Tipping
 

Thought I'd start a new thread so as not to hijack the Eat it or Send It Back discussion, but I have a question for you with serving experience.

Several posters have mentioned that servers have to "tip out" the bartenders and bussers at the end of the evening. But it was my understanding that those folks didn't make the lower tipping minimum wage, but who make actual minimum wage. Why should servers, who earn less with the assumption that they will make up for it in tips, have to share their tips with those who make actual minimum wage?

Not all servers make less than minimum wage. In New York State servers are required to make regular minimum wage, so after tips, they make considerably more than bartenders, busboys, and hostesses.

Hostesses and bartenders do NOT make minimum wage at many places [I can't say all, but I don't know of any that they do]. Same for busboys. The problem is that the owners prefer to have the servers pay the hostesses, etc than the company pay them. It's stupid.

You tip out because the quality of the work done by the other staff directly impacts how much you can make.

Waiting tables is easiest when you get in a good rhythm, and things are flowing. When I waited tables, if I was getting slammed I would often just give up on tables. I'd look for tables that were spending a lot of money, seemed nice, and felt like they were going to tip well for good service. If you weren't all those things, I'd make the conscious decision to only do the minimum for your table and hope for the best when it came time for the tip. BUT, if I was in rhythm - there was good spacing in the timing of tables, things were progressing smoothly, there were no emergencies, then it was very easy for me to give great service to all my tables. As such, my tips would be higher.

Busboys help you flip your tables - so they stay dirty for shorter periods of time. Then you can get tables re-sat.

Good hostesses can make your job unbelievably easier based on how/when they seat you. If they're paying attention and willing to give you even just a little bit of time between seating two tables, it makes things easier. Or if they're willing to help get drinks started or take to-go containers to tables, again easier.

Bartenders who are fast and accurate in their drink making means I don't have to wait forever to get my drinks to my table, keeping me in sequence.


When the whole team is clicking, a restaurant works amazingly well.

That automatic tip charge bugs me to no end!

I would tip way more than the "auto charge" for good service when the table is that big (seriously one night we tipped $150 for a $400 4-person meal, the service was the *best* I ever had!), but when it is taken out of my control, I do not tip anything more than what is added to my bill.

Sometimes it has to be done though because you'll get that large party and they'll throw a 10 down on a $100 bill. It's hard to judge who's going to give and who isn't.

I'm a person who regularly tips 20% or more. I know that servers don't generally make a lot of money and that they work very hard. With that said, I have come across some pretty terrible servers and usually they'll get 15% (or sometimes less). But what I absolutely loathe is the included 18% gratuity that is automatically put on the bill of a party of 6 or more. If they're a good server, they lose out because now I'll only give them 18% versus the 20% plus that I would've given had gratuity not been included. Also, why should I have to pay 18% is the service is terrible? I had a really bad experience at a restaurant last year on my friend's b-day. The waitress was flat-out nasty. She put a bunch of items on our bill that we had never ordered and told us that we were liars when we said we had not ordered the items nor had they ever been brought to our table. When the kitchen finally told her that she was wrong, she mumbled an apology and had the manager fix our bill while she hid in the back. While those items were removed from our bill (and we got a free piece of cake....to share between 9 people), the 18% gratuity was not. It's like this waitress was being rewarded even though she was a general asshat to us.

I can see some of the points about the auto gratuity, but having been a server in a college town at a restaurant that didn't add gratuity no matter the size of the party I often wished we would've had it. Tips in general were pretty bad there no matter how good a server you were. Even the poor tips weren't as bad as the people who come in and let their kids run all over and don't watch them.

I always tip 20% if not more... I'm very forgiving because even though I'm a good server, I know what it's like to be in the weeds.

Adding gratuity should be up to the server, we call it "a roll of the dice" because if you don't add it you could get really lucky or get screwed.
I usually can read my tables well enough to know that the 20% from autograt is all i'm going to get or if they'll throw down more than that.

I hate to say this, but women almost always just leave the bare basic amount, especially in groups, I had lots of them this holiday season.... Plus they are usually a huge pain in the @ss... :p

I noticed this, too, when I was a server. I usually got the general 15% (or less, sometimes) if I was waiting on women dining together. If I had a male-female couple, I usually got between 15-20%. If I had a table of all gentlemen, I'd get a really good tip. 20-25% and above sometimes. Once I waited on the Anheuser-Busch reps who came to our restaurant and they gave me $60 on a $100 bill. I know they probably got to write it off, or were dining on the company card, but still. I wonder, though, if gender does make a difference in how a server is tipped. Will a woman-patron tip more for a male server? My hunch is probably yes.

If you really want to tip more, leave it on the table. I'm sure they're not going to chase after you and give it back. The problem is, like many people said, groups can either be feast or famine so they have to protect themselves. By the time 15 people figure out who got what, sometimes people undertip through no fault of their own...I've seen it happen often.

I've worked at two restaurants that had a policy where gratuity had to be added to checks for large parties. I always hated it, because I tend to average pretty high tips, and most people would just leave it at whatever the added gratuity was. But, I didn't have a choice.

Also, as for tipping out, the rules have been different at all 9 restaurants/bars I have worked at. Some have you tip out on sales, some have you tip out on tips, some restaurants pay them so you don't have to - there's really no rhyme or reason to it.

Or, someone sees the person next to them throw down $2-3 and figures that's good for them too, and the person on the other side of them does the same thing...

Although I must say, some of my best tips came from large groups of Greeks. Of course, I would throw my PanHel affiliation out there, for good measure.;)

Unless I have really bad service, I generally tip between 18-22%. I usually also tip above that when the service is excellent.

I don't have a problem with the auto-tip being added to large parties at all! Sometimes when you dine with that many, people will be cheap or not add up their portion properly and the server often times is the one who gets screwed. Also, I think young people tend to be bad tippers...I remember when I was in high school and 10-15 of us would get together and go out to eat late at night; there was always someone who walked out or didn't put down enough money and I felt bad for our servers. And, sometimes, people will just round the cost of their meal up and assume that covers the tax and tip (think again!).

As I mentioned in the "do you eat it or send it back" thread, I have no problem tipping when someone does a personal service for me, but it bothers me that nearly every shop now has a tip cup on their counter.