Attention Foreign Tourists
In Europe, when you go to a restaurant it's 'service compris" which means that the price of the meal includes a tip for your server.
In America, as most of us know, unless you're in a large party, it's up to you to tip your server. The standard is 15-20%. You can tip 10% if the service and food was really horrific, but it's still pretty tacky. Servers make $2.50 per hour and they're expected to "tip out" the food runners and bartenders out of the money their patrons leave them.
Many fine tourists to our country are seemingly unaware of this.
My cousin is a kickass waitress. She's really good at it. She gets the orders right, she checks in on you at the appropriate time. And she looks like a super model. She knows a lot about the menu. And for this, on several occasions she was tipped between nothing and one percent by European patrons on checks totaling over $500.
What could be done to let people entering this country that this is totally culturally unacceptable?
Seriously, I'm really curious. I'm sure that it's not people being stingy, I just think they are totally clueless that it's just part of the meal.
In America, as most of us know, unless you're in a large party, it's up to you to tip your server. The standard is 15-20%. You can tip 10% if the service and food was really horrific, but it's still pretty tacky. Servers make $2.50 per hour and they're expected to "tip out" the food runners and bartenders out of the money their patrons leave them.
Many fine tourists to our country are seemingly unaware of this.
My cousin is a kickass waitress. She's really good at it. She gets the orders right, she checks in on you at the appropriate time. And she looks like a super model. She knows a lot about the menu. And for this, on several occasions she was tipped between nothing and one percent by European patrons on checks totaling over $500.
What could be done to let people entering this country that this is totally culturally unacceptable?
Seriously, I'm really curious. I'm sure that it's not people being stingy, I just think they are totally clueless that it's just part of the meal.
posted by Margaret at 8:16 PM
2 Comments:
Tipping is also totally tacky.
I much prefer the European system. For a while there were some restaurants converting to it, but that fizzled.
Happy New Year!
I also prefer the European system. I hate feeling blackmailed into adding 20% to the cost of my already expensive meal.
But this is what it is. It's wrong not to tip and I think a lot of people just have no idea.
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