Make 25% Standard Tip Rate....

[freedombecki]

We leave a tip for the server always. If the food is rotten, we tell the server and never go back again.

The server knows when the cook has served someone yellow lettuce with brown edges, sour canteloupe, bad milk, soft tomatoes with white stuff on it, gangrenous orange juice that is tarter than a lemon, overcooked meat that still smells rotten, cold soup, hard rice, burnt breakfast toast, bleeding chicken on the salmonellosis side, limp bacon that didnt make it to 155F on any skillet or microwave dish, bland watermelon except for its distinctive refrigerator odor taste, milk poured into a beer glass that tastes like beer, porous fish that is mealy-mouthed, and last but not least, grainy wet boxed mashed potato slop that doesn't have a single milligram of vitamin C left in it. Not to mention the water glass that has the lipstick smudge left on it from the last use or so.

 

[syrenn]

I won't pay for what I didn't get. Period.

And what would you expect for a 25% tip? The same level average service?

Or for that 25% would you expect them to raise their level of service to deserve that amount of a tip....considering it is more then you would normally leave.

That's not the question, is it? Or are we changing the subject.

I doubt that I would go or stay anywhere that I saw that on the menu. I have eaten places where mandatory 18% tip was on the menu, and I didn't have a problem with that, since I normally tip 20-25%. Had the service sucked, yes; I would have asked to speak to the manager.

Yes, it is all part of the same question. If you would complain about service and argue a 25% mandatory tip to be taken off of your bill ten you did not think what ever you got was worth that tip.

What is it you expect for that 25% tip? The same level of service... or better then you usually get.

None of this wold be necessary if it was not a mandatory tip. If service was sub standard to you you would tip accordingly. If service was great...again... you would tip accordingly.

 

[syrenn]

I usually pay 20% for most tippable services. Waiters deserve good money but also from their employers.

I think a base salary of about $10 is pretty damn good. 15% is a fair tip..... Giving more on your own is great!

How would you feel about a mandatory tip of 25% for BAD service?

In general (because I'm kind of an old fogey) I too tip around 20% for just average service. If I get truly outstanding sevice I've tipped as much as 50% but 25% is normal. If service is bad I will tip 10% and if it is just awful I won't tip at all and leave a note as to why I didn't tip.

There is one restaurant we go to that has wonderful staff except for one individual that is rude and obnoxious (why he is still employed is a mystery) and we specifically will not go into his serving area. It took two times to figure out that's the way he is and he pays for his crappy attitude every time we are there.

As far as the mandatory 25% I wonder if there is a way that if the service is bad you could deduct from the restaurants side of it? That might wake them up to a bad server.

I have been in that same situation. We had a regular restaurant we would go to twice a week. We were a plumb table as everyone knew we were excessive tippers and easy customers. We would flat refuse to sit in this one guys section...and it pissed him off to no end. We were asked why at some point... the simple answer was.. He was rude, slow and never got order an right.

 

[syrenn]

We leave a tip for the server always. If the food is rotten, we tell the server and never go back again.

The server knows when the cook has served someone yellow lettuce with brown edges, sour canteloupe, bad milk, soft tomatoes with white stuff on it, gangrenous orange juice that is tarter than a lemon, overcooked meat that still smells rotten, cold soup, hard rice, burnt breakfast toast, bleeding chicken on the salmonellosis side, limp bacon that didnt make it to 155F on any skillet or microwave dish, bland watermelon except for its distinctive refrigerator odor taste, milk poured into a beer glass that tastes like beer, porous fish that is mealy-mouthed, and last but not least, grainy wet boxed mashed potato slop that doesn't have a single milligram of vitamin C left in it. Not to mention the water glass that has the lipstick smudge left on it from the last use or so.

You got that right!


But.... the server cannot be held responsible for what is going on in the kitchen. Except for the dishes and the like.... that they do have control over. All they have to do is send it back to the dishwasher to do over. It is their job to check all of that on their tables. A tip of for the service they give you.

 

[Paulie]

At $60 and hour? Even from a mom and pop greasy spoon place i would except FIRST class service.

