Poll: Should There Be A Limit On Waiter/Waitress Tips?

You've obviously never worked in a restaurant. Wait staff are sometimes required to tip out busboys, bartenders, expediters, and maitre d's out of their tip earnings. They often don't make minimum wage and in most cases are required to claim a percentage of their gross sales as income to the IRS, thanks to some cheap republicans (Bob Dole) back in the 80's that thought the "job creators" deserved 3 martini lunches and that somebody else should have to pay for them. State and Federal taxes from both their hourly wages and the percentage of the sales are deducted from their paychecks, zeroing out those paychecks.

If you think wait people are underworked and overpaid, I suggest you confine your dining experiences to fastfood places and drive-up windows. If you don't think your wait person is worthy of the 15%-20% tip, you need to ask for the manager and complain about the level of service you received. Bear in mind that wait people are responsible for the timing and delivery of your food and beverages and they usually don't make the drinks or cook the food.

If you don't believe in tipping, it's not suggested that you patronize that restaurant very often as you may be recognized by the wait staff and it could affect the quality of your service and/or food and beverages. I'll let your imagination work out the possibilities about those effects. On the other hand, if you patronize a restaurant on a regular basis and are known to be an above average tipper, a whole new world opens up to you as to the level of service/products available.

The bottom line is that if you don't like to tip, you have no business being in a fine dining establishment.

TIPS = To Insure Professional Service

"The laws and tax rules obviously need to be changed. Tipping should be abolished and wait staff paid a living wage."

No time to wait for anyone in government to correct those items. None of them know what it's like to perform a real job. Now, most of the better fine dining establishments include the gratuity in the bill to retain the best service employees available and to discourage patronage from the people more concerned with the tip amount than their dining experience.

For those people that think waiting tables is only about walking back and forth between the kitchen and the dining room for a dollar per person tip, welcome to Denny's. With your attitude towards wait people, you'll probably never know what it's like to have a server call you by your name and have your usual drink waiting for you by the time you sit down.

Tipping represents the honor system and it's tilted in the customers favor. Being paid a "living wage" is subject to definition.

They serve you, they tend to your needs, they carry your food, they receive all the abuse that you foist on them, and most of all, in the US, they do it for LESS THAN MINIMUM WAGE.

And a good server will also remember that you don't like certain things on your food, or that you like your food prepared a certain way, that you require additional time with your courses, that you like lemon in your water with no ice, etc, etc.

Your $80 Tip on a credit card. 10% to the bar = $8, 10% to the busboy = $8, 5% to the maitre'd, kitchen or expediter $??, and the wait person taxed by the IRS for full $80 at whatever their income tax level is. When I waited tables, the IRS taxed us 10% of sales or the total of gratuities left on credit card receipts, whichever was greater. When we waited on cheapskates that didn't believe in tipping we were still income taxed for the sale amount. That also needs to be factored into the equation. What does that leave in real income? Maybe $30-$35? If I don't like it find a new job? I did. Restaurant owners that value business, value their service staff and protect them. Steaks, seafood, drinks, and wine don't walk to the tables on their own.

Most good wait people average 12%-16% in total Tip income off food and beverage sales. A job where you run your ass off for 5-7 hours without a break. What does that leave them when they walk out the door at the end of the night? Obviously it's pointless to attempt to explain it to you or anyone that thinks like you. You don't want to tip, no problem, don't eat where you have to. Simple. Get used to not being a regular diner anywhere or wonder what detour your food may have made before it got to you, if you're ever recognized as a bad tipper.

Most people don't go to fine same restaurants so often that the waiters remember all of those details. At best they will remember your name, your favorite drink and little more. The entire wait staff might remember all of those details for a Donald Trump, but rarely for the rest of us mortals.

I was a server for many years and took great pride in remembering those details for my regular customers.

curtis,

was there something about LESS THAN MINIMUM WAGE that you didn't understand?

And I usually tip about 50% of my purchase, so you are right, they don't get 20% of MY purchase, they get appreciably more.

curtis,

You don't understand how it works then,

the bus boy helps the waiting staff with their work,

the kitchen staff cooks your food, and plates it in a way that is appetizing (I hope they do for a 400 dollar meal),

etc....

They are ALL part of the process.

