Waiters are understandably upset about why I don’t tip and have given many illogical reasons in support of this ridiculous practice. Here’s a rebuttal of the most common ones.
Bullshit 1: We only Pay for the Food. Service is Extra
The menu price doesn’t include just the cost of preparing the food and paying the chef. It includes the restaurant setting, the tables, the cutlery, the effort and investment that the restaurant owner has put into the dining area. Now guess what? Since I’m paying for it, the restaurant has to give it to me. And how do they accomplish this?
Waiters. Ding ding!
See without waiters, the restaurant has no way of delivering the dining experience to me that I’m paying for. I’m paying for sitting down in a nice place. I’m paying for the air conditioning. I’m paying for the nice tablecloth and for my food to be delivered to me in a reasonable time. The menu price covers all this. Waiters are just the restaurant’s way of bringing me my food. Of fulfilling their part of the contractual obligation.
Bottom line. Servers are not independent contractors. They’re not an “extra” that you have to pay for. By hook or crook, the restaurant needs to deliver the product. Whether they use waiters or conveyor belts (a term that many seem to object to), is not my business. I don’t care. The waiters can just melt into the background and let me enjoy my food in peace. If the menu includes free refills or whatever, then waiters are required to deliver that as well. Why? Because…wait for it….I paid for it!
Bullshit 2: It’s the custom. It’s ‘merica!
Yeah right. You do realize that not all customs are created equal don’t you? Slavery was a “custom” back in the day and so was race and sexual discrimination. Anyone with an ounce of integrity does what they feel is right. There are many harmless customs in the world like bowing instead of shaking hands, or using chopsticks instead of forks etc that are morally neutral. It really makes no difference if you follow them or not.
But tipping? Hell no! It’s not morally neutral. If you get better service because you’re a good tipper, then you’re essentially paying a bribe to servers to get them to do their job properly next time. All customs have a limit. And tipping is such a convenient custom isn’t it? Hell, I wish I had a custom in place for people to just throw money at me.
And just in case someone feels I don’t appreciate the US, there are many great things about this country that I love and I’ve blogged about repeatedly. Freedom of expression, the way Americans show respect to their armed forces, the politeness of people as you walk by on the road, the work culture, the individuality.
I just don’t like tipping. It’s not as if a person has to blindly accept everything in a country without judgment. There are good things. And there are bad things. Just like everywhere else.
Bullshit 3: The cost of food will increase dramatically
Someone needs to do basic math. Increasing the price of food to pay minimum wage to waiters will not double the price of food. Some have even gone so far to claim that it’ll increase 4-5 times. Ridiculous. Totally, utterly ridiculous. Let’s dissect this rubbish.
As an example, I’ll take Chili’s. A waitress at Chili’s was so kind as to comment saying that the price of food at her restaurant will increase by 3 times – $30 for a $10 burger. Using the statistics she herself gave in her comment, there are 12 waiters (at full capacity) who need to be paid minimum wage. That’s $5 extra per hour per waiter making it a net total of $60 per hour that has to be added to the price of food on a full day.
$60/hr? For 12 waiters. That’s it! It’s peanuts. If you assume even that each waiter is serving just four tables. That’s $5 an hour extra they have to make from four tables. Even if we say that each table sits for a massive two hours, the extra paid per table is way less than $5. On the total bill. Worst, worst case scenario.
You know what? Customers won’t even notice. So stop the garbage about the prices of food going up several times to pay minimum wage. It’s utter nonsense. The only reason waiters don’t want this system in place is because they earn a hell of a lot more than than minimum wage using our tips. And they come across as the victims.
Waiters are Struggling Mothers/Students
Look, it’s not as if I don’t have sympathy for those who struggle in life. I just don’t think it’s my problem. And I specially don’t like it being impinged upon me. Generosity is one thing. Having money demanded from you is something totally else. Any tip I give is out of the generosity of my heart and I expect some gratitude for helping those in need. It’s not something I have to do since…refer to Myth 1.
Bottom line: Socially mandated tipping is a scam. I can’t believe how intelligent people have been hoodwinked into it. Probably because they like to come across as “nice” people and feel sorry for servers who hover around looking expectantly. Well, I find that irritating and I won’t buy into it.
As a small business owner, who serves at a local restaurant because I am re-investing in my company. I think you are rationalizing your cheap nature and taking it out on servers who make 2.13 per hour, which is all eaten up in taxes and come to a whopping 0.00 check every week. In fact, servers have pay taxes at the end of the year. Grow up and tip your servers or don’t go to a restaurant and eat. Be an adult, not a fourteen year old boy on his first date.
You’ve clearly never been to Italy. Tipping out of generosity doesn’t exist there, that’s “the custom”, you’ll wait forever to get anything, and there’s no composing, there’s no not tipping, you can’t do a thing. So when people like you stop tipping and we do away with it, don’t complain about having shitty service, because it’s true, a tip is an incentive, and yes some of us enjoy our job.
Did this person just compare mandatory tipping to SLAVERY? Relax, you cheap asshole. I work as a server and aside from the tips that I work my ass off for, I get a bottom line pay of ZERO. If I just snubbed by a table like you, you actually just made me PAY to wait on you because if you ordered an alcoholic beverage I have to tip out 4% of that to my bartender.