I don't care if THEY are having a bad day. I am not eating there to deal with their personal problems. Wait staff is paid to be nice, helpful and most of all friendly AND courteous.

I expect to be greeted with a smile, not a sullen snarl
I expect to have my drink refiled, without having to ask.
I expect my order to be taken in a timely manner.
I expect my order to be taken down correctly.
I expect my food to come as ordered and if not taken away and replaced.
I expect my server to come and check to see if my order is to my liking.
I expect my server to make sure my table is cleared and wiped down after we are finished.
I expect my check to come and not have to ask for it.


I expect all of that from a minimum wage server.... without a tip involved. That is THEIR job. All of that is what they are being paid by the employer to do.

A tip is what you leave in appreciation service rendered.... 15% is standard.

For 25%.... They better deliver over and above all of what i just listed.

You would be one of those uppity assholes I mentioned.

I don't disagree with much of that, but you need to come down off your high horse.

What is uppity about her expectations?

Everything she's mentioned is the bare minimum of expectations I have for my wait staff.
My servers are expected to be "on stage" while in the dining room (period). Anything less and I cut them off the floor.

I said I agreed with most of them, it's the way she presents herself with it. She leaves no room for a server who's possibly just having a bad day. People aren't robots.

You never know what kind of day someone is having. For all you know, the person just lost a loved one but can't afford to miss a day of work over it.

God forbid you don't have every single one of your expectations met 100% of the time you dine out. And god forbid you throw someone $20 on an $80 meal. I'd feel like a cheap fucking asshole if I gave a $100 bill on $80 and asked for change back out of it.

I'm not a waiter. I've never worked in that line of business. I am a business owner myself though and I understand that sometimes your help isn't always going to be 100%.

Life's rough. Get a fucking helmet. I don't know what else to tell you.

 

[freedombecki]

Well, I was an employer, and in the state I employed people in, you were considered the servant of your employees to a high degree, which isn't all that different from the Golden Rule that I believe in. The difference is, if anything about a restaurant tells me the employee was not informed of microbial issues of food handling, I do not hold the employee liable, but the employer. Therefore, we pay the labor fee that is owed, but we do not return for reasons of sanitation lack that should have been taught to the employee before he or she donned a uniform that tells people the employee is on the payroll. Failures to serve good, wholesome food is a proprietary issue, and if the proprietor is too busy to teach sanitation to food servers or handlers, somebody is going to get sick. I check for uncovered wounds on employee hands (the largest carrier of salmonella known to mankind) and if I see such or any of the above illness-related foodborne sickness issues, I stop eating immediately, spit out the bad stuff onto a spoon, pay my bill and tip and leave. The proprietor knows when enough people leave and do not repeat visits. I won't even go back if I have family working at an offending restaurant.

Bad food at a restaurant is an assault against the public at large. If I ask for the mayo to be held, and find another half cup of mayo piled on a burger, I don't go back there either. It's surprising how sickening food is before management catches on, or maybe they don't know either.

Hell, maybe we see so much garbage at restaurants these days it's because they're trying to get rid of the public.

It works. People die young every day.

 

[hortysir]

We leave a tip for the server always. If the food is rotten, we tell the server and never go back again.

The server knows when the cook has served someone yellow lettuce with brown edges, sour canteloupe, bad milk, soft tomatoes with white stuff on it, gangrenous orange juice that is tarter than a lemon, overcooked meat that still smells rotten, cold soup, hard rice, burnt breakfast toast, bleeding chicken on the salmonellosis side, limp bacon that didnt make it to 155F on any skillet or microwave dish, bland watermelon except for its distinctive refrigerator odor taste, milk poured into a beer glass that tastes like beer, porous fish that is mealy-mouthed, and last but not least, grainy wet boxed mashed potato slop that doesn't have a single milligram of vitamin C left in it. Not to mention the water glass that has the lipstick smudge left on it from the last use or so.

The server is the last line of defense against bad food.
They are a sort of guest liaison.

A server should never be afraid to push a plate back to the cook and tell them that they're not serving that to their guest.

On the opposite side of the window the cook should talk to the server just as (s)he would talk to the guest. The server is merely relaying the guest's requests.




All that being said, and since I probably haven't actually expressed my opinion on the matter, I am dead set against mandatory tipping.

