We’ve got to draw the line somewhere. It’s common knowledge that the modern expectations on tipping have gotten way out of hand in post-Covid culture.
So I’m going to call it. I am going to not only let you off the hook, but I am going to empower you to not leave a tip when prompted at a self-service restaurant- and to do so with confidence.
It will not make you a bad person. Instead, it will make you a person with strong boundaries and common sense; both of which are currently uncommon traits in American society right now.
I refuse to live in fear of being virtue signaled or someone telling me to “do better”. I am a good person. I can’t make everybody happy. If I could, then I would certainly be doing something wrong. Instead, I have a backbone.
The fundamental issue with tipflation is that customers are conflating the obvious obligation to tip a server whose hourly wage before tips is less than minimum wage versus a glorified cashier who is being paid at least minimum wage and apparently splits the tips with their coworkers.
Paying the person a tip up front is the equivalent of justifying giving out participation trophies.
The phrase has now become a cringy cliche: “It’s just going to ask you a few questions on the screen…”
I was a nice guy for the first several years of it. But now…
Now I am done buying into the concept of paying the “let me prove I am a good person” tax.
Now I officially and intentionally hit “no tip”. I actually get a thrill out of specifically being one of the people who goes to through the trouble to not tip a cashier at a self-service restaurant.
My son has found a burrito place that he likes to be taken to. It’s the exact same concept as Subway, but with burritos instead. It actually takes the workers less time and effort than if they were making a sub at Subway.
When it’s time to pay, there is not an option to leave no tip. But I figured it out this past week!
You have to choose “custom tip” and then not enter an amount- and then hit “next” or “enter”. Then it takes you to the total amount with no tip and lets you pay.
I proclaim that I am not being sneaky or shady for figuring this out nor for acting on it. It’s quite the opposite: The restaurant has designed it so that customers feel forced to leave a tip to give their workers “a raise”.
And when these businesses promote their job openings and recruit new workers, I assume there is mention of the possibly of sharing tips, on top of the wage.
To be clear, I always tip actual servers at restaurants, as well as my barber, at least 20 percent. And not only “if they provide exceptional service”.
It’s a pretentious concept that I should tip before the service, as if to imply that service will somehow be better if I pay more up front.
I can tell you for a fact: I have never been thanked the many times I have tipped someone before the service, as prompted by the computer screen. However, I have often been thanked when I tipped after the service was provided.
The converse checks out too: I have never been confronted by a cashier, acknowledging I hit “no tip” on the screen. Accordingly, the service I received was never worse because I left no tip up front.
In the summer of 1999, I worked as the cashier at Hardee’s. I made minimum wage. No one ever tipped me, nor should they have.
In the summer of 2005, I worked as a server at a steakhouse called Western Sizzlin’. My hourly wage was a little over $2. I depended on tips to at least be paid minimum wage.
There is clearly a difference. We can stop being too nice now. The Covid Epidemic was half a decade ago.
If people want to think I am a “bad person” and need to “do better” due to not tipping a computer screen…
Let them.
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