they are scolding the wrong people. How about paying a living wage? Seems like a no brainer.

after they work hard for their employer is dependent on someone's "mood" or "perception du jour" is MORALLY WRONG.

until there is a change in the way restaurants pay their servers, tipping a minimum of 15% is only fair compensation. Paying any less then that would be morally wrong IMO. The way the system operates is not the server's fault.

At some point, servers may want to consider taking control back.

http://www.unitehere.org/ -- Other industries had to fight to unionize to be treated appropriately. Unfortunately, the more of these threads that explain the solution is for the customer to do something (meaning people are relying on good will and luck instead of appropriate policy at both the company and government level) makes me think less complaining and more organizing might be a better answer.

I think I will follow that advice. Have a lovely day.

Hope yours is good, too.

I do recognize the difficulty of organizing people in such a transient occupation, though.
there are those servers that have been at the same game for a long time who would be easy to organize, but at the same time i think a majority are in it then onto something else as fast as they possibly can..

bit of a vicious circle, isn't it......

Changing expectations of normal isn't easy.

I am working on different projects that are considered impossible; the problem is pretty easily identified, and there are already solutions that work in place that can be copied.

I think serving is an honorable occupation. I don't see why people doing it shouldn't be able to plan on a living wage.

You are tired of people pointing out that it is important to tip fairly since waiters and waitresses don't make much money and think they should stop complaining and just organize?

Yes, I think at a certain point less complaining on the internet, and more action in organizing protests / changes to the laws is the best way to go.

It has been pointed out rather repeatedly in other threads that the laws allow for living wages in at least seven states.

I am appalled that waiters / waitresses need to depend on the "kindness" of strangers (which is apparently inadquate, based on the numerous posts) after working hard for a living. The tales of the abuses they suffer - being sent home after doing prep work for $2 an hour after one hour being an excellent example - really have nothing to do with the "mean customers" who don't tip.

Yes, I believe they should organize. It won't be easy, but I believe it is more important. And at least one DUer appears to think the "bad things" that would happen to him are truly comparable to what the men who organized the auto industry and coal mines suffered, which I won't lie, offended me. Fortunately, I was busy this weekend, so I came back to the thread, and won't be paying it much more mind.

Your question was courteous, though, and I wanted to give you a reasonable reply.

Perhaps working to address the problem at a larger level might help?

and join one. And in a "right to work" state, yet. Thanks a lot. A decent tip and a little respect would be much more effective.

keep doing what you are doing.

Some days you will go hungry.

You want to get paid a decent wage for hard work, FIGHT FOR IT just like every other industry had to do - and frankly, the miners had it worse because they would *DIE* due to the unsafe working conditions, while the autoworkers used to get beaten up by hired thugs.

Good luck.

including the murder of Jock Yablonski in '69 and the recent murder of miners in a non-union mine just over a year ago.

Two: we are all at the mercy of strangers in any job we do. You like to eat out? A stranger cooks your food and another serves it.

Three: take your patronizing speech and share it with the bulldog.

Seriously, a patron walks in, sees a price for a meal, and agrees to pay that price for the food prepared and served.

Tips are bonus money that servers receive for good service. Yes, I tip when I eat in an establishment where tipping is considered appropriate, but I worked in the "fast food" industry for less-than-minimum wage for several years, and we received the same wages regardless of whether we gave good service or not, so my attitude about "good service" is that it is *expected*.

With that being said, when I get poor service, I tip less; when I get exceptional service, I tip more. I also judge people on how they treat the server - "that is how YOU will be treated in six months!" - and the man I married gave a ten dollar tip on a twenty dollar meal on our first "real date" which is one of the reasons I knew he was the guy for me.

Don't like how your job pays? Either get a different one, or Do Something About It.

It really isn't just a patronizing comment; its reality. Good luck.

typical Teapublican/Teabilly/Ayn Rand - Rand Paulism. Its patronizing all right.

start going for the "typical Teapublican/Teabilly/Ayn Rand - Rand Paulism" insults.

I am not impressed.

As a man I respected once said, "Get off the cross, honey - somebody else needs the wood!"