I know my servers need to earn a decent wage, but that's just it...they need to EARN it.
We have a policy of 18% on parties of 8 or more and I cringe everytime I have to add it.
When/if a guest protests it we do remove it.
Part of the reason we do it is because a party of 8 requires 2 servers ( 1 for every 7...so 15 would require 3 servers, etc...).
We only recently upped it from 15% to 18%.
Needless to say my staff was tickled pink!

I always ask them, when they come to me to "grat" a party, if they think they'd make more or less if I *didn't* add it.
They know the level of service they've given, just as they know the people they're serving. There's been times they've asked me to *not* grat them because they know that they'd make more than the 18% if we left it alone.

But it IS policy and I gotta do it,
*shrug*

 

[Paulie]

As my income level has increased in my life, so have my tip percentages. Unless a server is just intentionally being a prick to me, which I've never encountered, I'm tipping them as my thank you for at the very minimum, serving me my food the way I requested it.

People who go out of their way to find small details as reasons to justify stiffing a server are really just cheap sons of bitches at the end of the day. If you live a financially comfortable life and still can't throw someone less fortunate than you a little cash for making your life just a little bit easier for that hour, you suck, I'm sorry.

 

[syrenn]

You would be one of those uppity assholes I mentioned.

I don't disagree with much of that, but you need to come down off your high horse.

What is uppity about her expectations?

Everything she's mentioned is the bare minimum of expectations I have for my wait staff.
My servers are expected to be "on stage" while in the dining room (period). Anything less and I cut them off the floor.

I said I agreed with most of them, it's the way she presents herself with it. She leaves no room for a server who's possibly just having a bad day. People aren't robots.

You never know what kind of day someone is having. For all you know, the person just lost a loved one but can't afford to miss a day of work over it.

God forbid you don't have every single one of your expectations met 100% of the time you dine out. And god forbid you throw someone $20 on an $80 meal. I'd feel like a cheap fucking asshole if I gave a $100 bill on $80 and asked for change back out of it.

I'm not a waiter. I've never worked in that line of business. I am a business owner myself though and I understand that sometimes your help isn't always going to be 100%.

Life's rough. Get a fucking helmet. I don't know what else to tell you.

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

 

[percysunshine]

A mandatory 25% tip?

I had better get a blow job out of this....wait, this is San Fransisco?

Never mind.

 

[hortysir]

What is uppity about her expectations?

Everything she's mentioned is the bare minimum of expectations I have for my wait staff.
My servers are expected to be "on stage" while in the dining room (period). Anything less and I cut them off the floor.

I said I agreed with most of them, it's the way she presents herself with it. She leaves no room for a server who's possibly just having a bad day. People aren't robots.

You never know what kind of day someone is having. For all you know, the person just lost a loved one but can't afford to miss a day of work over it.

God forbid you don't have every single one of your expectations met 100% of the time you dine out. And god forbid you throw someone $20 on an $80 meal. I'd feel like a cheap fucking asshole if I gave a $100 bill on $80 and asked for change back out of it.

I'm not a waiter. I've never worked in that line of business. I am a business owner myself though and I understand that sometimes your help isn't always going to be 100%.

Life's rough. Get a fucking helmet. I don't know what else to tell you.

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

Thank you!


My guests come in to relax over a great meal and escape from their daily grind.
The do not need to see a frump that will just cause them to ponder what their deal is.

Servers are "checked in" by a manager and a Smile is part of our uniform standards.

 

[Paulie]

What is uppity about her expectations?

Everything she's mentioned is the bare minimum of expectations I have for my wait staff.
My servers are expected to be "on stage" while in the dining room (period). Anything less and I cut them off the floor.

I said I agreed with most of them, it's the way she presents herself with it. She leaves no room for a server who's possibly just having a bad day. People aren't robots.

You never know what kind of day someone is having. For all you know, the person just lost a loved one but can't afford to miss a day of work over it.

God forbid you don't have every single one of your expectations met 100% of the time you dine out. And god forbid you throw someone $20 on an $80 meal. I'd feel like a cheap fucking asshole if I gave a $100 bill on $80 and asked for change back out of it.

