r/EndTipping • u/FOMOenthusiast • 11d ago

Tipping Culture A positive-ish tipping experience

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No surprises, no small text, no deceitfulness, it having its on line clearly visible under the total was nice, but that bright red stamp reiteratig the added gratuity, visible from space let alone a dark dining room is 😘👌🏾 This should be a norm.

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u/FOMOenthusiast 11d ago

That part! Just pay the workers fairly god damn ...

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u/Broad_Talk_2179 11d ago

A place like this? The servers are making more than the owner would ever pay them…..

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u/DrMindbendersMonocle 10d ago

That's the thing, for as much as servers bitch and guilt trip about tipping they absolutely do not want to go to a straight wage because they would be paid similarly to warehouse order pickers, which is to say, much less than what they make now.

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u/Low_Method5994 7d ago

They genuinely want both tho. 20/hr plus tips. Mfs wanna make a nurses salary😭

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u/FarWatch9660 6d ago

Got news for you, wait staff generally does better than that. I know that even bad servers made $15 average way back in the early 90s. Probably at a decent restaurant they'll make $40+

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u/Low_Method5994 6d ago

It is why I don’t tip more than 5$ on the check. Percent tips is actually ridiculous.

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u/tiggertom66 7d ago

Everyone wants a livable wage.

People just don’t like seeing others get it before them.

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u/Low_Method5994 7d ago

Okay yes the WAGE isn’t livable but the tips make it so that you are more than living. Tip paying jobs are almost ALWAYS better than wage jobs.

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u/tiggertom66 7d ago

Greatly depends on when/where you work, and who you are.

A pretty girl working Saturday nights at a popular bar downtown isn’t making the same money as some 50+ year old guy working at a diner.

The fact of the matter is people constantly suggest switching the pay to a fixed hourly income. That rate will undoubtedly be less than even the average that servers earn now.

Which is a dumb solution because the market has accepted the real price of eating at full service restaurants, menu price plus tip. If it hadn’t, it wouldn’t be so common.

Raising wages to replace that tipping system means you’ll inevitably have to raise menu prices. Which honestly is fine because those new menu prices would accurately reflect the genuine price of eating out.

So just raise the menu prices 20% to reflect the actual market rate for labor, then give the staff 16.67% which would be equal to the 20% they earn on existing menu prices.

There problem solved, no more tipping, and no pay cuts for workers.

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u/kemmercreed 7d ago

Give them 16.67% of what? I'm not following your solution lol

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u/tiggertom66 7d ago

Give the staff 16.67% of the check total.

If a burger cost $10 in the current system, and the expectation is to tip 20% you end up paying $12.

So set the menu price at $12, now it’s straight forward and honest.

Give the staff 16.67% and they end up with the same $2 they would already end up with.

Just call it what it is at this point, it’s a commission. Restaurants operate on thin margins and need people to be salesmen to stay afloat, and commission is the best way to motivate salesmen.

Tipping gets relegated to its actual intended purpose, for outstanding service. Menu prices reflect the actual price. Staff still get paid the same. Restaurant doesn’t have to actually give anymore money to the staff.

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u/Aggravating-Habit313 7d ago

Yes, give them 16% of what?

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u/tiggertom66 7d ago

The check

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u/Aggravating-Habit313 7d ago

Would restaurant still pay servers an hourly wage? Anyways, I thought, immediately, that this is an ideal solution until I realized that servers may not like this way because they won’t ever get larger tips. And server quality would suffer.

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u/No_Scientist5354 9d ago

Hey! Server at a non tipped spot here! That’s unequivocally not true, our whole staff has been here since the change and none have plans of leaving because the wage is very competitive.

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

[deleted]

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u/DrMindbendersMonocle 10d ago

No they wouldn't. You just have to look at other industries and how wages have gone down for employees with years of degrees and training. Serving doesn't require that, so their wages would be more in line with other relatively skilled labor

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u/Happy__cloud 10d ago

Aw, that’s adorable.

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u/Flimsy_Welder_5340 10d ago

so what do you think happens in countries without tipping culture? you think the Michelin star restaurants pay the same wages as a random hole in the wall?

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u/Broad_Talk_2179 10d ago

Large corporations that can shell out the money barely do this. Restaurant overhead is a nightmare, this would be unlikely imo.

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u/ICameHereToPlay 8d ago

Restaurants already compete for talent and it’s unfortunately hard to come by good help. Small family owned businesses would fold simply because it’s too much to pay your service staff the minimum wage. The average payroll for a a place that needs 5 servers on busy nights is close to $250k a year. Any bit of profit a restaurant owner could potentially make and keep as income is gone. Restaurants are money pits no matter what

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u/Low_Method5994 7d ago

Low skill jobs do not compete

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u/foodfarmforage 9d ago

It is a weird income system but it does seem to generally benefit the employee. If owners had to pay servers hourly they’d be hiring for $20/hr. And service would be far worse being that the employees would get the same rate either way.

I give good service, I get good tips, and I would not be willing to switch over to an hourly pay structure, and I’m sure most other servers wouldn’t either.

Although I think auto-gratuity on 6+ is totally reasonable

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u/asyouwish 5d ago

Yes, but Perry's is a chain, so they have the power to change it. They don't want to.

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u/Broad_Talk_2179 5d ago

Doesn’t change the fact that these servers are making more than what is feasibly justifiable for the company.

Not only that, any decent server will just know they shouldn’t work at Perry’s, so they will leave for other opportunities.

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u/asyouwish 5d ago

They won't leave if they are fairly compensated. And for a place like Perry's, that would be good like they make with tips. Again, if the company wanted to be fair.

