The biggest barrier to ending tipping in the USA is that restaurants are almost always over staffed there.
The owner wants the maximum ratio of servers to customers possible. In the typical USA system, being paid primarily in tips means the server is highly incentivized to upsell the customer as much as possible and do everything they can to increase the total bill, and therefor increase their tip. Essentially a commissioned sales person but the customer pays the commission.
This is the least efficient way to run a restaurant with regard to staffing.
European restaurants typically use a team service model, which greatly reduces the number of staff needed. Every front of house worker can take orders, make and serve drinks, run food to tables, etc. Instead of checking on the customer every few minutes they rely on the customer to ask if you need something. There is no pressure to run up the bill or clear out quickly in this model.
At least they don’t demand a bunch of extra tips. I’m European (well, Scandinavian, which some Europeans consider European and some don’t) and my rule of thumb is that if I go out I tip 10%.
If the service is extra good I might tip extra.
If the service is very bad (unreasonably slow, or staff forget or mix up the order in a significant way, or they are very rude), I tip 0%. Of course everyone can mess up things a little so it’s not like I immediately tip 0% just because of some minor thing. It has to be properly bad.
Also something I have learned from the Spanish is to always order something small and quick for the table even before we have decided what to eat. Then if it takes 40 minutes before the food comes it doesn’t matter that much compared to when you are starving for food. So this is a very neat trick that helps a lot to have a good experience even at slow places, and something I have started always doing.
I have to ask, why are you tipping 10% before the service is extra good? I'm really against the idea that the company isn't responsible for paying their staff properly.
Setting a baseline of 10% just says to me that the restaurant owners can just pay their staff less. And if the server is having an off day or just didn't meet your particular standards then they're losing money.
It would be a bizarre approach in Scandinavia because the consensus here is that companies must pay their employees a decent baseline salary -- which unions negotiate across the whole sector -- so there's no expectation of a tip by default.
But for much of the rest of the world, it's not a given that working conditions are as good.
I think in the Netherlands the general rule is to tip up to 10% depending how good the service was, unless it was excellent and you go higher. When drinking a couple coffees in a restaurant it is okay to tip with a single Euro for good service, even if that doesn't amount to 10%.
This is despite the unfortunate and rude trend of payment devices now offering a big dickover screen filled with obscene tip suggestions first (25% in a fucking chain fastfood place?), because with the decline of cash the old way of rounding up the bill dies out too.
I'm also Scandinavian (Norwegian), and I never tip when going out.
I can't think of any long-term outcome of a tipping culture that is efficient for the workers and employers, even if the amount the customer tipped was correlated with quality (the research I've read shows it's got more to do with looks). It is simply more efficient that both parties know what they are agreeing to up front when (1) the worker still has to go to work for 3 months when they resign and (2) the employer has to pay them (and their replacement) full wages during training.
I never tip because if burger with fries costs €15 then we had a fucking legal contract that you'll give me a burger with fries for €15, don't be like "uuuuuuh sir I'm going to ruin your evening by asking you to pay more at the checkout time because reasons".
Please stop tipping unless the service is very good. Hell, the quality of the service could be reflected in the cost of the food (it is), and you don't need to tip at all.
I lived in Swizterland, but never experienced any refund. Some places would reject tips outright when asked or point out that your tip is excessive, but a refund?
One of the biggest cultural differences - for Spain - is that servers are seen as equals, not as a client-provider relationship. This reflects heavily in the language often used - "when you can, bring me X". Just one of the quirks of a low gini coefficient society.
Just yesterday there was a story on HN about Spain's dying villages and a commenter who I assumed was Spanish attributed theow beth rate to income inequality.
Which is it - low gini for talking to a waiter, high gini for starting a fam?
It’s not surprising to anyone that two random Spaniards may disagree on whether a number like this is high or low. That’s because Spaniards don’t all get together to agree on a common position for online posting; and because high/low depends on the context and comparison to other countries.
Spain’s gini coefficient indicates it is much more equal than USA, but not as equal as, say, Denmark.
I don't think it is a fair comparison. The cost of raising a child can still be too high even in a fairly low gini country.
In fact I'd say gini has nothing to do with birth rate. Birth rate declines when parents have confidence that there is a good likelihood their children will survive to adulthood.
It is often easy to forget that just five hundred years ago almost one of two infants born didn't survive into adulthood. Low birth rates are good. Don't let anyone say otherwise.
Low Gini compared to the US, but mediocre for a European country (comparable to France, Germany, Italy; significantly worse compared to low-Gini regions like Scandinavia).
In my opinion, low birth rates can't be attributed to income, or income inequality. I feel like it's more about optimism, to have kids you have to be optimistic about the future.
I'm saying this based on anecdotal observations from my biased POV, so take this with a grain of salt. There are income differences, but most are inter-city/region differences. I'd say within a specific city or region, it's low gini, but there's a high gini if you compare cross-region. Income and costs in a village in rural Spain are less than half that of a "mid-tier" city, and less than a third or even quarter of that of Barcelona or Madrid
If anyone said this about the country that you’re from (based on this attitude, we all know what my guess is) you’d immediately clock how absurd it sounds.
Easily attributed less to Gini coefficient and more to the difference between a Western European approach to hospitality (structured management, technical precision and formal) and a Mediterranean one (warmth, relational connection, informal) as seen in Xenia, islamic tradition, etc
Two clichés to be contrasted with another two: the smiling first-name-terms coffee-shop barista in Hamburg, and the coldly brusque waiter in some Roman caffè storico.
All these generalizations are as slippery as a bar of soap.
Oh, please. This reeks of a anglocentric worldview. Most places are like that. The exception to this rule is the US and franchise/chain restaurants that they have around the world.
They're not just incentivized to upsell, but also to get you out of the door as quickly as possible so they can get the next customers in. It makes for a much less pleasant dining experience than, say, France where waiters are generally hands-off.
> Instead of checking on the customer every few minutes
This is likely one of the absolute worst features of the US dining system.
So many times I have been sitting in deep conversation with friends or colleagues just for a waiter to claim all attention to ask if we want to have refilled water.
That they can even push themselves to such rude behavior is entirely insane to me.
Experienced servers will usually try to 'feel out' a table to understand if they are in a rush, demanding, want to converse, etc. The same behavior that feels rude when you're catching up with old friends is often welcomed by a table that might have limited time to eat or that prefer to have things done without waiting or flagging someone down.
You do realize that it's perfectly acceptable and commonplace to explain your group's preferences to the server upon first being introduced? You're really telling them exactly what would make you happiest while also reducing the effort they need to spend on your group, a mutually beneficial setup.
Of course, incentives may not align in certain scenarios. On a busy night/time or at restaurants that don't have lots of seating, having a table that they can't 'turn over' quickly may be undesirable, especially if purchases (another round of drinks) aren't being made occasionally.
I agree it's super annoying, but I can say for sure it's not limited to the US. Has also happened to me many times over here in Ireland/the UK. Usually by waiting staff that are a little inexperienced. Of course the people I'm in conversation with at the time are probably relieved to have a break from me rabbiting on...
It seems like the universal standard in my area is that the server plunks down my food dishes and immediately asks if I would like anything else with that. And I don't know about neurotypical patrons, but in my mind it is impossible for me to process whether I will need anything else while the server is standing right there, staring at me and waiting for me to answer. So invariably I am forced to say "no" and then, more often than not, I belatedly discover what it is that my meal also needed, and so I wait to flag them down again (this necessarily involves not picking up utensils and not eating anything, so that they notice there is something amiss.)
I really haven't been smothered by checkups every few minutes. When the servers are really good, they can anticipate when you need something by simply looking at you and your table. They know when your drink is empty and when you want it filled. A server should rarely need to ask that stuff verbally. If they are continually checking up, they are inexperienced or insecure.
After I make my order, the server will usually try and take my menu. Lately I've said "I'd like to hold on to this" and they love when you do that! I don't always follow-up with another order, but sometimes I just need an extra side dish, or a dessert.
I've had that overstaffed experience, too. There are one or two small chains around here that employ 3x as many servers as they need. And their rooms are always 1/5th full or less. So the moment I walk in, there are 3-4 people greeting me and escorting me to a table, before I can even pull off my hat and gloves. In the same place, while they don't appear to do "team service" I would meet one waitress, and then get fobbed off on another guy for no stated reason. If they are sharing tips, a lot of slices to that pie.
No. After you've ordered, it is rare to order anything else. You might ask for a refill of a beverage or something like ketchup, but the waiter is not expecting more ordering.
It's simply expected by diners that their waiter is there and will help with whatever they need. In Europe you'll wait 20 minutes to get the attention of a waiter for salt or ketchup until your food is cold. Also in Europe this will be described not as dead time waiting for a small thing, but as culture. European culture.
So why do waiters in the USA keep pestering me every 5 minutes asking if I need something else? It's part of the culture, and it gets plenty annoying when I'm trying to enjoy a meal but have to stop mid-bite to say "no, thank you" when I'm clearly not in need of anything else.