I'm not a waiter. I've never worked in that line of business. I am a business owner myself though and I understand that sometimes your help isn't always going to be 100%.

Life's rough. Get a fucking helmet. I don't know what else to tell you.

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

I never advocated mandatory tips, so let's just get that part clear. I'm just saying give people a fucking break every once in a while. You expect perfection out of people who have a pretty tough job. Sometimes they won't meet every single expectation of yours.

Personally, I like a server who spends as little time as possible at my table. One return trip after serving the entree, and that's it. I don't like being bothered while I'm eating and talking to whoever i'm with. Anything else really doesn't matter all the much as long as my order is right. I couldn't give a fuck less if you smile at me or not. I'm not sure why that's so important to people. But I'm a friendly person by nature, I usually do what I can to make THEM smile, because I know that it's gotta suck dog balls to spend 8 hours or more doing that kind of work.

 

[hortysir]

A mandatory 25% tip?

I had better get a blow job out of this....wait, this is San Fransisco?

Never mind.

Close your eyes and try to ignore the stubble

 

[Paulie]

I said I agreed with most of them, it's the way she presents herself with it. She leaves no room for a server who's possibly just having a bad day. People aren't robots.

You never know what kind of day someone is having. For all you know, the person just lost a loved one but can't afford to miss a day of work over it.

God forbid you don't have every single one of your expectations met 100% of the time you dine out. And god forbid you throw someone $20 on an $80 meal. I'd feel like a cheap fucking asshole if I gave a $100 bill on $80 and asked for change back out of it.

I'm not a waiter. I've never worked in that line of business. I am a business owner myself though and I understand that sometimes your help isn't always going to be 100%.

Life's rough. Get a fucking helmet. I don't know what else to tell you.

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

Thank you!


My guests come in to relax over a great meal and escape from their daily grind.
The do not need to see a frump that will just cause them to ponder what their deal is.

Servers are "checked in" by a manager and a Smile is part of our uniform standards.

You have a conflict of interest in this discussion. You HAVE to be about your business because unhappy patrons means money lost. It would be near impossible for you to be impartial on this.

 

[hortysir]

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

Thank you!


My guests come in to relax over a great meal and escape from their daily grind.
The do not need to see a frump that will just cause them to ponder what their deal is.

Servers are "checked in" by a manager and a Smile is part of our uniform standards.

You have a conflict of interest in this discussion. You HAVE to be about your business because unhappy patrons means money lost. It would be near impossible for you to be impartial on this.

I'll admit bias.

To the GUEST.
Without whom I have nothing.

My servers have to be able to leave it in the parking lot. I have dozens that would answer a call-in if I cut a frown and sent them home.

It may be hard to tell from my posting style but I am a fun manger to work with.
"Cheer-leading" personality traits
I keep 'em pumped and excited.... but also on course.

I also make sure that my guests see the level of excitement.

It's the Yin and the Yang....everybody's happy!

 

[Intense]

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

Thank you!


My guests come in to relax over a great meal and escape from their daily grind.
The do not need to see a frump that will just cause them to ponder what their deal is.

Servers are "checked in" by a manager and a Smile is part of our uniform standards.

You have a conflict of interest in this discussion. You HAVE to be about your business because unhappy patrons means money lost. It would be near impossible for you to be impartial on this.

No, It's called Professionalism. There are standards to uphold.

 

[alan1]

We leave a tip for the server always. If the food is rotten, we tell the server and never go back again.

The server knows when the cook has served someone yellow lettuce with brown edges, sour canteloupe, bad milk, soft tomatoes with white stuff on it, gangrenous orange juice that is tarter than a lemon, overcooked meat that still smells rotten, cold soup, hard rice, burnt breakfast toast, bleeding chicken on the salmonellosis side, limp bacon that didnt make it to 155F on any skillet or microwave dish, bland watermelon except for its distinctive refrigerator odor taste, milk poured into a beer glass that tastes like beer, porous fish that is mealy-mouthed, and last but not least, grainy wet boxed mashed potato slop that doesn't have a single milligram of vitamin C left in it. Not to mention the water glass that has the lipstick smudge left on it from the last use or so.