Ayn Randian sensibilities.

to help the plight of waiters and waitresses other than trying to pick the pockets of your patrons with pitiable tales of poor planning. Have you even *investigated* the union link I provided? Have you talked to the organizers they probably have on staff? And if you don't like them, maybe you could use the Google thingy and find a different group to help you get the *real* problem -- not being paid a living wage -- fixed???

I am fighting other "impossible battles" that matter to me -- maybe you should get to work fighting this one, since it impacts not only YOUR livelihood, but that of others?

Less complaining / insulting, and more FIXING would make the world a better place.

We can support changes in the law while urging people to treat and tip servers fairly.

I'm not impressed with you either.

Whatever.

If that make me a special treasure then I'm a special treasure!


Don't you have some duckface photos to post on facebook now or something?

Rude. Personal insults. Likening DUers with different opinions to Republicans.

Seems to me you are trying to be a bully; I just don't think you are very good at it.

Bye-bye!

you don't even realize it. The randian aspect here is that the employers aren't the ones to blame, that we should not even bring up the fact that the problem is not the ones who don't tip well, it's that the minimum wage doesn't apply to food service. You're one step away from waitstaff working for tips only, and you'd still say that people are jerks for not tipping instead of raising hell that they are slave laborers.

You want us to all just go along with how it is until it changes? then it will never change, take it back to the GOP, we don't need that type of help

Stop reading the scolds.

Problem solved.

That is just mind-blowing. Tips ARE a waitress's take-home pay!
Glad I tip 20% as a standard ... and sometimes more for outstanding service.

grossed about $700 for those two weeks that included Valentine's day. People need to know how badly they are treating waitstaff and how many people WE pay wages to. We also cover walked checks, carry a bank and tip the hostess.

whoever came up with that anyway?

baseline tip should be 20%, and up.

comes to mind as a tight-assed blowhard that doesn't tip cabbies. Shelley Berman was a sour old man the day I carried him, but he tipped within reason. The Commodores were funny and tipped well. I guess they still remembered their modest roots. Those GM execs at the Fischer building were poor tippers. The priests at Sacred Heart Seminary school tipped well. I guess they wanted to buy my silence about taking them to a "exclusive" bar. The boyfriend of the Bishop of the Detroit Archdiocese was a regular rider. He tipped well. The Bishop kept him in spending cash. Corrupt cops tipped well (drugs and money). They used taxis to pick up payoffs from drug dealers and brothels.



People in the service industry know the secrets of the rich and famous. My wife could have ruined the careers of several "macho" male country singers, but they treated her with respect and she repaid them with her silence.

will make a lot of people stop eating out. I do 15% for bad serice- I wont be told to increase that to 20.

Yep. You show that server who's boss.

It takes a real stand up guy to do that. We're all bettered for your efforts.

That will reduce the number of times I eat out. How is saying that I tip 15 for bad service "telling her"?

I am so sorry. What state are you in?

I love to tip. I mean that sincerely. It makes my day to make someone's day and if that takes a few extra dollars above what is customary, well what else is money for?

Meantime, yes, we should all push for a living wage for every worker. Just tel me what to do to help.

he "gives" me $2.13/hr and If I don't make it to minimum wage from tips, he covers it. I have had employers tell me what to declare as tips so he didn't have to cover it. So I worked that week for less than minimum wages. There are single and two parent families in this business who qualify for rent help and food stamps seasonally in this business, and in Texas, it seems waiters do not get meals and we aren't allowed to take anything home, even the left overs from employee meals we PAY for. We get no breaks and at least once a week I am cut or leave early due to over staffing, always AFTER I've done at least an hour of prep work, at $2.13/hr. Sometimes after only a couple of tables.

And I try to give them 20% cash even if I pay the actual bill with a credit card as a thank you for your service

I've always been a wonderful tipper

included, the employer had to bring them up to that minimum.

I don't see how employers could get away with paying people effectively nothing; nor do i understand why anyone would continue working for such employers.

If you grossed $350 a week, how could your net be 26 cents?