The feeling I get from those experiences is that I'm being rushed to clear the table, not that the service is great and always there to help me.
> Also Europeans are not, I think, accustomed to asking for salt, or ketchup, on already seasoned food.
I would expect to find salt, pepper and mustard on the table in a decent restaurant, in my corner of Europe. Not ketchup, though, except in a cheap burger place.
It's amazing how much is attributed to culture. What if I like more salt? European are not accustomed to ask for salt. What if the chef forgot to add salt? You'll wait till your food is cold. It's culture.
I don't know about other European countries (well, I know, but I'm polite), but in France, restaurants will always have salt/pepper and frequently oil/vinegar on each table.
For ketchup, I'm afraid you'll need to stay in the US.
Please stop spreading these... untrue statements, you clearly have very little experience with actual European restaurants. Any decent restaurant has salt&pepper available on all tables, if yours was cleaned and not put back just ask waiter politely. You know how to call a waiter, right? Not much more complex than raising hand at primary school.
One thing is true though, I never ever had to add salt in restaurant in past 25 years, one can ask for pepper/olive oil/etc but salt? They often use too much of it to enhance taste ie in sauces. Maybe get your kidneys and heart checked with such refined palate.
Ah yes the homogenous European culture. Can't say I've ever really experienced this anywhere other than when its obvious a restuarant is slammed. Spain is probably the worst place I've been for service but the standard is still generally very high, you just need to actually get someones attention they're not going to ask if you're ok all the time. Maybe this is a reflection of the standrd of the places you go or how you treat people?
So after you ordered the main meal, after you finished it, is it uncommon in the US to order something afterwards? Like coffee, dessert, an ice cream cup?
Most waitstaff attempt to be observant enough to watch their tables for empty plates, approach the table and clear them off, and ask at that moment if they would like to see a dessert menu.
> USA is that restaurants are almost always over staffed there.
> European restaurants typically use a team service model, which greatly reduces the number of staff needed
100% this.
US restaurants have a "zone" model and always seem to need 3x the staff of European restaurants.
If you went the Euro model, you could have less staff and pay them more per head and therefore not need tipping.
> There is no pressure to run up the bill or clear out quickly in this model.
I think this is more a function of "need to turn over tables at some multiple per night to cover costs" but costs aren't just labor e.g. rent and food are also big line items.
Turnover in the restaurant industry is brutal. An always overstaffed restaurant where the waitstaff ends up not earning much in tips will quickly lose staff to competitors (at least the good ones).
>European restaurants typically use a team service model,
American chain restaurants also use the team model. The server that writes down the order often isn't the same person bringing out the hot plates of food. Maybe less of team than Europe because the waitress taking the order will typically be the same one refilling the drinks.
It's the white tablecloth high-end restaurants where the one waiter is the only person handling all interactions with the table.
What you are describing is not team service because the server "owns" the customer and are the one who will collect the tip from that table.
What you are noticing is that many chains have a "full hands" rule: if any server with free hands walks past a table with dirty dishes on the way to the kitchen, they are expected to pick them up no mater who's section it is. Also, if they are heading out from the kitchen with free hands they are expected to run out some dishes no matter what table they are for.
>the server "owns" the customer and are the one who will collect the tip from that table.
In many USA restaurants, the waitstaff tips are also shared into a pool with the runners, busboys, and kitchen staff. The % may not be equal however.
>What you are noticing is that many chains have a "full hands" rule:
But that contradicts the idea that "USA restaurants almost always over staffed there." The chain restaurant could just "overstaff" with dedicated table runners with no need for a "full hands" rule.
It doesn't seem like USA restaurants are overstaffed nor do owners have the incentive to overstaff. The very common scenario is the hostess seats you at the table and the waiter doesn't even show up for 10 or 20 minutes to take the order and patrons are frustrated and wondering why it's taking so long. That's a symptom of understaffing where the waiter is handling too many simultaneous tables.
Used to have a lot of American workers here on some projects here, and mind you - these are very travelled and well-versed ones. The contractors that travel around the world for a solid chunk of their careers.
They didn't really mind the the typical service here, where you'll have to wait a bit before a waiter sees you. You get used to it.
On the other hand, you have the first time tourists, that will go "excuuuse meee" after 5 minutes in a restaurant if the waiter hasn't showed up to take a order, and become pissy when they discover that free refills isn't really a thing.
Most Americans traveling abroad are in my experience polite and patient. But there are always the bad apples that will keep tabs on how many times the waiter comes by to offer something, and demand immediate service.
As far as I understand this is broken incentive system. Waiter can rarely make restaurant experience better - food is dependent on the kitchen - and it only worse make it worse - bad attitude, spitting in food etc. So from customer PoV, it makes no sense to pay percentage of the good as a compensation for the good. This model works where there is some risk associated - like if you sell a house, or do some legal counselling. But tips as a percentage of the bill makes no sense to me - waiter has no contribution in me ordering steak or salad. The offer, from waiter, to order something cheaper could be more tip-worthy service than alternative. Therefore, compensation as % of turnover should be Restaurant managers' concern and not the customers' problem.
> The owner wants the maximum ratio of servers to customers possible. In the typical USA system, being paid primarily in tips means the server is highly incentivized to upsell the customer as much as possible and do everything they can to increase the total bill, and therefor increase their tip.
I don't think so. The biggest upsell of a US-style tipping culture is that restaurant owners have a no-downside free pass in exploiting workers. They literally are allowed to have people working for them for barely paid and performing a role aimed at increasing throughout and demand. Therefore there is no incentive whatsoever for a restaurant owner to stop exploiting their staff.
Also, many Europeans have the "equal work, equal pay" mantra drilled into them. Tip-based salaries are the complete anti-thesis to that. It is obvious that better-looking younger women get more tips than those without those characteristics. It rubs me and many others the wrong way; hence, I never tip because that is always fair. As a customer I 100% prefer "worse" service over having to deal with the tipping BS. Americans don't care and don't think about fairness at all in the same way.
At restaurants at least, most people I know just default tip 20% and only adjust up or down in pretty rare circumstances. Maybe it’s different in other parts of the US or for other generations, but I recall studies supporting that people generally have a set percent they always tip.
Japan has a lot of the same things, but no tipping. Although the tradition of "checking in" to see if you need anything seems to not be very prevalent - instead people either press a button or call out for the staff if they need something.
I remember a few American restaurants experimenting with this when I was a kid. I remember the experience being a little inconsistent. I imagine the feedback wasn't particularly good.
> want to be coddled and always want to feel like they are the king of the world. Greeters at Walmart, cashiers not being allowed to sit but have to stand for "respect",
I thought the greeters were an anti-shoplifting technique, "hello someone saw you here" kind of thing.
And putting a seat in the checkout station means they can't be packed quite as closely and also gets in the way when someone else needs to tag in to ring up booze or whatever.
I’ve spent about five weeks in the US split across two trips. At home, I eat out very very regularly, at both very nice and very shabby places, and varied places. I pretty much immediately came to your conclusion… within hours of each visit, if not less. it’s so jarring, and artificial, and tacky. I can’t imagine being so delusional as to have any of this stuff be a positive experience. I hate it. And I’m far from an introvert, but these social interactions are not genuine and they go out of their way to make you feel like you’re superior. I hate it and I think that it says a lot about the US. It’s part of what makes me just have a background feeling of being on edge the entire duration of my visit, in a way that I’ve never felt in other countries, even those that have a much larger cultural difference from my own, and that I should really feel less ‘at home’ in.
LMFAO, have you ever been to a restaurant in Europe? The service is horrific. Sit down and wait 15 minutes for the menus, another 15 to place a drink order, another 10 for the drinks to get there, another 10 to place food order. Now you finish the meal, good luck getting the waiters attention to bring the check. European dining is the worst, every time I am back stateside I feel like im being waited on in the white house or something fancy.
I could say the same about US restaurants. I want to socialise with the people I'm sharing the meal with, not some random waiter. The servers are constantly interrupting, ruining the mood and you feel unwelcome like they want to get you out the door the moment your plate is empty (because that's exactly what they want). It's like being on a conveyor belt.
The waiter comes by about twice in a visit, asks you "Is there anything you need?". You say "No thanks". And you get upset by that. And then you complain about Americans and their terrible ways. What sense does that make? Can't you see how rude you are? The person simply came by to check, since that person is your waiter and the goal is that you have a tasty and pleasant time.
If I need anything, I will call for the waiter. I do find it intrusive and patronizing if they come and check if I need anything. I'm not "upset" about it, but it does make my dining experience worse. It also gives me the impression they are trying to get me to free up the table as soon as possible.
It is very amusing to me that in a different part of this thread people are complaining that the waiter doesn't come by enough, and here the complaint is the opposite.
While I very much agree with your sentiment and to be honest I prefer dining in the USA, it’s naive to think (in most cases) that they actually care about anything other than getting you out of the restaurant as soon as possible to work a new party.
