this post was submitted on 25 Oct 2023
12 points (100.0% liked)
AskBeehaw
2003 readers
1 users here now
An open-ended community for asking and answering various questions! Permissive of asks, AMAs, and OOTLs (out-of-the-loop) alike.
In the absence of flairs, questions requesting more thought-out answers can be marked by putting [SERIOUS] in the title.
Subcommunity of Chat
This community's icon was made by Aaron Schneider, under the CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
When COVID started, I started tipping everywhere including fast food restaurants, coffee shops, take out counters, etc. At the time I considered it to be a sort of "hazard pay" almost, since I felt bad for the workers having to be on the front line against their will.
These days with most people (including the employees) disregarding COVID as a whole, I no longer feel the need to tip everywhere, but I find it very hard to know where to tip.
I used to (before COVID) use the rule of thumb that if there was a cash tip jar, then the tip was not expected; but with the POS machines always asking for tips I honestly get pretty confused about what's expected of me.
Even when I'm confident a tip is not necessary (a merch booth, for example), I feel incredibly guilty searching the POS screen for the "no tip" button.
In most grey area situations I usually just take the L and add a tip because I'm fairly certain I'm getting paid more than whichever worker would be receiving the tip and it's a nice easy minor method of wealth distribution. I usually just consider it part of the cost of the good/ service.
In terms of the main portion of the question (percentages tipped): if it's something I think I would have tipped on pre-COVID my starting point is 20%, if it's a grey area situation where I'm pretty sure I'm not actually "supposed" to tip my starting point is usually 15%.
This is what I do, with one more category - I tip 22 or more to small, local businesses I use. Box stores or large franchises, not so much.
During covid, when I did order takeout we kept it to our favorite two places, hoping they'd survive, which they did. When we went back to in person it turns out I was known - it was a funny way to become a regular. So I feel like it must have made a difference.
Anyway. The landscape is increasingly complicated and I think we've got to choose the one or two things that are important.
I can get behind the idea of wealth redistribution. I'm making decent money (enough to eat out in Seattle) so I usually tip 15% normally and 20% if I've been a nuisance with special requests, etc.
The idea of knowing who my money goes to is important. If I can interact with waitstaff and tip them for helping me through the dinner transaction, I feel like it's a bargain. On the other hand the tip jars seem like a donation to management and not the workers. On the POS screen, it's always 'no tip' for me with cash on the table.