Tipping question on dining plan

[musicotb]

Maybe we're thinking alike and I just read his comment wrong. I know there there are general rules on tipping, but I just don't happen to agree with them in extreme cases. Let me offer an example...

Let's say I go into a restaurant and order just a plain cup of coffee. I'm waited on by the server and the server brings me the cup of coffee, brings me a refill if I want it, brings me my bill, and cleans up the table when I'm done. My bill comes to around $1 give or take depending on the place. I would never leave less than a $.50 tip and in most cases I'd leave $1. That's 50% to 100% of my bill. By acceptable "rules" I should only have to leave $.15 to $.20.

Similar situation...A family of four eats at a Chinese restaurant and the meals are only $4.99 each (not unheard of around here). Add in your cokes and your looking at a total bill of about $25. I would probably leave a minimum tip of $6 tip, but not because I applied some sort of percentage...I would just figure that the server deserved no less than $1.50 per person, even though it works out to 24% of the bill.

On the other hand, I'll use your example at Spoodles. You ran up a $280 bill for 4 people. The server is probably a bit more experienced/sophisticated than the chinese food server, he probably did a bit more work for his tip (since there would be an extra course and he probably talked to you about daily specials), and I think he would certainly deserve more than $1.50 per guest. But do I believe he deserves the $50+ that he is receiving from the DDP simply because 18% is considered the standard tip? No, I don't. I won't repeat my analysis from before (which Lewisc found the flaws in as usual), but simply put...he's serving around 4 tables at a time...that's $200 an hour. I'm by no means trying to put down waiters, but I honestly don't believe it's a job which deserves wages of $200 per hour. Most college graduates with many, many years of work experience never earn that high a wage in their life. Flame me if you wish, but if I was paying OOP for the Spoodles meal (which I would never do simply because it's out of my league), I'd leave either a $25 or $30 tip depending on the service I received. Even at that, I'd feel like the server was being very much overpaid for the work he performed.

Honestly... the real issue here is that you, and anyone agreeing with you, believe that a waiter/waitress is not deserving of making good money. The real issue is that they were smart (or perhaps fortunate) enough to get a job on the wait staff at a more expensive restaurant, and reaps the benefits of that in his tipping. While in college, my mom waitressed for 2 years, and the point someone made about "what about the people who don't tip" is VERY true. In fact, ask anyone who has ever been a waiter - a LOT of people don't tip, and if they do, they don't tip well, when the waiter may have done a GREAT job. I don't know about everyone else, but I don't ever eat out unless I know I can afford to tip at least 20% on top of my bill. So, if you can't "afford" to tip at least 18% for really good service at an expensive restaurant, or don't agree with their food prices, DON'T GO THERE!

 

[musicotb]

Formernyer: "I honestly think ---- just gets his thrills out of flaming people, trying to prove them wrong, or casting moral/ethical judgments on others."

Ugh. You just can't stand disagreeing with you. You did the same thing in the post about DDP & weight. Trying to prove everyone wrong and make them feel bad is a lot different than discussing. Your moral/ethical judgments are quite a bit skewed, I think.

Onto the actual topic of this thread: My DBF and I will be tipping extra if the service is above our expectations. He grew up in the restaurant business and is never afraid to call over a manager when we have bad service, or highly tip and verbally compliment an excellent waiter. And I wholeheartedly agree.

 

[mom2my3kids]

Honestly... the real issue here is that you, and anyone agreeing with you, believe that a waiter/waitress is not deserving of making good money. The real issue is that they were smart (or perhaps fortunate) enough to get a job on the wait staff at a more expensive restaurant, and reaps the benefits of that in his tipping. While in college, my mom waitressed for 2 years, and the point someone made about "what about the people who don't tip" is VERY true. In fact, ask anyone who has ever been a waiter - a LOT of people don't tip, and if they do, they don't tip well, when the waiter may have done a GREAT job. I don't know about everyone else, but I don't ever eat out unless I know I can afford to tip at least 20% on top of my bill. So, if you can't "afford" to tip at least 18% for really good service at an expensive restaurant, or don't agree with their food prices, DON'T GO THERE!

Could not of said it better...Bravo