J.J. in WA wrote:

> This reminds me of an incident that happened in the early 70's,
> when I was pretty young. My mother and I had a nice lunch at a
> local diner, and I really like the waitress. On the way out, I
> put some money on the table for her, just as my mom had done.
> It was all that I had, but since I was about 7 years old, it was
> a mere two cents. I thought I was being nice, but my mother was
> horrified when I told her about it later -- she said what I had
> done was terribly insulting even though she had left a decent
> tip herself. I wonder what that long-ago waitress thought when
> she saw those two pennies...


She probably thought you were a sweet little boy, smiled to herself and
never gave it another thought. A penny left on the table can be an
insult if there are other indications that the customer means to be
insulting, but it's not necessarily an insult if everything else is OK.
I've waitressed. I've seen people pick up change off the floor and
leave it on the table or empty their pockets of change. As long as the
all-over tip is acceptable, I just put the change in my pocket.


I'd love to see a world where tipping at restaurants was like tipping at
the car mechanic's, i.e., non-existent. When I get my brakes fixed or
my oil changed, I don't entice the mechanic to do a good job with the
promise of a tip. I expect him to do a good job, or I don't go back
there again. If, for some reason, the service isn't acceptable or I
feel that I've been treated rudely, I'd go straight to the owner or
manager. I'm sure I wouldn't get away with saying "the mechanic was
impatient and abrupt so I'm driving off with the new radiator without
paying for it."


Thus with restaurants. The servers should give good service because
that's their job as employees of the restaurant. The restaurant should
pay them because they're employees the same way garage mechanics are
paid. If there's a problem with the service, the customer should
complain to the management or not return to the restaurant. At least,
that's the way I'd do it if I could click my heels together three times
and get what I want. Last I checked, no one was letting me run the world.


With that in mind, I think a mandatory service charge, called a service
charge, and put clearly on the menu, is a good idea. Ideally, it would
be figured into the price of the food, but anything that removes
arbitrary nature of the tip appeals to me. For this idea to work, the
service charge would be on the bill, and anything extra would have to be
returned to the customer with an explanation that the bill has been paid
in full.


Bad service can be a result of rude or incompetent servers, but it can
also be endemic of a badly managed restaurant. Someone gave the example
of the customer asking for clean silverware and not getting it. I
remember that one.


The restaurant didn't have enough silverware for the busy lunch period.
The dishwashers couldn't run the dishwashing machines fast enough to
supply clean silver. Waitresses started hoarding silver. It was worth
it to hand wash the silver themselves so they'd have it for their next
customers rather than put it in the bus tray and risk losing it. Or
they'd try to gather up enough silver first thing in the morning to last
them all day. The waitresses set their tables, but other waitresses
would take clean silver off the set tables from another section when
there wasn't any in the clean silver trays. Alliances would form as
waitresses would give clean silver to their friends but not people they
didn't like.


I was young and naive and didn't realize the nuances of what was going
on. I wouldn't have been any good at the game if I had understood. I
did sometimes yell at or beg the dishwashers to give me silverware when
the customers asked me for it, but the dishwashers shrugged their
shoulders or laughed in my face. Other waitresses might have gotten
silverware by giving the dishwashers a portion of their tips or sexual
favors. I'm glad I don't know that if that was the case. I can tell
you that the few weeks I kept that job was way too long, that I was a
terrible waitress, too dreamy and unaware, and that there was no way any
of that could be explained to a customer who just made a simple request
for clean silverware.


--Lia