Of course, there’s a bit of future optimization where they want you as a repeat customer, but that manifests in pretending they don’t want you out, not actually feeling that way. It makes sense - a rational revenue maximizing business does want you out but they need to pretend they don’t. The veneer is thin in many cases (though it varies by establishment). Personally, I’d prefer the incentives aligned with being a bit more straightforward, down to earth and without fake flattery.
I remember I had a meal once as a group of 5 about 10 years ago at a beachfront restaurant in Boca. At this group size a tip of 18% was added by default. Our waiter had been so cloying and over the top, calling us friends, etc. When the bill came and I didn’t tip anything other than 18% the waiter started shouting from across the room and made physical contact with me because he thought I hadn’t tipped. It was really a horrible experience, but very telling.
I've been in hundreds of not fancy restaurants across Europe in my life, in many countries. The service speed in like 95% of all cases is at maximum or vary close to it. It's between 0 to 1-2 minutes to get menu, then 0 to 1-2 minute to flag a waiter and order, and that all delays possibly induced by the serving staff. The rest is just how long it takes to cook and is not relevant here. So maybe USA shaves off a few tens of seconds of that, and pays for that with tens of dollars per visit plus suffers an annoying questions all the time, while I'm eating. No thanks.
Maybe you guys like your USA service model. Maybe Europeans are mistaken about USA service model. But one thing is certain - you USA guys have zero idea about speed of service on average in European cafes and restaurants, judging by your comments :) .
It’s possible that many of the Americans commenting here have gone to very different restaurants than locals have in mind, and are basing their experiences on a very different sample. Like touristy places with a patio on the main old town square of (insert European city here)
This is literally what the grandparent comment was doing.
> In the typical USA system...
> European restaurants typically...
But the interesting thing is that no one ever complains when people group things by continents like that if the theme is bashing the US and praising Europe. Only when talking bad about Europe it's suddenly an issue.
Yes, the dining experience in California and New York is just so, so different. One waiter might call it pop, the other soda, it's like being on a different planet!
It's wild the extents to which Americans overestimate the cultural differences between their states and literal entire countries with actual differences. Scandinavia and the Mediterranean are quite different, Americans speaking in a different accent and maybe being slightly friendlier or not is nothing.
In the Netherlands this has been my experience many times. By the time they finally come to take your order (which is always "what would you like to drink?", requiring me to say "actually I'm ready to order the food as well") - I would have already been eating in many other countries.
The reason I think is a mix of things: firstly people really want to make a night of it, seeing the whole dinner as an experience, and secondly the amount of staff (both waitstaff and in the kitchen) won't support a faster process.
Edit: it's not a case of better or worse, just different expectations going in
Not sure which destinations you're eating in, but as someone who lives in "Europe", that's not been a regular occurrence at all. Generally, the waiting times are not so long and service is reasonable. There are of course experiences at both end of the spectrum. I've walked out of a Vienna cafe once because I waited 20 minutes for someone to bring the bill. Three steps out the door the waiter chased me down and I paid the bill. Problem solved. However, I've also been in situations where I us want the wait-staff to bugger off and let me enjoy my meal and conversation in peace. Usually, the service is somewhere in between.
I live in half Europe for the past 15 years and have been to more restaurants than I can count. Typical service is courteous and efficient. Of course there are outliers, too.
Repeat business is rewarded like in most places. I frequent many cafes and restaurants where I'm recognized and treated like family even though I have never once tipped there.
Ah much generalisation. Europe is over 40 countries with vast differences in quality of service and restaurant culture. I have been to restaurants in many European countries and the only generalisation I can make is that tip culture does not exist in Europe.
Although in the UK, there is often an "optional" service charge tacked on for table service dining. (Yes, you can get it taken off but I'm guessing most people don't.)
My last trip I gave a $10 tip to a waiter in a Spanish restaurant. I apologized that I didn't have euros. The guy smiled broadly and thanked me. If tip "culture" didn't exist in Europe, he would have thought of me as inappropriate and would have given the money back. Like if you try to give a tip to a firefighter, he'd give it back, because it's not appropriate.
He accepted it because he saw you as an American cash cow.
Obviously you will do as you please, but I wish tourists would try to get with the culture. As a European, one of many reasons I don't tip is that I don't want to encourage a class system where anyone who doesn't pay up is seen (and sees themselves) as stingy.
I have not been in a place in Europe where the tips would be rejected. However, universally they are not the norm or expected.
Also about the $10 - they would need to gather quite a few more dollar notes and spend time finding a cash exchange bureau. Else the note is just a memento of a weird American.
In some EU countries the tips have to be counted as salary and income (+social) tax paid, or even they have to be declared as revenue to the restaurant along with the VAT (19-25%) going straight to the state. Of course, when paid in cash - that rarely happens. The point is that the provision exists in the law (so the tips are not unheard of)
Of course you can tip and nobody would refuse one. The difference is tipping is not expected by default and you get same service regardless of your tip. In contrast many years ago a waiter in a NYC restaurant made my then girlfriend crying when the waiter decided that the tip was not big enough. Is this great American service people here keep raving about?
People over the Atlantic just have a better concept of social gathering as opposed to neediness of being served and staffed with food.
People come to a place to have fun and talk for a few hours or their free time. Drinks and food coming and going is just a small nuance. 10 minutes (often way less of course) for drinks to arrive is mostly okay. Nobody is busy waiting for them.
From the restaurant owner's perspective there is no benefit of slow or bad service. That means guests are taking up room without spending money. It makes much better sense to be speedy in giving your guests attention and service, as this gives you more sales, more margin for error, and most importantly much happier guests. They can still focus on the socializing and being merry.
If you're upset that you wait then maybe something like McDonald's would be better for you. When you go out to eat, you're also going out to socialize and enjoy your time.
In Japan, I think the servers are paid well, and they don't accept tips. If you leave money on the table, they will chase you down, and give it back.
And the service is incredible. Japanese service culture is pretty amazing, if you are used to the US. You really want to tip them -much more than in the US.
I think the US underpays waitstaff pretty badly. They desperately need the tips, but in some places, they can do fairly well. I know lots of [former, mostly] bartenders, and they tell stories of bringing home hundreds of untaxed dollars, every night.
> the problem of going tip-free is that customers struggle to get their heads around the maths.
Maybe they should show the price "without tip" next to the full price, so people can compare.
Paying employees with tips is an insane concept, fundamentally abusive. If it wasn't, then the owner would also get paid from tips. "The meals are all free, and we count on you to pay them through tips". Obviously no owner would take that risk, because it is insane. They make their employees take that risk because they can abuse them, that's all.
And yeah, on top of abusing the employees by not paying them (and relying on the customers to pay the employees directly), stealing from the tip is even more abusive.
And let's not even talk about those delivery (and similar) apps that also abuse the tips in their algorithms.
Let me restate what the OP said. (quotes used for paraphrasing, not for quoting)
"Restaurant owners set a price on their dishes, because if everyone payed at will, the owners know they would make less money. Therefore we can assume owners know that paying at-will does not optimize earnings. Therefore, it's insane that they make their staff work for pay that's at-will".
We need to at least normalize not tipping for counter service. Given the current wage structures and labor laws in the US and Canada, if I sit down at a table and I receive table service, I'm going to tip 15% unless the service was abhorrent.
I am not going to tip if I order and take my food from a counter and serve myself (and then almost certainly clear my own table as well), or I buy any other form of product standing up. Basically, if I'm standing for the entire customer service transaction, it's not tippable.
Using the example of my local chipotle as a typical stand up and order and pay at counter arrangement, the food is made before I get to the POS terminal.
I'm not saying they're right to do so, but it sounds like their intuition was honed well if they pegged you correctly during your faux-pas era? Fascinating, wonder what the tell was.
> Europeans would be far less likely to tip (or tip generously).
Southern europeans tip, there wouldn't be much difference there
Northern ones it depends, they don't tip at home but they usually do on vacations to southern europe (where tipping culture very much exists). Though some of that also has to do with currency conversions, at least historically, even if the tradition has stuck past the euro being introduced. So maybe that's why they don't tip when it comes to dollars?
> As a foreigner in the US, I've made the faux-pas of assuming waiters and waitresses were being paid a full salary by their employer.
This depends on the state. For example, in California, servers get state minimum wage, at least ($16.90/hour). On the other hand, most "red" states use the federal minimums: $2.13/hour for servers (!) and $7.25/hour for non-tipped employees.
To be honest they are paid a full salary. Tipped wage does not preclude the minimum wage. In addition there are many states like CA that do not have a tipped wage.
Actually not. In my state and others, when a business is designated as accepting tips, the workers can be paid less than minimum wage, while expecting that the tips they collect will make up for it.
So it’s really a way to extort good tips from customers, because it’s understood that our gratuities are the only way they can make minimum wage!