People working for "the extreme minimum wage with tips" have to pay taxes on the tips. But the tips are not turned into the company, they go home with them. So the check is only the wages, less taxes on the wages and the tips.

But they may go home with other "thems" too, that isn't any of my business.

have to report the tips that they earn to management, but the people who earn to tips take them home. The tips are not given to management. The tips that they report go on their check stubs and the taxes are taken from the check, and at the end of the year, the tips they reported are shown on a line on the W-2.

So if someone makes the food server minimum wage, the check is low to begin with. Then you add the tips to the earnings and you deduct the taxes due on the tips, and the check can be nothing.

impossible to verify the actual amount of tips, they started taxing F&B workers based on 8% of sales. If a server serves $1,000 on her shift, she is taxed for an assumed income of $80 whether she made that much or not.

It's been decades since I had anything to do with this horrible industry, so the numbers are probably higher than the were then. Back then the minimum tipped employee wage was $2.01 (unless you were a really big restaurant chain like Denny's, their servers only got $1.80).

at the expense of working people. Now the Subway CEO is whining about regulations; if you want to serve unsafe food that should be your right as a 'merican!

and the server is saying ". . . even if I make 20% tips all night . . ."

Here is a link to the original.

http://www.indystar.com/article/20130224/OPINION/302240012/Poor-tippers-need-understand-reality

"It shall be illegal for any service sector employee to communicate n any fashion that the worker's compensation is based on gratuities. It shall be illegal for any service establishment to present bills that include a blank line for tips or otherwise include any suggestion that the customer should offer a gratuity. But is is OK to continue paying workers $2.00 an hour."

And they will call these, "Right to free service" laws.

They get paid enough. The only ones that give tips are stupid Americans.

It's part of your bill. Americans are not the only ones who give tips. People tip all over the world.

You don't have to wrestle in your mind about what to add to the bill. The bill is the bill.

I would love for the bill to be the bill. I do wrestle with what to add as a tip, and if my mind is working on different things, this is something that I would rather not deal with. A decent wage and no tipping would be a dream to me.

However, some of like to tip because we are generous and like to pay for good service rendered, i.e., it's a "bonus".

So, I guess I'll just have to put up with being called a stupid American because I like to make people happy with the extra money I have to share...

We went wandering around London and found ourselves standing outside The Sherlock Holmes Pub at dinner time. Being our first meal in England we went for the sterotypical fish & chips, causing a couple of the locals at the next table to chuckle "Look at the tourists!" We laughed back and said you can't go to England and not try fish & chips at least once. At the end of the meal we were wondering how much to tip, so we turned back to the chuckling locals who told us that unless we got service above and beyond all expectations, don't tip.

It felt weird, and we hoped we weren't being played to make us look like "ugly Americans" but we were relieved to find out later that is indeed the norm.

Then I wondered why it wasn't the norm everywhere...

Some times the food at Mc D's is as expensive at least they pay minimum wage and you don't have to tip.
Maybe the servers should try the fast food chains for a better pay, if that don't work "ORGANIZE".

And if you think McD's has the same quality food at the same price, you don't deserve it either.

Tipping isn't a magnanimity, it's a necessity.

Pretty sad when that's seen as a step up, but enjoy your fast food.

Fucking crazy business model that expects their customers to foot the entire bill for their labor cost.

So many of them come in, treat their server like garbage, and then stiff. No, it's not right that the payment system for table servers works the way it does. But that doesn't excuse asshole customers from taking advantage of and abusing that problem. They are every bit as bad as the people directly responsible, since it is their custom that helps perpetuate the problem.

But refuse to go out as a couple, and pay 50 bucks for a couple beers, burgers and fries.
So I end up tipping nothing at all by not going out - because the prices are ridiculous.

If you can't spring some bucks for the pizza guy, don't order a pizza.

Simple as that. Figure it into the cost of going out/ordering food. Not that complex. It's part of the cost.

There may be the exceedingly rare occasion when someone's service is so crappy a message needs being sent through a small or even nonexistent tip, but usually? Most of the time?

Give them a damn tip. Yes I'm a "scold" on this issue, for the benefit of the people scraping by of which I was one for many years.

i will tip 20%....