The other thing is that in most high end restaurants, the tips go into a pool, and the tips for the night are spread equally amongst the staff. That is so that when a cheapskate is dutifully served by the establishment, that they don't get penalized because someone doesn't appreciate the work that they put into making sure that your evening is pleasant.

Curtis, you said, "Again, what makes waiters and waitresses special?"

I was simply making an example of one such specialty. Just because you have never had that experience PERSONALLY, doesnt' mean that it doesn't happen. Perhaps, with your attitude, the servers at the restaurants you frequent don't wish to make your dining experience as pleasant as it could be in hopes that you would take your attitude elsewhere. Just a thought.

curtis,

Would you like to see some bills?

I pay the tip, and because these are usually business expenses, (I am a really good cook myself so I don't need to go to a restaurant to eat a fine meal), I calculate what part of the tip is deductible and what part isn't.

And yes, I do generally tip that much when I do go to a fine restaurant. Last dinner for two that I went on ran about 650, I rounded that up to a thousand.

Don't forget, that at a high end restaurant, the number of people that someone may serve is FAR reduced, than what they would serve at a place that serves 20 dollar meals. So what the staff may gain in raw money from the tips, they lose in the number of people that are tipping them.

I waited tables for 9 years in a very nice place. On the weekends, my previous customers requested me when they made reservations and waited to sit in my section. They were never without their favorite beverage in their hand while they waited. These were usually business dinners and I was told many times that the service they received made those dinners successful. They threw money at me and I spread it around to the people I worked with.

I never waited for anything behind the bar or in the kitchen. My tables in the dining room were reset before the customers passed thru the door on the way out. My repeat customers got free drinks and promotional bottles of wine, the best cuts of beef, the biggest lobsters, and special desserts for their birthdays, anniversaries, and special occasions. This happened because I knew the value of tipping the help. It's obvious that you will never experience this level of service.

curtis

and I am telling you that is NOT how it works. You can take whatever ideas of what you think should happen, but that doesn't make it true, that doesn't make it right. That just makes it your idea.

If you go to a restaurant where you can buy a 400 dollar meal (no, 400 dollars of buffalo wings and beer doesn't count), you might want to ask how it get split up. Because it DOES get split up.

Hell there are some wait staff that I know that get paid 35 dollars to work a full night. Their lives depend on tips, but also the lives of the support staff depend on those tips, because that is just how the restaurant industry works.

If you want to fight it, then maybe you should fight for decent wages for restaurant/service workers. But then your 400 dollar meal is going to go up to 500 dollars or more anyways, to cover those extra costs.

You're totally clueless. Stick to drive-up windows and putting your change in tip jars.

Why should wait staff get tips and not other low paid workers who serve the public.

Because the federal government in it's infinite wisdom decided that since SERVERS RELY ON TIPS to live, then they can be paid BELOW the standard minimum wage. The minimum wage for servers in the state of PA is $2.83/hour, for everyone else, it's $7.75/hour. How else is a server supposed to survive? And don't give me the crap about "pay them minimum wage", GOOD servers are far more important to a restaurant owner than you or the people you bring in. A GOOD server will bring in their OWN clientelle.

Can you tell me how you think the restaurant owners are being subsidized by tips?

actually no they don't do that well. They generally get paid below minimum wage as well. They also rely on tips.

They do extremely well at high end restaurants because in general people tip MORE than the minimum. Someone I know that is a waiter at a high end restaurant doesn't even think about the money he makes from the restaurant itself, because he makes FAR more in tips. 300 a week in wage, sometimes 4000 a night in tips. (yeah 400 dollar meal is not what you get at the place he works). Now he doesn't make the 4000 a night, because it goes into a pool and is split between the different people that work on that night, but the idea that the wait staff make their money from wages at high end restaurants is bs.

jonathan, it's obvious that we can talk until we are blue in the face. This guy just doesn't WANT to have to tip, so he wants someone else to do it for him. I really hope that his servers don't peruse newsvine and put two and two together, or he's going to be having a LOT of terrible meals at a VERY high price.

curtis, here's a thought. If you don't want to tip based upon the price of the meal, then tip PRIOR to ordering TO INSURE PROMPT SERVICE which is what TIPS mean. I'm sure your service will be more attune to what you are accustomed when you initiate this practice.