A friend in Southern California worked for a restaurant in Disneyland. Her employer calculated what they felt each waitstaff should have earned and had all of them pay up for sub-tips go cooks and busboys. Refusal to do so was grounds for termination. She had several days where the end of the shift had her net pay her employer due to non or low tipping that day.
That was grossing up for her. Illegal? Likely. "But they have laws against that" - low wage employees are easily taken advantage of. They often _need_ that job.
Threatening assault on a paying customer for not knowing tipping norms is just one of the many reasons why American society is in the state it is. I've seen similar things like 'be glad I didn't spit in your food', 'next time they are getting trouser food'. This is despicable.
Level of service doesn't depend on the tip in the USA. Tip size may depend a little bit on level of service, but not the other way around. Basically the tip is how the customer pays the server and table clearers etc, because the restaurant owner does not. It's just a convention on how to split up the total charge that American culture has determined in the way to do it. And like every single weird thing in American culture, it's that way because of slavery.
Yeah but that's for restaurants. In restaurants, the tip is usually post-paid. Tipping in other industries may have a different dynamic.
For example, with Doordash and Uber Eats, tips are prepaid. The driver may also be made aware of their prospective tip during the bidding process. Therefore, tipping is gamified into enticing a driver into accepting the bid over other jobs.
I will not reduce a post-paid tip if I perceive that I got bad service. I usually won't increase it, either, without extenuating circumstances, for example, if the server overcame adversity somehow (especially if I was the adverse one). However, if a prepaid tip turns out to be unwarranted by horrendous service, I will go after that and require it to be reduced to $0. That is basically the only punishment that a customer can exact on a service worker. I don't like to do it, but if it was a prepaid thing, I consider that tip to be made under duress, and revocable.
We're going in the other direction. In Seattle it's common for restaurants to tack on an extra "service charge" that's not a tip, just because. It's supposed to be declared somewhere.
That’s also very common in the UK, and shows up elsewhere in Europe sometimes. In the UK, they are legally but not practically or socially discretionary. There are some tax advantages for the restaurant and in the ideal case for staff.
Touristy places in central London maybe. They wouldn't dare try sneaking an undeclared service charge onto a locals bill in Northern England or Scotland :-)
> In the UK, they are legally but not practically or socially discretionary.
Speak for yourself. When entertaining clients at touristy places in London, one routinely asks for this underhand charge to be removed from the bill. (Whether or not we then choose to leave a cash tip is a matter of discretion, but the chances are rather low after such shenanigans).
I doubt whoever thinks installing this US software on UK/Irish POS terminals has done their homework. Its simply one way to piss off the customers and embarrass the staff.
Interesting. What POS terminals are common there? I am curious about culture spreading through technology defaults and wonder if it's effectively driven by whatever Square chose and whomever else decided to ape the incumbent or whatever.
You them everywhere. Most insane are the bars where you have to walk up from your seating to the bar to order, the bartender plops the drinks on the bar and immediately moves on to another customer, and the terminal still displays default tip amounts and you have to do custom → €0. What the hell am I tipping you for?
At this point I'm waiting for supermarket self-checkout to add a default tip amount.
I've seen this (UK), albeit "round up to £x.00 and donate the change to charity", which <supermarket> will use to announce "We've donated £X million to charity".
Hahaha, I was surprised by one of those in Newark/EWR. I can't believe it's real haha. Who gets the tip? I just tipped the self-service worker in cash ;)
It's configurable on any terminal that supports it — obviously the terminal is designed so it can be used in a restaurant, or for paying in a shop, or paying a fee to the government. (To give an example of where even Americans don't tip.)
I don't think square supports slovenia for now, but POS vedors add the tip option, and our restaurant owners enable it, because it doesn't cost them anything, any many (especially foreign) guests "feel bad" for choosing the zero on the screen.
Because from the restaurant's POV it seems like free money. If no one tips, they perceive no harm. If someone tips, then free money.
It's also more money to the company providing the payment system so they are incentivized to tell every restaurant to turn on tips.
I hate it. I don't know how to fight it except to try to start a movement big enough that everyone who goes to such a restaurant gives it 1 star and not not return, until it becomes unacceptable for business to do it. Like many things that is unlikely to happen without some major awareness campaign.
Unless it's a bottle deposit tax, then it gets added outside the advertised price ;) 2 Euro bottle of Coke, great, I have 2 euro left, pay 2 euro 20 please... Fawwwwwkkkkkkkkk
yeah, this one also gets to my bones. and then you cant return every deposit-taxed bottle everywhere - but only in stores where it's sold. then some friends leave bottles at your place which you cannot return anywhere near... what a mess
Good service is mostly invisible. Courses paced to how you're eating, not fired all at once or giving you 20 minute gaps between mains. Drinks refilled, plates cleared without asking. Reading the room and knowing when I want to chat or be left alone. Staff that know what their serving, whats in it, how it's cooked, what wine pairs well, etc.
That also includes accomodating guest preferences and allergies, and the staff being empowered to act.
For example, let's say you're allergic to nuts. Not only should the menu list all allergens, but also you should be able to say "I'm allergic to nuts. Can I have the beef cheek without the walnut garnish?" and the waiter should know if that's possible or not, and if there are any other nuts hidden in there, without having to ask the chef. They can say "let me check with the chef", but if they don't need to check because they already know the dishes well enough, that's great service.
It goes without saying:
- if you can and do order it nut-free, the dish served to you should be nut-free
- the waiter shouldn't freak out like this is the first guest with allergies they've ever had to accomodate
- they shouldn't refuse to serve you anything at all because "there are nuts in the kitchen", even if you explain that you're ok with the presence of nuts in an area provided they're not deliberately part of the food
- they shouldn't hand you a binder of laminated pages marked "ALLERGENS" and make you find the menu entry yourself
Also, if you're doing a tasting menu with a party of six and the restaurant has already agreed to accommodate your allergies, but you sit at a different seat at the table, they shouldn't reliably serve the nut-free dishes to the wrong person, sitting in the seat they decided the allergic customer would be sitting at, for every course.
That's a good question. Good service is something important to the overall dining experience, so much so, higher end places regard the "maître d'hôtel" aka the service/restaurant manager equal to the chef.
Great service is generally about "reading your mind": e.g. providing you with a replacement fork that you dropped without you needing to ask. Also, coordinating that "timing" you are after, perfectly. Good service is attentive without being overly present. If you ever ate somewhere in a sitdown restaurant and thought after "wow that was a great meal", service contributed to that.
There's a one star restaurant in my hometown. Not even expensive, it's about 60€ for a three-courses menu, so we try to go at least a few times a year.
It's really about reading the room. A good waiter won't bring the main of you're still finishing the wine that paired with your entrée. Won't come to pick the empty plates right in the middle of a lively conversation.
Things will land on and leave your table at the right time.
It means nothing. Whoever writes this has no idea about American restaurant protocol. The "tip for good service" thing comes from the UK (perhaps elsewhere in Europe too, not sure since I don't know those cultures well). There (obviously it's changing as US cultural virus propagates) the idea was: default is no tip, a tip only exists as a token to denote thanks for something -- friendly service, quick service, and so on. Most service is slow and surly so -- no tips.
By contrast in the US the tip is mandatory. The server doesn't make any money and goes broke if you don't tip. So everyone does. Service would have to be astonishingly bad (waiter threw up on the customer?) to receive no tip. On the other end, one might give a somewhat higher tip if the server was particularly friendly, helpful, is related to you, is a friend of your kids, seems like they could use the money, and so on. There's no metric of "I was well served" that correlates to the tip.
I am french, living in the US: yes, service is always included in France, but service is usually not that good. At least, definitely not as good as in the US.
I spend about equal time in the USA and split between France, Germany, and The Netherlands.
Personally, I find the service in USA restaurants to be obnoxious, overly fake, and disruptive. I generally only go out to eat in Europe because I prefer a peaceful meal rather than a rushed one with a side of fake friendship.
Japan is amazing in some places, that you can order with a tablet apps then you pick up your food yourself when it arrived. Very minimum interaction and employees needed.
The market works better in China: Competition is fierce and nowadays with online reviews most restaurants are so scared of a bad review that they go the extra mile and staff go all out as soon as you raise a slight concern.
This is a problem for the employer and for the selection and remuneration of staff (at all levels of the chain and not just those in contact with the customer)
I live in the US but have traveled to France for my entire life and speak French reasonably well. My take on this is: service is just fine in France. The difference is that nobody is "servile" in France. Also there are protocol differences (e.g. server never brings the bill until asked) that might be interpreted as lower levels of service.
Most people I know are happy to leave a tip - especially to reward great service as part of a great night, or in cases where you have a long term relationship with an establishment and its staff.
I can only imagine the staff is likewise happy to see the nice tip from us at the end of the night.
If you can only imagine "unnecessary bad feelings" - I can only imagine the tip you leave and how the staff feels about you. If you are so poor, you won't enjoy the price hike either and if you are not poor then just tip properly and move on.
