I would expect a Good job. I would tip if they went above and beyond.
In my experience, repair people/tradesmen are already expensive. At service anywhere from $60-110/hour, I don’t have any idea why someone would feel obligated to augment that.
Maybe there used to be a time when repair folks didn’t cost as much, but if they’ve set professional rates, I think a desire to tip is misguided.
It would be if they were giving away meals or worse, they were pocketing the money for the meals.
I only did it once. When my oven broke, the repair guy who came was absolutely dedicated to fixing it. When there were no spare parts, he took the board back with him and repaired it, and when that didn’t work he figured out which wires had burned out. I sent him a $100 Amazon gift card.
He moved soon afterward, damn it.
I’ve managed a circuit board test group, and I would have hired this guy for anything in a second.
What? Hire someone to do MY WORK? And then TIP THEM???
Well, why not just drink my beer, sleep with my wife, and kick my dog on the way out the door!
They do that when you’re not home!
GaryM you win the internet today! 
Assuming that they are doing their assigned jobs, then that is what they are doing. I’m not sure I follow you there. The customer is paying for a service, for which the restaurant is being compensated. Just like a cable tech that is installing the number of outlets that the customer has paid the cable company to have installed.
Now, in the case where servers are not ringing in drinks or soups and salads, and either getting a bigger tip for giving that discount to the customer, or simply pocketing the difference themselves, that would be more in line with “tipping” the cable guy to do work that isn’t being paid for. OTOH, those who will accept bribes to steal from the company usually do pretty shoddy work, at least the drinks and starters that the server is stealing were made by the same cooks as the drinks and starters that an honest server will actually properly charge for.
And just as there are dishonest cable techs who will take cash to use company time and resources for work under the table, there are dishonest servers who will do that sort of thing as well.
It ends up costing honest employees and customers. When I worked in restaurants, my raises were tied to food cost. When people bribed servers to give them free stuff, that took money directly out of my pocket.
At the cable company, the dishonesty and low work ethic of my co-workers was a large part of the reason that I left that job. So, you get stuck with dishonest and lazy techs, and we all get stuck with higher cable bills.
If you ever want to know why your cable sucks, it’s because honest hard working people don’t want to work there, as they are punished for being honest and hard working, and it is those who will steal from the company who are rewarded. If you want to know why your bill is so high, it’s because it is going to pay for all the work and resources that are not being paid for by the customer who is getting them.
Not sure if you are getting the concept of tipping. Not a bribe to get free stuff, it’s just to thank someone for a job well done. In the service industry, tipping is part of their take-home pay, and is expected. Tipping a worker for a job well done with a professional, friendly demeanor isn’t a bribe. It’s a thank you.
Yes, I very much do. I’ve spent most of my working life in jobs that involve tipping.
However, I was responding to someone who said that they paid a cable tech to use company time and resources to run extra outlets for them.
You are the one who said that you didn’t see how that was any different from tipping a server at a restaurant.
I guess sometimes there’s a subtle difference between bribing someone and tipping someone. Back to the OP, I’m surprised that so many people don’t tip (not bribe) home-repair folks for a job well done. My sister lives in Canada, and I remember tipping a bartender in BC a buck for a drink, and I got a funny look like what do you expect. Here in Oregon tipping the bartender is expected.
No, why would you?
In large part, the bill at the restaurant is for the food, and the tip is for the wait staff who bring it to you and otherwise cater to your needs. Same thing for delivery people- you’re paying for the flowers and how they’re arranged, and the tip might be for the delivery person taking good care of it and getting it to you in good condition.
With a repair/service person the bill is FOR whatever repair or service they performed- a plumber is billing you directly. So is a mechanic, a painter, a housekeeper, etc…
Bartenders are kind of a weird beast, in that for some things, they don’t add much value- any person can learn how to draw a beer out of a tap after a couple of tries and give it to a customer on a coaster. But not everyone can remember dozens of cocktails and mixed drinks and whip them up to order and have them actually be good. In that case, the bartender adds a lot of value in that the finished drink is more than the sum of its parts. The custom is to tip regardless of what value they add, so I always do.
There is the argument that the delivery cost or the cost of the wait staff doing their thing is, or at least should be part of the cost of the item, but in practice, that’s not always how it works.
Let’s say I have a washer and drier delivered and installed, then some time later repaired. The delivery/installation persons get tipped, the repair person does not. Because, that’s why.
Thanks for your insightful input.
I think Mrs. L tipped a repairman once because he squeezed us in just before a holiday weekend. We had a water leak and he saved the day, as well as the holiday.
But ordinarily, no. We had another guy we used for a few things but he was actually charging us his hourly rate for the 45 minute drive here. @$150 per hour he was already steep.
It’s not that subtle.
It soloist had said:
“I’d offer to pay the server directly for free drinks and salad. It was a win-win: they’d make more money, and I’d pay less than the official menu price for drinks and starters. One guy set me up with a complimentary ribeye steak.”
would you agree that that is theft?
That would be a bribe, and in some ways bribery is worse than theft. What does that have to do with tipping someone for a job well done as a thank you?
It is theft from the company. The fact that you are bribing them to steal for you is the whole point. You were the one who was confused as to why it was theft at all, and I did my best to explain.
But, back to what I replied to:
“I’d offer to pay the cable guy directly for extra cable runs. It was a win-win: they’d make more money, and I’d pay less than the official cable company rate for extra cable runs. One guy set me up with a complimentary signal booster.”
Is that just tipping for a job well done, or is that bribing the tech to steal from the company?
I’m not sure how this could possibly be made any clearer.
Yeah I get it that bribing the cable guy for extra cable runs in egregious and unacceptable, for the sake of humanity. What does that have to do with the OP or any of my comments?
It certainly is drifting from the OP at this point.
But as to what it has to do with your comments, you asked:
“Not sure I follow you here. Isn’t a waiter/waitress doing their job on company time, with their equipment and resources? Why wouldn’t that be theft?”
And I answered your question.
I’m not sure what your angle is here, if you truly don’t understand the basics of the difference between tipping for a paid service and bribing to avoid paying for a service, or if you are not capable of following a simple discussion that you initiated, or if you have some other subtle point you are trying to make, but I think that this conversation has exhausted all potential benefit.