They still have to pay into Social Security based upon what their servers claim as income. They have to pay worker's compensation and unemployment compensation based upon those same numbers. The only "perk" is that they get to hire workers at a substandard wage.

curtis,

they also get paid a lot more.

they also get paid a lot more.

no, they get paid normal. ours get paid less.

it's only legal to pay them sub-human wages here in the US because of the expectation of a tip. It's a weird, twisted system built on a custom rather than solid policy, logic, or philosophy consistent with our values.

most of us don't want to bother thinking about it, so we just go along.

greck

so I shall rephrase it, 'they also get paid a lot more than service staff here'.

Better?

so I shall rephrase it, 'they also get paid a lot more than service staff here'.

Better?

it means the same; my point was that we conceptualize it backward. Rather than thinking of it as normative or as "could be either-or" that we really oughta be conscious of what it is we really do.

It's great to see that someone is willing to be rational about this.

problem is, If I actually put that rationality into practice, I'd have to go around being a huge d*ck to people every time I eat out.

So what we have here is a Mr. Pink

Mr. Pink: Uh-uh, I don't tip.
Nice Guy Eddie: You don't tip?
Mr. Pink: Nah, I don't believe in it.
Nice Guy Eddie: You don't believe in tipping?
Mr. Blue: You know what these chicks make? They make @!$%#.
Mr. Pink: Don't give me that. She don't make enough money that she can quit.
Nice Guy Eddie: I don't even know a @!$%#ing Jew who'd have the balls to say that. Let me get this straight: you don't ever tip?
Mr. Pink: I don't tip because society says I have to. All right, if someone deserves a tip, if they really put forth an effort, I'll give them something a little something extra. But this tipping automatically, it's for the birds. As far as I'm concerned, they're just doing their job.
Mr. Blue: Hey, our girl was nice.
Mr. Pink: She was okay. She wasn't anything special.
Mr. Blue: What's special? Take you in the back and suck your dick?
Nice Guy Eddie: I'd go over twelve percent for that.

Reservoir Dogs

;)

His coffee wasn't (re)filled enough to his liking.

Mr. Pink: Look, I ordered coffee. Now we've been here a long @!$%#ing time and she's only filled my cup three times. When I order coffee, I want it filled *six* times.
Mr. Blonde: Six times. Well, what if she's too @!$%#ing busy?
Mr. Pink: The words "too @!$%#ing busy" shouldn't be in a waitress's vocabulary.
Nice Guy Eddie: Excuse me, Mr. Pink, but I think the last @!$%#ing thing you need is another cup of coffee.

Reservoir Dogs

In the first place, the standard tip rate, at least where I live, is 15% of the bill, not 20%.

High end restaurants do not pool their tips. Top end wait staff will not work in establishments that have a pool system.

There is a whole lot more to waiting tables than just serving a few dishes, your waiter is your liaison between you and the chefs, they have to remember who ordered what, know how long it takes to prepare and be sure everything is served at the same time, lest someone be left sitting with no food while the others either have to start eating before them, or let their food get cold while they wait for the rest of the food to be served. If a dish gets out of timing in the kitchen and is left to sit too long, it gets cold and/or the sauce and gravy glazed over, and good waiter will not bring a dish to a table that has glazed over gravy.

A waiter also has to keep multiple time clocks running in their head, allowing guest the proper time at each table they are serving to complete each course. Meanwhile they will keep an eye on who is drinking water, so they can make sure those glasses are kept full.

They also have to keep their eye on each table to see if someone needs additional service, ie; refill a drink, bring more coffee or anything else a guest may need. In other word, they are "Waiting"on you, and your paying for their service. Poorly timed service, or the lack of it can ruin an evening out, regardless how good the food is.

It takes a lot of experience, and it often can be very difficult to get a job in a job in really high end establishment. The wait staff in the best of restaurants do not get a salary at all, they actually pay the house a fee to get a station in the place. Next to the food and the ambiance, the quality of service from the wait staff is the measure of quality of the restaurant, and for the most part determines the level of pleasure you derive from your dining experience.

curtiscrx25,

Working at McDonald's is hard, pumping gas in all kinds of weather is hard, standing at a cash register all day at a grocery store is hard etc, yet none of these people get tips.

Almost every job is "hard" in one way or another, and the compensation for doing those jobs is part of the employers overhead, which is in turn calculated into the price you pay for the service or product.