Many restaurants pay their waiters around $1-3 an hour and the rest of their pay is from tips alone. If it’s a slow night, I sometimes go home with only $50-60 after working 8-10 hours. Either way, waiters go through a lot of training to make sure that your experience is more than just some shadow of a person handing you food and then taking it away. I refuse waiting on tables that I’ve known for not tipping before and I will continue to do so because it’s a waste of my time to greet a table, make their drinks, gather all utensils or side plates they may need, bring out their food, refill their drinks, clear away their dirty plates, bring them their bill, say goodbye and wish them a good day/night, and then clean their table all with a smile on my face if I’m not going to get a tip. No, I don’t put on some phony act and do all of the things I do for a tip, I actually enjoy waitressing, I enjoy talking to new customers and I have made friendships with several regulars. Although, it is people like you that make this job much more difficult.
Tips are incentive for your waiter to do well. You said in the previous article that you worked as a some kind of retail floor manager, but have you ever worked in food service? I’ve done both. It’s hard work. Its more physically demanding, it requires more multitasking skills, and a better memory. Why would I waste all of that effort to get paid 2-8 dollars? Tipping shows appreciation for your waiters hard work and attention, that’s what’s polite, not just giving them your money. And your argument that tips aren’t taxed is bull. When an employee earns tips they have to specify that on their taxes and they’re supposed to keep track of their tips to add to the taxes they owe. If you love america so much, then respect for its residents that make your life easier. And next time you want to refuse a tip, go get your food from the kitchen yourself.
I’ve workd in the food industry as a server, bartender, bus boy, and line cook. And ninety-nine percent of the wait staff I’ve met, myself included from time to time, complain they don’t get tipped well. As far as I’m concerned, minimum wage should be applied to all jobs that require you to pay taxes, which is to say ALL JOBS. Relying on tips to make ends meet is bullshit. I’ve been months behind on my rent because my tips weren’t there. And before anyone can say “well your service must not be all that great, then.”, kindly shove it up your arse. This is me outside of work, at work I am professional. And when I was behind on my rent, I was working at a 4 star, reservation only restaurant. So my service was on point, I didn’t have one complaint, and I still have my former manager on my resume as a top contact. Back on point though, I say we petition to do away with tips and gratuities, and apply the standard minimum wage to wait staff.
If you don’t agree with the way things are done in the American restaurant industry then don’t participate in it. If you want to make a change, then write posts about how unfair it is that restaurants don’t pay their servers and how it shouldn’t be the customer’s burden to pay our salaries. Because I agree with you in that regard. But going out to restaurants and not tipping your server will never change anything. You are just making whoever your waiter is take your order, fetch your drinks, bring your food, monitor your table to make sure you have everything you need, process your payment, bus you dishes, and wipe down your table for free. You really want to make a change? Boycott restaurants that don’t pay their servers a living wage. Why take it out on people who are just trying to make a living?
Smoke a bowl. Seek help.
Your an idiot through and through, and this applies to any of you agreeing that servers should be tipped. First things first, you keep blabbering about restaurants not paying servers a “respectable” minimum wage. WE KNOW THIS when we apply, if why we want the job FOR THE TIPS, you idiot. We work as servers for the tips because in America (and in many other countries) it’s custom to tip. YOU KNOW this but yet you still go out to eat and refuse to tip, this makes you borderline psychotic getting off on fucking your server over probably laughing on the way out to your car. Your like that cartoon villain that constantly tries to inflict pain on the good guys. You obviously have no moral aptitude or social construct so here’s a couple quick pointers for you. 1. Stay home and cook the fucking food yourself, oh wait your probably as bad of a cook as you are a blogger, so nevermind. Wait, unless it means accidentally, or purposely poisoning yourself than by all means go ahead. 2. Get it to go or carryout, some restaurants will actually bring it out to your car so you lazy ass. 3. Move somewhere that tips aren’t the CUSTOM and considered moral right to do so. Even elderly church goers and teenagers tip most of the time. So, in summary your a bitter asshole(s) who get off on making your servers feel like shit by not paying them for services rendered even though you know its how the system works yet don’t have the will or balls to tell them up front. You Asshole(s) are psychotic villians who hate America. P.S. suck a fat diiiiiiiiiiiiiiik.
I meant who think servers SHOULDN’T be tipped
This is the most ridiculous thing I have possibly read today, or in the past couple days for that matter. Do your research. If you are going to come to another country and trash our “customs” then get your facts straight. I would almost bet that most people don’t know that restaurants aren’t the ones that choose to pay 2.13 and hour. Servers get taxed on everything they claim, they have to claim at least an earning of 18% if their sales (whether they made that or not) and if what is claimed doesn’t average minimum wage times hours worked the restaurant has to pay the server the difference. The measly $2.13/hour pay isn’t even enough to cover the taxes on what is claimed for earnings, i.e. the amount we enter every shift that is earned in tips. Bhagwad- you say you like many things in America…..well, it’s our “beloved” politicians that funnel money your way when you come over here that make the laws that say servers are paid $2.13/hour because that job falls under the description of a “tipped” job. THEY are the ones that determine that you should turn around and share some of your “hard-earned” money with your “fellow” Americans after OUR government pays you to live here. You don’t want to tip? Don’t go to a restaurant that hires a person to provide a service to you. McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Taco Bell, and every other fast food place does not hire tipped employees because YOU pick up your own food and fill your own drink and get your own extras therefore eliminating the need for a service worker. If you want to be waited on hand and foot for free, bring your woman with you. I understand they have no problem being your slave and appreciating you for treating them that way!!!!