to give a poor tip. For example, i have no problem with Debaser’s actions in Post #46. I’ve always believed that it’s worth making clear to the server why your tip is bad, so they know that they fucked up and that you’re not just being cheap.

If you are dissatisfied with a restaurant’s service, you are unlikely to return in any event. If you are dissatisfied and intend to return and your only signal that a particular occasion was not to your standards is a unilateral downward reduction in the socially-accepted price you are doing a disservice (heh) to the restaurant, to the wait staff and to yourself.

True, but sometimes it feels wrong to ‘tell’ on a poor server. A tip can be somewhat private between yourself and a server who might be simply having a bad day. Where as if you inform management about the problems you had it could get the server in much more trouble. I would also be very wary of ever being served again by a server whom you have compalined about to a manager. Whereas a server who forgot half your order on one day, would I hope recognise why the tip were low, and expect that reasonable service on another tip would get a propper tip. I don’t believe in a $0.01 tip to show dissatisfaction, as the government taxes servers on their expected tip, so $0.01 ‘steals’ money from the server, but I would tip close to the government’s cut if service were unacceptable on a particular day. Some places just have bad service days sometimes and excellent service on others so simply avoiding the place forever due to one day of shoddy service seems both a waste and somewhat unfair to the few consistantly good servers who do work there. If the place I’m thinking of wasn’t so constantly busy, I would ask for a particular waiter, but it is very busy, and I feel that might be too much trouble to ask for.