Restaurants where tipping is banned or not practiced, force the wait staff compensation to be included in the prices on the menu. In most of those cases good service will be provided or the server will be fired. (Unless your server happens to be the owners relative)

If the tip system is abolished and restaurants have to pay their wait staff a salary, they are going to have to raise their prices to cover that additional expense. Which means your paying for cost of the service you get, regardless of the quality.

With the tip system, the house pays little and sometimes nothing for it's wait staff and leaves it up to the customer to compensate for the wait service according to what they feel it is worth.

Wouldn't it be nice if every time a joker at McDonalds screwed up your order, you got a discount?

Or if you got a discount on your groceries when the check-out person took their sweet time?

Curtis,

You don't seem to know too much about the restaurant business, particularly what goes on behind the doors to the kitchen.

When you go to "Better Restaurants" your most likely looking for a quality experience. If you want quality, your going to have to pay for it.

Restaurants do not set their prices on "what suits their fancy", they set them on what it cost to operate.

I'm sure you will be amazed to know that Five Star restaurants pay upwards of $150,000 or $200,000 dollars a year for a good Head Chef, even quality Line Cooks commonly make $75,000 or $80,000 a year.

Then they have to pay a Kitchen manager, who oversees and manages all the preparation and cooking staff, which includes chefs, cooks, Salad Prepers, Pastry Chefs and the general help needed to keep the cooking staff supplied with the food they are preparing plus a competent dishwasher who can properly operate a complicated dishwashing machine and keep the cooking and wait staff supplied with clean preparation utensils, cooking pots, pans, bowls, cooking utensils, dishes eating utensils, cups and glasses.

That is just is what goes on in the kitchen where a team of people are working in a hot, noisy environment filled with tense people trying to keep track of everything that is happening and get all the orders prepared in a coordinated fashion so they can go out to the "Front" on time.

A good restaurant will often have a Matre De' who in effect, is the manager of the Wait and Bussing staff, assigning tables, coordinating the serving of the various courses and making sure all the tables are quickly bussed and reset for the next guest and generally seeing all the patrons are properly taken care of. A good Matre De' does not come cheap.

If you think any business sets their prices at a level that simply "suits their fancy", you don't know anything about running a business.

Cost + Overhead + margin = Price

I don't know why I spent all this time explaining this to you, except that maybe you will realize that the reasoning behind your concept of the way people are, or should be paid in the food service business is based upon your lack of knowledge regarding the industry you are criticising.

".....customers would still go to their favorite restaurants even if the prices were raised to cover the cost of higher wait staff salaries - do you agree or disagree with that?"

I disagree.

You will have to spend some time in the kitchen to understand the reason why I feel that way. You see, the operation of a restaurant is akin to the entertainment business. The whole thing is a big unscripted show, the dining room being the stage and the kitchen being the "backstage".

When you leave the tension filled, hectic atmosphere of a busy kitchen and walk through the door on the "stage" and into the quite relaxed mood of the dining room, it's not always easy to instantly transform your demeanor, from being furious after a heated exchange with the head chef, to being a smiling, pleasant servant of your patrons.

However, if your wait staff does not have the incentive to insure that you have a pleasant experience, you just may not have one. The potential of a good tip is what provides that incentive. Most restaurant patrons want the ability to reward their wait staff for good service, and not reward them when the service is poor.

As for your last post, there a few things I don't understand;

Who doesn't know that chefs at five star restaurants are well paid?

I didn't say you didn't know they are well paid, I just assumed you were not aware how well paid, and understand the other factors involved in setting menu prices.

You did not provide a detailed financial analysis on restaurants and how they set their margins.

(?!) What is that supposed to mean, and why does it make a difference?

Great restaurants rake in millions and customers pay whatever they charge because they enjoy the food and atmosphere.

Much of that "atmosphere" is from the incentive of the wait staff to "put on a good show", so they can justify a good tip.

I have been to many award winning restaurants and as I have already said, in those restaurants no matter what the cost, I feel like I got the better end of the deal.

I'm sure if you were to better understand just what goes into making you feel like you got the "better end of the deal", you will not have so much of a problem leaving a good tip.

I think you two are putting waaaaay to much thought into this.

Look, here it is in anutshell for both of you.