Is poverty the only reason to dislike tipping in your eyes?
I'm absolutely fascinated by how sheltered you are, and I'm desperately trying to be charitable here as that's one of the more cunty things I've read on this site.
I hate that some workers depend on tips and that creates an obligation on me, but I do like to tip because I know how great it feels to get one. At work I sometimes get a bonus and what’s that if not a tip?
I benefit too. It’s a way for me to express gratitude.
Exactly! Thank you for expressing this so consciley. The fact that some people can't imagine enjoying giving (and receiving) a nice tip is really gross.
If the price increase is actually linked to higher wages for the staff, there should be no increase in taxable revenue for the restaurant, because the wages are deductible expenses. But there is still the matter of sales tax (paid by the customer), and the tax payable by the employee on their wages (not sure if tips are technically taxable income already, but regardless, you can bet most staff aren't paying taxes on them).
They used to be taxable income, but now thanks to Trump’s “no tax on tips” campaign promise they aren’t. Effectively nobody paid taxes on cash tips anyway, but nowadays cash tips are relatively rare and credit card tips definitely show up on paystubs/W2s.
From old family stories, I figure the real reason for tipping service workers is that both employers and customers want there to be plenty of service workers available - but the demand for their labor (restaurant customers, whatever) is very unpredictable compared to factory, farm, or gov't work. And service industries can't afford to keep a lot of idle workers around at full pay. So tipping is a simple revenue-sharing scheme, wrapped in social niceties, that boosts/cuts the service workers' income based on whether business is currently fast or slow.
Even in the majority of states that have sales tax, services are exempt and voluntary tips are also not taxable. (Mandatory tips are often considered part of the sales price, which seems reasonable enough to me.)
I grew up in a restaurant in the US. Tipping is a counterintuitive evolution in wages, I’ll probably dig in more.
Anecdotally, a waitress could easily earn more than minimum wage during a shift. Sometimes easy clearing $100 when minimum wage was $7/hr (it was $2.15/hr for wait staff). Add to that the tip reporting was lax and no there’s no tax on tips, waiting is on par with minimum wage.
An interesting side effect is that adding waitstaff is marginal cost to an operator.
The bigger story for me is tipping fatigue. Almost every service worker requests a tip now. It seems to be from the rise in digital payments where everyone just turns on that feature. As a consumer, I have no idea if the worker’s compensation model is tied to tips or not and it feels like the ones who aren’t have hijacked my generosity.
The thing that bugs me about tips is the fact they are a percentage. Why am I supposed to tip more if I ordered something more expensive but the service is equally good?
In general a higher bill is a proxy for a larger meal of more people in a more high-end establishment so it tracks well.
I agree if you had the $200 sea food tower by yourself it deviates from that otherwise perfect proxy. But that's already a weird situation so just pay the tip and move on.
A massive price difference would be the drinks (also the most of the profit) - realistically opening a bottle of expensive wine vs the bog standard cabernet serves as no proxy to anything.
As engineer I question why don't they present me in seconds time they spend on me. Then I could calculate fair rate to tip. Say altogether they spend 6 minutes on me. 2€ or 20€ an hour sounds reasonable enough if it was good work... Then again this probably should be included so maybe not that much.
it's time for a worldwide reset on tipping culture / assumptions.
america was always weird - the tipping practice leads to over-the-top fake service, is abusive to staff and only benefits restaurant owners. and they turned all that up to 11 over the last few years. how americans can cherish and even defend this, i can't get my mind around it.
meanwhile in europe, american practices are imported by way of POS terminals asking in outrageous use cases for outrageous amounts of tips. no, im not tipping 30% for an item i pick from a shelf in a store. add to that the awkward interaction at a bar or so when you have to select a tip under the watchful eye of the server.
people are shamed into tipping in all manners of ways and let those abusive practices plow over them.
it's a disgrace.
i wish for a world where all prices, including tips & taxes, are on the label / menu when i buy them and asking / giving anything on top is illegal. we would all be better off, even though americans for some reasons can't accept it - i have little trust in the headline of the linked article becoming a bigger phenomena.
The way I look at this is that I get to pay for socialism in the USA.
We'll never get it via the government, but at least I can improve some low paid workers' lives a bit.
I think you'd be very surprised to learn that in a lot of cases, tipping pays much better than whatever a "reasonable" hourly wage for taking an order and carrying food to a table would be. If you're serving three tables that each have $100 checks and you get at 15% tip, that's $45/hour... yes it may average out higher or lower but you're not gonna like how much eating out costs if employers are expected to pay the higher end of what a server can make (spoiler: waiters will demand that).
A famous recent example, the South Park guys bought a restaurant and eliminated tips with a very nice $30/hour wage. Seems pretty good, doesn't it?
Guess what? The waiters demanded a return to tipping[0]!
I am against the popular opinion and I actually tip if the hotel is somewhat cheap (ie food does not cost a small fortune). I do it out of selfish reasons. When I order chicken, I want them to bring me a good piece. Or if I order Porotta, I want them to bring me the most fresh one.
Or sometimes when I get a very tasty meal, I just tip them to share them some of the happiness that they brought me. But totally depends on how strapped for cash I currently am...
In the US, it wouldn’t be customary to tip before receiving service.
In my opinion, the 15-20% tip is so expected and routine in the US that the supposed incentive of a tip doesn’t make your service any better. Everyone gets roughly the same service and everyone gives roughly the same tip. It might as well be abolished.
It’s also worth looking up tipping practices and its segregation history in the US. Essentially, it became popularized because it was an easy way to get around laws surrounding the end of slavery and integration. The employer isn’t allowed to discriminate based on race or other factors, but the customer is allowed to.
Any recommendations for tipping in India? (Amounts etc) I was warned against tipping too much by locals who worried it could distort local economies toward tourists and away from local people.
Sounds like you talked to the locals who might end up being expected to pay tips. The ones who might expect to receive tips would have a different point of view.
I usually do like something between 30-50 Rs (around 10% of the cost of food). It is not a lot, but I don't think anyone would expect to be tipped more than that..
> The people breaking their backs and minds in the kitchen - often the least visible and the least celebrated - were taking home a fraction of what the front staff made on tips for the same hours
Why not put all tips into a pool and just share it out between everyone?
This is what many restaurants do in my country. It's fair but it creates many issues. How you split it, who decides that, and there is always someone that is suspect of stealing.
Another issue is that if Americans tip, then you start to expect tipping from everyone make the experience more expensive and worst from anyone else.
PS. I don't own a restaurant or work at one, but I have friends that do both.I live in Greece, that counts also as "Europe" I guess
The POS handles it automatically. The workers know how the tips are split. Remember that tip income is offset by a lower base wage. They do expect tipping.
The waiters are usually more racist the more dependent they are on tips. After the racially profile you, they adjust their service based on expected tip. This system in America is indefensible. Pay them a living wage!
Every time tipping comes up there's a vocal contingent of anti tippers, coming from one of these perspectives: European pride, cheap fuckery, or faux labor concerns.
It's important to remind that American restaurants work well - we have promp and good service as a rule, the majority of Americans are fine with and enjoy tipping and the vast majority of service workers enjoy getting them and are ahead financially vs European counterparts. This is our culture and we by and large like our culture.
It's fine to experiment with other options and it's (of course) fine to disagree and complain but it's also an important baseline to acknowledge that things mainly work and people mainly like it.
I've traveled to places where I would not tip and I don't remember the experience being very different. I say what food I want and get a plate with such food.
It's insane how it takes advantage of good people who feel like they're doing something wrong for hitting "no tip" in settings where nobody was asked to tip just 5-10 years ago.
On the other hand, lots of people have the liberating experience of discovering that "no tip" is a sensible default to press, and from then on we're out of the tipping game. Bots don't guilt trip me anymore, hooray!
Flip the script, you're a greedy ASSHOLE for asking people to tip in this economy! Now it becomes easier to hit 0 tip. Even try negative tip, some devices allow this bug.
It is pretty common to be prompted to tip by the PoS system in any place you can buy made-to-order food. This includes stores that are normal retail stores but also have some sort of made-to-order food. Like a fancy wine shop or gourmet food store that also sells sandwiches. But this isn't really a new phenomenon either. It's just that there used to be a tip jar sitting by the register, but now the PoS system prompts you because nobody carries cash anymore.
Tipping is a weird phenomenon that's only an issue in the Americas. I have traveled extensively all over Asia and even the same chain/restaurants which are US based don't actually have the concept of tipping. Sure, you can always tip if you want. However, the issue with tipping culture is the blatant entitlement. I always tell rude waiters who literally demand tips for shitty services this:
A tip is a token of gratitude, should the customer choose to offer. It is not an entitlement.
I get it, their wages aren't great. However, that is a discussion to be had with their employer, not me.
