warrrreagl

I take tipping deadly serious. As a former teacher, I don't believe in giving A's for mediocre schoolwork, and I similarly don't believe in giving tips for mediocre service.

Very frequently, we don't tip at all. Many restaurants in town have gotten to know us, and we've gotten to know the good servers (and ask for them by name). A major drawback for us is that we live in a college town, so most of the waiters and waitresses do not take their jobs very seriously. I'm sure if they had kids and real bills at home depending on tips, they'd do a better job.

When I was in college, I worked in food service, and I was a great, attentive, and sensitive server. I also understand that cooks and dishwashers can be an ass-pain to the servers and interfere with their good service. However, as I used to explain to my classes, "You may not be responsible for everything that happens to you, but you are responsible for how you handle it." And in a college town, servers are too apt to say, "Fuck it" when the kitchen gets backed up.

Three years ago at an Applebee's in our town, my wife ordered a brunch that was supposed to include canteloupe. The waiter explained that they were out of canteloupe that morning and there would be no fruit on the plate. My wife pointed out the window toward the grocery store that shared the same parking lot as Applebee's and said, "Well, there's Kroger right there." The waiter apparently told the manager, and the manager came over to tell my wife that he'd just sent a cook over to Kroger to buy her some canteloupe. Many college-aged waiters would have gotten beligerent over a comment like that, but our waiter handled it very well, and got a good tip out of it.

I'm especially interested in hearing how our non-U.S. TFPers feel about tipping.

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