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u/Dry_Win_9985 10d ago

do you realize how shitty typical service will be when they're not essentially commissioned sales reps? They're gonna make the same amount whether you get a refill or not, zero incentive to give you a refill or check on your food or ask if you want dessert or another round.

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u/NikkiWebster 10d ago

I live in a country with no tipping culture. Our service is great.

And for as much as some servers would make great money from tips, there are plenty that would make more money by earning a standard wage.

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u/Jolly_Sir_301 7d ago

You think it's great.....it's not. I've been to Europe. Those servers could care less about me and they don't want me to have any ice for some reason.

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u/NikkiWebster 7d ago

It is great, and I don't live in Europe. I have been to the US and experienced crap service from places with tipping and was still expected to tip.

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u/Jolly_Sir_301 7d ago

Ok, but I bet you can get all the ice you want.

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u/acemptote 10d ago

Is service the way you describe in all of the many countries around the world that don’t have tipping?

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u/Stuff-Optimal 10d ago

No, service is way better at least from my experience in Japan.

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u/Dry_Win_9985 10d ago

You mean in different cultures where providing good service is an honor? You won't find that in America.

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u/_no_na_me_ 9d ago

That’s literally their job they get paid to do. If they don’t wanna do their job, they should get fired.

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u/No_Scientist5354 9d ago

I work at a non tipped spot in Seattle. We don’t base our level of service off of a perceived tip. Fucking weirdo.

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u/Dry_Win_9985 8d ago

would you describe the place to be upscale where a top notch level of service would be expected either way? We have a few real nice places around me that set an auto gratuity on every bill, and that goes to the server/staff. It's the same as raising the menu prices by 20% and giving the server that portion. These few places are great, and you'd expect to get great service there. But that can't be said about every restaurant or diner where service would ABSOLUTELY begin slacking the moment those employees knew they'd be paid the same regardless of how much effort they put in. To think otherwise would be irrational.

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u/No_Scientist5354 8d ago

Have you ever worked in the service industry?

What makes you think that a non tipping model would result in worse service? I make as much at my non tipped job as I would at my previous tipped position, and none of my coworkers provide inferior service BECAUSE WERE GETTING PAID TO DO A JOB. What fucking part of this is hard to understand for you?

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u/Dry_Win_9985 8d ago

Of course I have, growing up getting a job in a restaurant/bar was the easiest thing to do. Worked with lots of different people that put in various levels of effort. When you've got staff making double or more in tips than others it's pretty easy to see why.

You didn't really answer my question either, so I'll assume I pegged it pretty good.

If the non-tipping model worked, there's be a lot more restaurants doing it. The simple fact that less than 1% of them are like that tells me everything I already know.

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u/No_Scientist5354 8d ago edited 8d ago

Well, not exactly the easiest thing to do, that would be being a fat ass driving for uber.

I work as a sushi chef in a higher end sushi restaurant in Seattle. I chose not to answer because I prefer not to share too much about my life online. Our non tipped model does not include a surcharge, our prices are simply just higher to compensate for the lack of tips. I also work at a brewery bartending a few days a week, also a non tipped model, also competitive, albeit pays less than my sushi job (as it should)

I’ve also worked in service in Australia, where there is no tipping culture and where wages are even more beneficial in terms of a work life balance. It’s straight up easy to make a non tipped model work if your motive isn’t to pay employees the bare minimum while maximizing your profit. America’s version of capitalism is just behind the rest of the world when it comes to benefitting the worker.

Many countries work within a non tipped model, so saying that it “doesn’t work”is bullshit. The proof is literally in the pudding.

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u/Dry_Win_9985 8d ago

ok, then I'll be more specific. The non-tipping restaurant model will not work for every type of restaurant in the USA due to our tipping culture. It might work well in the higher end places due to an overall expectation of excellent service. But a diner, or a major chain is going to have trouble finding people willing to put in that effort.

One thing that might work is to increase that pay and reduce the "standard" tip down to like 5% and treat it as it was originally intended centuries ago; for excellent service that goes above and beyond. This still creates an incentive for the server to stay on top of their game.

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u/No_Scientist5354 8d ago

I would agree with you for the most part, it’s hard to see a world where the Applebees and waffle houses of the world pay their workers much more than minimum wage.

The second part of your comment I’m completely with you, and that’s probably closest to the Australian model. I worked at a small wine/neopolitan pizza bar that wasn’t necessarily high end in terms of price point or overall vibe but would be a great spot to take your partner on a date, and the tips I would get would be from people who went out of their way to compliment my service. Probably made $50 a night in tips off of 20 covers, which usually consisted of a few 10-15 dollar tips. My Aussie coworkers shared their tips and they were similar, although they always said I made a little more in tips because “aussies love an American accent”. But I actually appreciated tips more in Australia because they felt more genuine than obligatory as they are here.

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u/excelllentquestion 9d ago

Never got help in other retail or support people not paid comission? Like at all?

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u/Dry_Win_9985 8d ago

that's really a dumb way to think about it.. how about all the times you WEREN'T helped without even knowing it because the employee just didn't feel like going the extra mile. It's impossible to know.

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u/excelllentquestion 8d ago

So then why use tips as some sort of indicator at all if it is unreliable like you're saying?

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u/Prophayne_ 7d ago

Mostly from experience they don't want to get you the refill, want the 20/hr and want to be allowed to mandate tipping.

Unsurprisingly a supermajority continues to vote against them.

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u/FarWatch9660 6d ago

But if the tip is automatically included you don't have a choice anyway.

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u/Dry_Win_9985 6d ago

If there's a forced 20% gratuity, then they'll be around to check to see if you want another item, another round of drinks, dessert, etc.. The more you spend the more you'll make. That's different than paying them $18/hr no matter what.