Of course, I want them to get paid a fair wage too - the only way to fight against this culture is taking a stand against tipping. If enough people don't tip, hopefully the restaurant will struggle to find staff and eventually - either close down or increase the wages. But, don't try to run a restaurant when you clearly can't afford to pay your staff a decent wage. That's just running a business on hopes and dreams. It's not my job to subsidize your poor financial and business planning.
I think you might be missing a couple words because it’s not clear what you grievance is. Not tipping a waiter in the USA is poor form regardless of your individual opinion on tipping culture.
He probably looked at you strangely because you don’t seem to know much about beer. Do you think all beer called a pilsner is imported from Czech Republic or all Vienna Lager is from Austria?
These are reasonable prices for a place much cheaper than SFO. This is what people pay in Eastern Europe. 2500 CZK for a set - around $120 - won't be at all surprising or perceived as high in Prague, for instance. It can go up to 8000 or so.
I'm from New York City and I've lived in Buenos Aires, Argentina, since 2006. I go back and forth between the two cities every year, and I can unequivocally say they couldn't be any more different when it comes to service. I'd say both locations expose extremes on opposite sides of the spectrum. In New York City, there's a burning need to turn tables and seats over as fast as possible, which really sucks for the customer experience. However, their service efficiency—especially when you're in a rush in a place like NYC—does have its benefits. Can you simply hang out and people-watch, or have a deep conversation with a friend without feeling pressured to leave, order something else, or be constantly interrupted every five fucking minutes? Nope.
In Argentina, tipping is not part of the culture. Socialism from back in the Perón days still lingers, although it's quickly changing now under the new government. Mentally speaking, though, employees feel entitled to do the least amount of work possible once their three-month grace period ends. They walk around the restaurant or bar with a "cara de culo" (literally "ass face"), sending you a clear message: Don't even bother me. You're not worth my time. I have zero incentive to make you a happy customer or make you want to come back. However, if you become a regular, they warm up to you—especially if you ask their name, tell them yours, take the time to ask about their life, and share a bit about yourself. About ten years ago, when the Venezuelan immigration wave hit, almost 50% of establishments quickly replaced their workers with happier Venezuelan immigrants who were cheaper and much more grateful for their jobs. For the first time, the industry finally had cheerful servers and staff, a change that was pleasantly welcomed by both business owners and customers.
My feeling is that there should be a happy medium somewhere in between, though I'm not entirely sure what that is. I like the gesture of tipping, and as a business owner, I like providing incentives and meaning to my staff. In the end, though, this seems to be a deeply embedded cultural quirk that starts when you're a child learning how to relate to other children and adults.
Personally, I prefer the laid-back Argentine style. I can sit down at any table in a café and enjoy five to ten minutes just to decompress, without someone immediately getting in my face to take my order. I need time to unwind. I need time to peruse the menu and check my Instagram feed. I need time—not everything is "time is money." I also need time after finishing a meal to take it all in, maybe journal a bit, notice my surroundings, and be in the present moment without any pressure to leave. Hell, if I want to open my laptop and keep working for another two hours, it's no problem—I'll just order another beverage. I get it. For me, this city moves at a much more natural, human pace than any other city I've ever lived in.
Ping me if you're in the barrio!
The owner wants the maximum ratio of servers to customers possible. In the typical USA system, being paid primarily in tips means the server is highly incentivized to upsell the customer as much as possible and do everything they can to increase the total bill, and therefor increase their tip. Essentially a commissioned sales person but the customer pays the commission.
This is the least efficient way to run a restaurant with regard to staffing.
European restaurants typically use a team service model, which greatly reduces the number of staff needed. Every front of house worker can take orders, make and serve drinks, run food to tables, etc. Instead of checking on the customer every few minutes they rely on the customer to ask if you need something. There is no pressure to run up the bill or clear out quickly in this model.
Sometimes it takes a lot of time to get your order at rush hours, but the culture tolerates patience and waiting.
If the service is extra good I might tip extra.
If the service is very bad (unreasonably slow, or staff forget or mix up the order in a significant way, or they are very rude), I tip 0%. Of course everyone can mess up things a little so it’s not like I immediately tip 0% just because of some minor thing. It has to be properly bad.
Also something I have learned from the Spanish is to always order something small and quick for the table even before we have decided what to eat. Then if it takes 40 minutes before the food comes it doesn’t matter that much compared to when you are starving for food. So this is a very neat trick that helps a lot to have a good experience even at slow places, and something I have started always doing.
Setting a baseline of 10% just says to me that the restaurant owners can just pay their staff less. And if the server is having an off day or just didn't meet your particular standards then they're losing money.
It would be a bizarre approach in Scandinavia because the consensus here is that companies must pay their employees a decent baseline salary -- which unions negotiate across the whole sector -- so there's no expectation of a tip by default.
But for much of the rest of the world, it's not a given that working conditions are as good.
I can't think of any long-term outcome of a tipping culture that is efficient for the workers and employers, even if the amount the customer tipped was correlated with quality (the research I've read shows it's got more to do with looks). It is simply more efficient that both parties know what they are agreeing to up front when (1) the worker still has to go to work for 3 months when they resign and (2) the employer has to pay them (and their replacement) full wages during training.
Thank you, A Swede.
She was non-Swiss herself though and I read it as trying to take advantage of a tourist
Why would being non-Swiss make someone more likely to take advantage of a tourist?
Which is it - low gini for talking to a waiter, high gini for starting a fam?
Spain’s gini coefficient indicates it is much more equal than USA, but not as equal as, say, Denmark.
In fact I'd say gini has nothing to do with birth rate. Birth rate declines when parents have confidence that there is a good likelihood their children will survive to adulthood.
It is often easy to forget that just five hundred years ago almost one of two infants born didn't survive into adulthood. Low birth rates are good. Don't let anyone say otherwise.
All these generalizations are as slippery as a bar of soap.
This is likely one of the absolute worst features of the US dining system.
So many times I have been sitting in deep conversation with friends or colleagues just for a waiter to claim all attention to ask if we want to have refilled water.
That they can even push themselves to such rude behavior is entirely insane to me.
The answer is always yes. I'd come get you if it weren't.
You do realize that it's perfectly acceptable and commonplace to explain your group's preferences to the server upon first being introduced? You're really telling them exactly what would make you happiest while also reducing the effort they need to spend on your group, a mutually beneficial setup.
Of course, incentives may not align in certain scenarios. On a busy night/time or at restaurants that don't have lots of seating, having a table that they can't 'turn over' quickly may be undesirable, especially if purchases (another round of drinks) aren't being made occasionally.
Are you sure? I've seen way more staff shortages in real life restaurants over the past 5-6 years than any other time in my life.
I really haven't been smothered by checkups every few minutes. When the servers are really good, they can anticipate when you need something by simply looking at you and your table. They know when your drink is empty and when you want it filled. A server should rarely need to ask that stuff verbally. If they are continually checking up, they are inexperienced or insecure.
After I make my order, the server will usually try and take my menu. Lately I've said "I'd like to hold on to this" and they love when you do that! I don't always follow-up with another order, but sometimes I just need an extra side dish, or a dessert.
I've had that overstaffed experience, too. There are one or two small chains around here that employ 3x as many servers as they need. And their rooms are always 1/5th full or less. So the moment I walk in, there are 3-4 people greeting me and escorting me to a table, before I can even pull off my hat and gloves. In the same place, while they don't appear to do "team service" I would meet one waitress, and then get fobbed off on another guy for no stated reason. If they are sharing tips, a lot of slices to that pie.
The feeling I get from those experiences is that I'm being rushed to clear the table, not that the service is great and always there to help me.
You could ask for the salt or ketchup when the meal arrives.
Also Europeans are not, I think, accustomed to asking for salt, or ketchup, on already seasoned food. So your request is actually unusual.
I would expect to find salt, pepper and mustard on the table in a decent restaurant, in my corner of Europe. Not ketchup, though, except in a cheap burger place.
For ketchup, I'm afraid you'll need to stay in the US.
That’s a perfectly valid reason for complaining, then. Politely, of course, but the chef might use the feedback.
One thing is true though, I never ever had to add salt in restaurant in past 25 years, one can ask for pepper/olive oil/etc but salt? They often use too much of it to enhance taste ie in sauces. Maybe get your kidneys and heart checked with such refined palate.
> European restaurants typically use a team service model, which greatly reduces the number of staff needed
100% this.
US restaurants have a "zone" model and always seem to need 3x the staff of European restaurants.
If you went the Euro model, you could have less staff and pay them more per head and therefore not need tipping.
> There is no pressure to run up the bill or clear out quickly in this model.
I think this is more a function of "need to turn over tables at some multiple per night to cover costs" but costs aren't just labor e.g. rent and food are also big line items.
Why? It sounds very weird. In every kind of business the owner has strong incentive to cut labor.
American chain restaurants also use the team model. The server that writes down the order often isn't the same person bringing out the hot plates of food. Maybe less of team than Europe because the waitress taking the order will typically be the same one refilling the drinks.
It's the white tablecloth high-end restaurants where the one waiter is the only person handling all interactions with the table.
