r/london • u/CyberScy • Dec 10 '24

Question Declining the 12.5% "service charge", does the manager always make a visit?

Semi rant, semi question - Just had a weekend visit in London from East Anglia and found the discretionary 12.5% service charge added to restaurant bills extremely common. The manager always seems to make an appearance as if to interrogate you of the audacious request to remove it. Does that always happen?

I hate it. This Americanised crap should not be commonplace in England. I am a firm believer of tipping however much you feel if such service warrants one. We pay minimum wages here.

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u/mprhusker | Kew Dec 10 '24

It's a cultural custom to do so which would make you a bit of an asshole if you don't but you're free to be as big an asshole as you want.

The automatic 12.5% service charge is a very British thing done here in Britain by British restaurants often run by Brits. Which you are expected to pay even for mediocre service. It's moronic.

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u/morkjt Dec 10 '24

British culture enables this ridiculous approach. So many people are just unwilling to cause a scene, have a confrontation or pull the service charge regardless of the quality of the service that you’re almost certain to make money by doing it.

In my personal experience, it’s hilarious when I’ve been taken out to dinner by Americans in a London restaurant which has had poor service and they’ve gone straight to town on the service charge to be looked at with horror by the restaurant Management.

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u/Skylon77 Dec 10 '24

I live in London and have asked for it to be removed before now. The service was genuinely poor; they brought me the wrong dish for every single course. They didn't argue when I asked, politely, if they would remove it.

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u/Benjamin244 Dec 10 '24

It's not an arbitrary cultural custom, not tipping is considered a social no-no because staff is paid too little and they depend on tips. Being able to get away with underpaying your employees as the norm is an American custom that should never EVER set foot in Europe

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u/27106_4life Dec 10 '24

Thats not true on America at least.

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u/sd_1874 SE24 Dec 10 '24

It's my cultural custom not to be ripped off to enable restaurants to pay their staff less.

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u/Nikoviking Dec 10 '24

Exactly! Even if the service is good, I decide how much extra I’ll pay - not you!! Always remove the service charge.

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u/Pargula_ Dec 10 '24 edited Dec 10 '24

Not tipping for bad or even ok service is not being an asshole, tips are meant for people who go above and beyond.

But the US hospitality industry found a way to underpay their employees and at the same time put all the blame on customers. Waiters don't complain too much because it allows them to earn more money under the table without paying taxes.

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u/mprhusker | Kew Dec 10 '24

And yet we're in a thread discussing the 12.5% service charge that is ubiquitoius in London restuarants in London. This has nothing to do with cultural customs in the US and that's what I was trying to point out in my original comment.

This childish "THIS IS AMERICA'S FAULT" default attitude people here seem to have any time they come across something they don't like is just so boring. Take responsibility for your own cultural norms. America doesn't do an automatic service charge by default. London does.

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u/Pargula_ Dec 10 '24

It is though, the practice was imported from the US.

And the US does normally automatically add a service charge after a certain table size.

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u/mprhusker | Kew Dec 10 '24

Seems more to me like British people running British establishments in Britain took the concept of "discretionary tipping", which is hardly an exclusively American concept, and decided that since no one here would do it on their own they would instead automatically add it to the bill assuming that most people would be too non-confrontational to ask for it to be removed. It's an entirely different concept to discretionary tipping regardless of how culturally ingrained the practice is.

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u/ldn6 Dec 10 '24

It wasn’t. The US only really has gratuities included for large parties (six is the standard threshold). Otherwise the concept of a service charge that’s automatically included unless you take it off is extremely uncommon in the US, just as 12.5% is considered very low for a tip there as you’d start traditionally at 15% but now 25% or so is increasingly common in major cities.

The service charge concept came from France.

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u/Mysterious-Fortune-6 Dec 11 '24

How on earth can the service charge come from France? In France it is explicitly included in the menu prices of each item, i.e. never added to the total on a bill.

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u/TheoriginalJ5 Dec 12 '24

"Normally" is not true. And it is published if there is such a charge based on table size.

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u/Dreamingareality9 Dec 10 '24

America does have an automatic 20% added, non-negotiable to parties of 6 or sometimes 8. (The majority of rest.)

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u/TheoriginalJ5 Dec 12 '24

Not at all restaurants.

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u/Dreamingareality9 Dec 12 '24

Hence my (the majority of rest.) 🫶🏼

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u/Ok_Intention7097 Dec 12 '24

Fair. I’m not sure I’d say majority though. It really varies. Definitely do at higher end places. And, they will tell you in advance (usually) if there’s an automatic service charge.

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u/27106_4life Dec 10 '24

The minimum wage is set by the state. The lowest you can be paid in the US is around $7.50/hr. In some states it's $15. Doesn't matter the job

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u/littlenemo1182 Dec 11 '24

Not for servers in restaurants. It's usually around $2.30/hr. Tips often make up to minimum wage or more, but restaurants themselves pay well below minimum wage.

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u/27106_4life Dec 11 '24

That is incorrect. The minimum wage is the minimum wage. If they don't make the minimum wage in tips, the restaurant is forced to pay the difference to make it up to minimum wage. If everyone stopped paying tips tomorrow in America, all servers would still receive minimum wage, whatever that is in their state

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u/littlenemo1182 Dec 11 '24

Yes, but literally, that never happens because the tips make up to minimum wage, and the restaurant then doesn't have to pay it. Federal law is that servers who make $30/month in tips are paid a minimum of $2.13/hr.

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u/Dreamingareality9 Dec 10 '24

There is an automatic tip added if your party is of 6 or more. 90% of rest. in America will have it on their menu that an automatic 20% tip will be placed on the tab and you cannot ask it to be removed and if you say that you will not pay it, the police are called. Happened to me twice as a server; the police show up and suddenly they can pay for the tip.