The average person could give a @!$%# less about what goes on behind the scenes. Nobody gives a damn. Period.

What we care about is the food we are served and the manner in which it is served to us. And when it comes to the 5 Star type of restaurants, you can't afford to be there at all if you are even looking at the prices.

What I know is this. Servers depend on tips. It's that type of job. (Like Movers or Delivery people.) Everybody knows this, including me the consumer. Their not like...say, a Dentist. You don't slip your Dental Hygenist a $20 spot for the quick scrubbing.

So all of us know and understand this.

But Tips do need to be earned. I don't expect you to treat me like freakin' royalty, but I do expect you to be courteous and as fast as the environment allows for. (A little friendly might be nice too, but after dealing with @!$%#s all night, even I can forgive and understand a little tiredness on their part. I personally can't keep a fake smile for more than 2 minutes, so I get it.)

And thats what it boils down to. I understand that they depend on my tip, but I also understand that they need to...well, earn it. Take care of me and I will take care of you. And it is that simple.....

(And for the record, I think anybody who doesn't tip well -for Great Servers- is a total cheap ass. I've done Banquet Serving and let me tell you, it is hard work. I have serious respect for those type of Servers. I have constructions workers who couldn't do what those people do.)

I think you two are putting waaaaay to much thought into this.

Not the one of us that said this;

"Granted the food was good and the atmosphere was nice, but all the guy did was take the order, bring out some plates and bring out some dishes. In total I doubt that he spent more than 5 to 10 minutes serving us. $80 for ten minutes of work comes out to $480 per hour."

I've had friends and relatives in the business over the years, so I'm fairly familiar with what it takes to own a restaurant, and ignorant comments like that really piss me off.

I wouldn't go into that @!$%#ing business, no matter how much I could make.

And when it comes to the 5 Star type of restaurants, you can't afford to be there at all if you are even looking at the prices.

They usually don't put prices on the menu.

Some sanity needs to be brought back to tipping.

I agree that some sanity needs to be brought back into this.

To me it's simply more of the "entitlement culture" that has engulfed this country.

The good old "I deserve it because I am" mentality.

Now as far as the "fast food" types, they are at least paid minimum wage.

The whole fallacy on tips as far as I can see is that granted there is some sort of calculation done for taxes, that basically brings their wages up to minimum wage level for tax purposes, but there is NO allowance made for those that take in MORE than that.

I knew this young woman who consistently made hundreds in tips nightly waiting tables. An "off" night for her would be a night she brought home less than a hundred in tips. It wasn't that she was any better than anyone else on the waitstaff, she simply was friendly and flirted more with the customers, so they tipped her more than the others on the waitstaff.

It depends upon the resturant in all honesty.

Aren't waiters paid minimum wage?

Most are not, because of the expectation of tips according to law. The standard cultural rules of tipping have served us well. It is only cheap bastards that mess it up.

No, servers do not receive minimum wage. They are exempt from minimum wage laws. Most probably are paid in the range of $3 an hour.

Not only are they not paid minimum wage, some places tax the waitstaff on a percentage of their sales, not what they actually take in in tips.

So far I have not heard any arguments explaining why waiters deserve 20% tips or any tips at all while others who serve the public and have low salaries don't.

A tip because most waitstaff is paid less than minimum wage I can see and is IMO a good justification for tipping, IF they provide good service.

But 20%, give me a break.

Nope, no reason at all, other than "tradition".

They don't pay them minimum wage because they have been told that they don't have to.

benefitting restaurant owners and the government

and don't forget the 1%

I can seriously relate!

Last night -THANK YOU freakin' Cupid for this bull@!$%# Holiday!- I took my wife to The Breakers on Palm Beach Island.

Just me and her.

Well, the final damage was over $325.

But I have to admit I left a Tip. A somewhat nice one in my opinion. ($50 bucks) But it was really really earned. The Service was fantastic and the food was wonderful. And hey, the poor girl had to work on Valentines Day night. (Wish I had to work last night, but I enjoy sex with my wife and if I had worked on Valentines Day night.....well, I wouldn't even get to see it for 6 months.)

But anyways, generally i'm a pretty generous tipper and my reasoning for it has nothing to do with how it makes me look.

It has to do with paying it forward.

But I will not be bullied into it and as stated, if you don't at least pretend to care...well, you won't get a dime.....