What you are noticing is that many chains have a "full hands" rule: if any server with free hands walks past a table with dirty dishes on the way to the kitchen, they are expected to pick them up no mater who's section it is. Also, if they are heading out from the kitchen with free hands they are expected to run out some dishes no matter what table they are for.
In many USA restaurants, the waitstaff tips are also shared into a pool with the runners, busboys, and kitchen staff. The % may not be equal however.
>What you are noticing is that many chains have a "full hands" rule:
But that contradicts the idea that "USA restaurants almost always over staffed there." The chain restaurant could just "overstaff" with dedicated table runners with no need for a "full hands" rule.
It doesn't seem like USA restaurants are overstaffed nor do owners have the incentive to overstaff. The very common scenario is the hostess seats you at the table and the waiter doesn't even show up for 10 or 20 minutes to take the order and patrons are frustrated and wondering why it's taking so long. That's a symptom of understaffing where the waiter is handling too many simultaneous tables.
Especially because most payments are by card (where I live), the tip first ends up with the restaurant itself anyway, not individual waiters.
They didn't really mind the the typical service here, where you'll have to wait a bit before a waiter sees you. You get used to it.
On the other hand, you have the first time tourists, that will go "excuuuse meee" after 5 minutes in a restaurant if the waiter hasn't showed up to take a order, and become pissy when they discover that free refills isn't really a thing.
Most Americans traveling abroad are in my experience polite and patient. But there are always the bad apples that will keep tabs on how many times the waiter comes by to offer something, and demand immediate service.
I don't think so. The biggest upsell of a US-style tipping culture is that restaurant owners have a no-downside free pass in exploiting workers. They literally are allowed to have people working for them for barely paid and performing a role aimed at increasing throughout and demand. Therefore there is no incentive whatsoever for a restaurant owner to stop exploiting their staff.
I thought the greeters were an anti-shoplifting technique, "hello someone saw you here" kind of thing.
And putting a seat in the checkout station means they can't be packed quite as closely and also gets in the way when someone else needs to tag in to ring up booze or whatever.
Of course, there’s a bit of future optimization where they want you as a repeat customer, but that manifests in pretending they don’t want you out, not actually feeling that way. It makes sense - a rational revenue maximizing business does want you out but they need to pretend they don’t. The veneer is thin in many cases (though it varies by establishment). Personally, I’d prefer the incentives aligned with being a bit more straightforward, down to earth and without fake flattery.
I remember I had a meal once as a group of 5 about 10 years ago at a beachfront restaurant in Boca. At this group size a tip of 18% was added by default. Our waiter had been so cloying and over the top, calling us friends, etc. When the bill came and I didn’t tip anything other than 18% the waiter started shouting from across the room and made physical contact with me because he thought I hadn’t tipped. It was really a horrible experience, but very telling.
That's at least once too often.
Maybe you guys like your USA service model. Maybe Europeans are mistaken about USA service model. But one thing is certain - you USA guys have zero idea about speed of service on average in European cafes and restaurants, judging by your comments :) .
Europe has 40+ countries with what, a million, restaurants… let’s conflate them all! Horrible! The whole continent! 1 star (and not a Michelin one)!
> In the typical USA system...
> European restaurants typically...
But the interesting thing is that no one ever complains when people group things by continents like that if the theme is bashing the US and praising Europe. Only when talking bad about Europe it's suddenly an issue.
It's wild the extents to which Americans overestimate the cultural differences between their states and literal entire countries with actual differences. Scandinavia and the Mediterranean are quite different, Americans speaking in a different accent and maybe being slightly friendlier or not is nothing.
The reason I think is a mix of things: firstly people really want to make a night of it, seeing the whole dinner as an experience, and secondly the amount of staff (both waitstaff and in the kitchen) won't support a faster process.
Edit: it's not a case of better or worse, just different expectations going in
Repeat business is rewarded like in most places. I frequent many cafes and restaurants where I'm recognized and treated like family even though I have never once tipped there.
Obviously you will do as you please, but I wish tourists would try to get with the culture. As a European, one of many reasons I don't tip is that I don't want to encourage a class system where anyone who doesn't pay up is seen (and sees themselves) as stingy.
Also about the $10 - they would need to gather quite a few more dollar notes and spend time finding a cash exchange bureau. Else the note is just a memento of a weird American.
In some EU countries the tips have to be counted as salary and income (+social) tax paid, or even they have to be declared as revenue to the restaurant along with the VAT (19-25%) going straight to the state. Of course, when paid in cash - that rarely happens. The point is that the provision exists in the law (so the tips are not unheard of)
Also, those times depend on the place and location. The ones I've been lately were pretty fast
People come to a place to have fun and talk for a few hours or their free time. Drinks and food coming and going is just a small nuance. 10 minutes (often way less of course) for drinks to arrive is mostly okay. Nobody is busy waiting for them.
If you just want a quick meal there's more than enough places but you generally order at the counter there, don't sit and wait for a server.
Some extremely touristic areas can get away with anything.
Part of European dining is the social aspect, that gets ruined when you're constantly being asked if you want another drink.
So like every culture in the world then?
And the service is incredible. Japanese service culture is pretty amazing, if you are used to the US. You really want to tip them -much more than in the US.
I think the US underpays waitstaff pretty badly. They desperately need the tips, but in some places, they can do fairly well. I know lots of [former, mostly] bartenders, and they tell stories of bringing home hundreds of untaxed dollars, every night.
Maybe they should show the price "without tip" next to the full price, so people can compare.
Paying employees with tips is an insane concept, fundamentally abusive. If it wasn't, then the owner would also get paid from tips. "The meals are all free, and we count on you to pay them through tips". Obviously no owner would take that risk, because it is insane. They make their employees take that risk because they can abuse them, that's all.
Actually it's quite common for owners to take some of the tips, even though that's not legal.
And yeah, on top of abusing the employees by not paying them (and relying on the customers to pay the employees directly), stealing from the tip is even more abusive.
And let's not even talk about those delivery (and similar) apps that also abuse the tips in their algorithms.
That was not obvious. Nor is that a common practice
"Restaurant owners set a price on their dishes, because if everyone payed at will, the owners know they would make less money. Therefore we can assume owners know that paying at-will does not optimize earnings. Therefore, it's insane that they make their staff work for pay that's at-will".
I am not going to tip if I order and take my food from a counter and serve myself (and then almost certainly clear my own table as well), or I buy any other form of product standing up. Basically, if I'm standing for the entire customer service transaction, it's not tippable.
Of course, the staff also see how you tio before they prep your food...
I even suspect that I received sub-par service from some of them, who may have identified me as a "no-tip risk" from the first moment.
Source: I waited tables in NYC in a past life.
Southern europeans tip, there wouldn't be much difference there
Northern ones it depends, they don't tip at home but they usually do on vacations to southern europe (where tipping culture very much exists). Though some of that also has to do with currency conversions, at least historically, even if the tradition has stuck past the euro being introduced. So maybe that's why they don't tip when it comes to dollars?
This depends on the state. For example, in California, servers get state minimum wage, at least ($16.90/hour). On the other hand, most "red" states use the federal minimums: $2.13/hour for servers (!) and $7.25/hour for non-tipped employees.
So it’s really a way to extort good tips from customers, because it’s understood that our gratuities are the only way they can make minimum wage!
That was grossing up for her. Illegal? Likely. "But they have laws against that" - low wage employees are easily taken advantage of. They often _need_ that job.
For example, with Doordash and Uber Eats, tips are prepaid. The driver may also be made aware of their prospective tip during the bidding process. Therefore, tipping is gamified into enticing a driver into accepting the bid over other jobs.
I will not reduce a post-paid tip if I perceive that I got bad service. I usually won't increase it, either, without extenuating circumstances, for example, if the server overcame adversity somehow (especially if I was the adverse one). However, if a prepaid tip turns out to be unwarranted by horrendous service, I will go after that and require it to be reduced to $0. That is basically the only punishment that a customer can exact on a service worker. I don't like to do it, but if it was a prepaid thing, I consider that tip to be made under duress, and revocable.
With tip your bill can easily end up 40% higher.
Touristy places in central London maybe. They wouldn't dare try sneaking an undeclared service charge onto a locals bill in Northern England or Scotland :-)
> In the UK, they are legally but not practically or socially discretionary.
Speak for yourself. When entertaining clients at touristy places in London, one routinely asks for this underhand charge to be removed from the bill. (Whether or not we then choose to leave a cash tip is a matter of discretion, but the chances are rather low after such shenanigans).
At this point I'm waiting for supermarket self-checkout to add a default tip amount.
Esso petrol stations routinely ask for this, and the staff member ALWAYS clicks the 'no' button before you can offer your card.
Source: Somebody who drives around the UK a lot for work.
The old ones (never seen the tip option on those... for now): https://www.simple-shop.si/en/pos-terminal-tcpip-en and eg https://www.unicreditbank.si/si/podjetja/upravljanje-z-denar...