Wow, you got to some crappy places.

 

[BDBoop]

And what would you expect for a 25% tip? The same level average service?

Or for that 25% would you expect them to raise their level of service to deserve that amount of a tip....considering it is more then you would normally leave.

That's not the question, is it? Or are we changing the subject.

I doubt that I would go or stay anywhere that I saw that on the menu. I have eaten places where mandatory 18% tip was on the menu, and I didn't have a problem with that, since I normally tip 20-25%. Had the service sucked, yes; I would have asked to speak to the manager.

Yes, it is all part of the same question. If you would complain about service and argue a 25% mandatory tip to be taken off of your bill ten you did not think what ever you got was worth that tip.

What is it you expect for that 25% tip? The same level of service... or better then you usually get.

None of this wold be necessary if it was not a mandatory tip. If service was sub standard to you you would tip accordingly. If service was great...again... you would tip accordingly.

The same, since I normally tip, as I said, 20-25%.

 

[syrenn]

I said I agreed with most of them, it's the way she presents herself with it. She leaves no room for a server who's possibly just having a bad day. People aren't robots.

You never know what kind of day someone is having. For all you know, the person just lost a loved one but can't afford to miss a day of work over it.

God forbid you don't have every single one of your expectations met 100% of the time you dine out. And god forbid you throw someone $20 on an $80 meal. I'd feel like a cheap fucking asshole if I gave a $100 bill on $80 and asked for change back out of it.

I'm not a waiter. I've never worked in that line of business. I am a business owner myself though and I understand that sometimes your help isn't always going to be 100%.

Life's rough. Get a fucking helmet. I don't know what else to tell you.

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

I never advocated mandatory tips, so let's just get that part clear. I'm just saying give people a fucking break every once in a while. You expect perfection out of people who have a pretty tough job. Sometimes they won't meet every single expectation of yours.

Personally, I like a server who spends as little time as possible at my table. One return trip after serving the entree, and that's it. I don't like being bothered while I'm eating and talking to whoever i'm with. Anything else really doesn't matter all the much as long as my order is right. I couldn't give a fuck less if you smile at me or not. I'm not sure why that's so important to people. But I'm a friendly person by nature, I usually do what I can to make THEM smile, because I know that it's gotta suck dog balls to spend 8 hours or more doing that kind of work.

... trust me, i know its not an easy job... but it is their job.

Having a bad day... may effect the smile sure.... but should in no way impact anything else i listed. As a customer... i do not like being hovered over... but i also know what they should and should not be doing.... if my ice tea or coffee is never refilled.... if dirty plates are left on the table for a long time.... if the table is cleared of dishes and not cleaned up. If i see them getting slammed... i cut them all slack. If i see them chit chatting with the other servers and not taking care of business.... oh hell no. I am as quick to reward and compliment as i am to withhold and complain.

If it sucks dog balls to do the job they applied for... then they need to get a different line of work.

LOL...i think of it as my job to to make them laugh and feel at ease too... i also know what they have to put up with and deal with.


And for $60 bucks an hour....i would expect better then perfection out of a server. Both as a customer.... and back of the house.

 

[syrenn]

How about this.... i present it in terms of a restauranteur and restaurant management. What i said is simple...at a very basic level of waitstaff service. That is the ..... job.

I know full well people have bad days, and if that is the problem they are off the floor if they cant reign that crap in. It is not a customers issues or problem what the server may or may not be "going thorough". A customer is there to enjoy themselves...I am paying for them to be served...and a customer should be given a basic level service.

That is what I pay them to do. Any tips they receive is based on how well they preform... not something squeeze out of patrons.

Life is very rough...if you want a great tip.... then do something to deserve a great tip. Don't try and have a mandatory tip planted onto a check...and just do average or sub standard work.

Thank you!


My guests come in to relax over a great meal and escape from their daily grind.
The do not need to see a frump that will just cause them to ponder what their deal is.

Servers are "checked in" by a manager and a Smile is part of our uniform standards.

You have a conflict of interest in this discussion. You HAVE to be about your business because unhappy patrons means money lost. It would be near impossible for you to be impartial on this.

I am pretty sure he also eats out.