The new ones: https://www.sumup.com/sl-si/karticni-citalec-terminal/ and https://besteron.com/si/pos-terminali/ (both support tips) + many other in similar designs (full front touchscreen)
I don't think square supports slovenia for now, but POS vedors add the tip option, and our restaurant owners enable it, because it doesn't cost them anything, any many (especially foreign) guests "feel bad" for choosing the zero on the screen.
It's also more money to the company providing the payment system so they are incentivized to tell every restaurant to turn on tips.
I hate it. I don't know how to fight it except to try to start a movement big enough that everyone who goes to such a restaurant gives it 1 star and not not return, until it becomes unacceptable for business to do it. Like many things that is unlikely to happen without some major awareness campaign.
Edinburgh Fringe special variant: charging extra for plastic cups and then not accepting returns.
- may I ask: What does this actually mean?
I have never been to a "high class" or "fine dining" location, so maybe my expectations are in general not high.
My expectations are just simple: Give me the menu quickly, let me order quickly, let me eat and let me pay quickly.
Thats it. What do I miss?
EDIT: Im located in EU.
For example, let's say you're allergic to nuts. Not only should the menu list all allergens, but also you should be able to say "I'm allergic to nuts. Can I have the beef cheek without the walnut garnish?" and the waiter should know if that's possible or not, and if there are any other nuts hidden in there, without having to ask the chef. They can say "let me check with the chef", but if they don't need to check because they already know the dishes well enough, that's great service.
It goes without saying:
- if you can and do order it nut-free, the dish served to you should be nut-free
- the waiter shouldn't freak out like this is the first guest with allergies they've ever had to accomodate
- they shouldn't refuse to serve you anything at all because "there are nuts in the kitchen", even if you explain that you're ok with the presence of nuts in an area provided they're not deliberately part of the food
- they shouldn't hand you a binder of laminated pages marked "ALLERGENS" and make you find the menu entry yourself
Also, if you're doing a tasting menu with a party of six and the restaurant has already agreed to accommodate your allergies, but you sit at a different seat at the table, they shouldn't reliably serve the nut-free dishes to the wrong person, sitting in the seat they decided the allergic customer would be sitting at, for every course.
Great service is generally about "reading your mind": e.g. providing you with a replacement fork that you dropped without you needing to ask. Also, coordinating that "timing" you are after, perfectly. Good service is attentive without being overly present. If you ever ate somewhere in a sitdown restaurant and thought after "wow that was a great meal", service contributed to that.
It's really about reading the room. A good waiter won't bring the main of you're still finishing the wine that paired with your entrée. Won't come to pick the empty plates right in the middle of a lively conversation.
Things will land on and leave your table at the right time.
By contrast in the US the tip is mandatory. The server doesn't make any money and goes broke if you don't tip. So everyone does. Service would have to be astonishingly bad (waiter threw up on the customer?) to receive no tip. On the other end, one might give a somewhat higher tip if the server was particularly friendly, helpful, is related to you, is a friend of your kids, seems like they could use the money, and so on. There's no metric of "I was well served" that correlates to the tip.
Being interrupted every 2 minutes with a "Is everything ok?" is annoying.
Personally, I find the service in USA restaurants to be obnoxious, overly fake, and disruptive. I generally only go out to eat in Europe because I prefer a peaceful meal rather than a rushed one with a side of fake friendship.
Overly-solicitous hospitality staff can make me tense.
At the far end of the scale are bathroom attendants who want to help me wash/dry/moisture my hands after using the facilities.
Efficient service, good food, good prices (for a foreigner), no tipping expected or even possible.
Most people I know are happy to leave a tip - especially to reward great service as part of a great night, or in cases where you have a long term relationship with an establishment and its staff.
I can only imagine the staff is likewise happy to see the nice tip from us at the end of the night.
If you can only imagine "unnecessary bad feelings" - I can only imagine the tip you leave and how the staff feels about you. If you are so poor, you won't enjoy the price hike either and if you are not poor then just tip properly and move on.
Is poverty the only reason to dislike tipping in your eyes?
I'm absolutely fascinated by how sheltered you are, and I'm desperately trying to be charitable here as that's one of the more cunty things I've read on this site.
I benefit too. It’s a way for me to express gratitude.
The actual history of tipping: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tipping#History
And a bit on Sales Taxes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sales_tax#In_the_United_States
From old family stories, I figure the real reason for tipping service workers is that both employers and customers want there to be plenty of service workers available - but the demand for their labor (restaurant customers, whatever) is very unpredictable compared to factory, farm, or gov't work. And service industries can't afford to keep a lot of idle workers around at full pay. So tipping is a simple revenue-sharing scheme, wrapped in social niceties, that boosts/cuts the service workers' income based on whether business is currently fast or slow.
Anecdotally, a waitress could easily earn more than minimum wage during a shift. Sometimes easy clearing $100 when minimum wage was $7/hr (it was $2.15/hr for wait staff). Add to that the tip reporting was lax and no there’s no tax on tips, waiting is on par with minimum wage.
An interesting side effect is that adding waitstaff is marginal cost to an operator.
Yes, the staff are supposed to declare all their untraceable cash income, but...yeah.
So at least some of that income is untaxed, meaning higher net for same gross, meaning total prices even including tip can be lower.
I agree if you had the $200 sea food tower by yourself it deviates from that otherwise perfect proxy. But that's already a weird situation so just pay the tip and move on.
Likely certain single malts vs jim beam.
america was always weird - the tipping practice leads to over-the-top fake service, is abusive to staff and only benefits restaurant owners. and they turned all that up to 11 over the last few years. how americans can cherish and even defend this, i can't get my mind around it.
meanwhile in europe, american practices are imported by way of POS terminals asking in outrageous use cases for outrageous amounts of tips. no, im not tipping 30% for an item i pick from a shelf in a store. add to that the awkward interaction at a bar or so when you have to select a tip under the watchful eye of the server.
people are shamed into tipping in all manners of ways and let those abusive practices plow over them.
it's a disgrace.
i wish for a world where all prices, including tips & taxes, are on the label / menu when i buy them and asking / giving anything on top is illegal. we would all be better off, even though americans for some reasons can't accept it - i have little trust in the headline of the linked article becoming a bigger phenomena.
“The system will ask you a few questions”.
Bam I’m supposed to tip 25% for standing at a counter to order and take my food.
A famous recent example, the South Park guys bought a restaurant and eliminated tips with a very nice $30/hour wage. Seems pretty good, doesn't it?
Guess what? The waiters demanded a return to tipping[0]!
0: https://www.restaurantbusinessonline.com/workforce/casa-boni...
Or sometimes when I get a very tasty meal, I just tip them to share them some of the happiness that they brought me. But totally depends on how strapped for cash I currently am...
This is India, and not US, by the way..
In the US, it wouldn’t be customary to tip before receiving service.
In my opinion, the 15-20% tip is so expected and routine in the US that the supposed incentive of a tip doesn’t make your service any better. Everyone gets roughly the same service and everyone gives roughly the same tip. It might as well be abolished.
It’s also worth looking up tipping practices and its segregation history in the US. Essentially, it became popularized because it was an easy way to get around laws surrounding the end of slavery and integration. The employer isn’t allowed to discriminate based on race or other factors, but the customer is allowed to.
Why not put all tips into a pool and just share it out between everyone?
One place is a very popular restaurant with counter service. The other is a bar.
I also earn tips playing music on the side.
Another issue is that if Americans tip, then you start to expect tipping from everyone make the experience more expensive and worst from anyone else.
PS. I don't own a restaurant or work at one, but I have friends that do both.I live in Greece, that counts also as "Europe" I guess
Is this before taxes or what remains after?
It's important to remind that American restaurants work well - we have promp and good service as a rule, the majority of Americans are fine with and enjoy tipping and the vast majority of service workers enjoy getting them and are ahead financially vs European counterparts. This is our culture and we by and large like our culture.
It's fine to experiment with other options and it's (of course) fine to disagree and complain but it's also an important baseline to acknowledge that things mainly work and people mainly like it.
Of course, I want them to get paid a fair wage too - the only way to fight against this culture is taking a stand against tipping. If enough people don't tip, hopefully the restaurant will struggle to find staff and eventually - either close down or increase the wages. But, don't try to run a restaurant when you clearly can't afford to pay your staff a decent wage. That's just running a business on hopes and dreams. It's not my job to subsidize your poor financial and business planning.
They had 'Brussels IPA' and 'Belgian IPA', I ordered those beers coming from Brussels and did not knew those beers.
The waiter looked at me strangely. I did not gave any tips.
https://youtu.be/M4sTSIYzDIk?si=VkoIHgKpIFz-eMOJ
+1 reason not to travel to USA
..and the most hilarious example of how the capitalist overlords keep the peasants fighting over pennies amongst themselves
No. The customer pays your boss → your boss pays you. Stop being bitches and demand your bosses to pay you a proper salary.