YOU MAKE THE CALL - Tipping edition

[Texter]

I went to a chain Italian restaurant Called Carrabas with the family back when my kids were little, so they are eating off the kid menu. The waitress says, “so I dont have to keep going back and forth so much I can give your kids full sized glasses instead of the tiny plastic cups that come with the kids meal”, I’m like, “whatever easiest for you”

Bill shows up and I get billed for 3 extra drinks at $3.50, so I say, “you billed me for the kid drinks by mistake”, “she retorts, you said you wanted the big glasses for the kids”

I just took it out of her tip.

Fast forward a couple years, at the same chain restaurant but at a different location, a different waitress did the same fucking thing, it was deja cuz all over again...they must train their staff to gouge people. Here I am doing you a favor and you act like it was my idea.

I again took it out of her tip and have never gone back.

[tgull]

I went to a chain Italian restaurant Called Carrabas with the family back when my kids were little, so they are eating off the kid menu. The waitress says, “so I dont have to keep going back and forth so much I can give your kids full sized glasses instead of the tiny plastic cups that come with the kids meal”, I’m like, “whatever easiest for you”

Bill shows up and I get billed for 3 extra drinks at $3.50, so I say, “you billed me for the kid drinks by mistake”, “she retorts, you said you wanted the big glasses for the kids”

I just took it out of her tip.

Fast forward a couple years, at the same chain restaurant but at a different location, a different waitress did the same fucking thing, it was deja cuz all over again...they must train their staff to gouge people. Here I am doing you a favor and you act like it was my idea.

I again took it out of her tip and have never gone back.

Perfectly reasonable, take it out of her tip. Instead of tipping $20 on a $100 tab you leave $15. Case closed, you got your $5 back with no incident. You definitely don't walk around the restaurant with your check at 6:30 pm, height of business traffic, and confront the manager and create an uncomfortable situation for everyone around you. If you feel compelled to do so, simply call the next day at 4pm when the place is opening and the manager is at his desk. He will hear you, likely agree with you and you get a free appetizer. Everyone wins. You get retribution, the restaurant gets repeat service and the waitress still gets tipped although not what she could have received.

[mdj1980]

I went to a chain Italian restaurant Called Carrabas with the family back when my kids were little, so they are eating off the kid menu. The waitress says, “so I dont have to keep going back and forth so much I can give your kids full sized glasses instead of the tiny plastic cups that come with the kids meal”, I’m like, “whatever easiest for you”

Bill shows up and I get billed for 3 extra drinks at $3.50, so I say, “you billed me for the kid drinks by mistake”, “she retorts, you said you wanted the big glasses for the kids”

I just took it out of her tip.

Fast forward a couple years, at the same chain restaurant but at a different location, a different waitress did the same fucking thing, it was deja cuz all over again...they must train their staff to gouge people. Here I am doing you a favor and you act like it was my idea.

I again took it out of her tip and have never gone back.

Glad you posted that...I have two small kids and my wife loves Carrabba's. If they ever try this on us I will literally show the server your post and they will get a 0.0 tip. What you are describing is different than accidentally overcharging you or making you wait a long time or the server being rude. As you described it, they are actually trying to steal from you and I don't think reducing the tip by the amount of the theft is going far enough.

[MumblesBadly]

I went to a chain Italian restaurant Called Carrabas with the family back when my kids were little, so they are eating off the kid menu. The waitress says, “so I dont have to keep going back and forth so much I can give your kids full sized glasses instead of the tiny plastic cups that come with the kids meal”, I’m like, “whatever easiest for you”

Bill shows up and I get billed for 3 extra drinks at $3.50, so I say, “you billed me for the kid drinks by mistake”, “she retorts, you said you wanted the big glasses for the kids”

I just took it out of her tip.

Fast forward a couple years, at the same chain restaurant but at a different location, a different waitress did the same fucking thing, it was deja cuz all over again...they must train their staff to gouge people. Here I am doing you a favor and you act like it was my idea.

I again took it out of her tip and have never gone back.

Glad you posted that...I have two small kids and my wife loves Carrabba's. If they ever try this on us I will literally show the server your post and they will get a 0.0 tip. What you are describing is different than accidentally overcharging you or making you wait a long time or the server being rude. As you described it, they are actually trying to steal from you and I don't think reducing the tip by the amount of the theft is going far enough.

To be fair, you can’t blame on it on the waitresses. They are probably trained per management policy in those chain stores to upsell in that manner and probably repeatedly get shit on by customers for those extra charges. But if they stop pushing the upsells, they might lose getting the better shifts. Corporate policies can be fucking brutal that way.

[RS_]

This is the beauty of tipping culture. If you have a dickhead waitress, then you just don't leave a tip. Simple. Maybe she'll put 2 and 2 together and think, "Maybe if I weren't such a bitch, people would actually tip me." Tipping the staff when they provide bad service is 100% unacceptable...all it shows is that they can be terrible people and still get tipped. It grinds my gears when people still try to tip after getting very poor and undeserving service.



Druff, what would you have done if they didn't remove the $3 charge? Let's say you're by yourself and not with a party.

I went to a chain Italian restaurant Called Carrabas with the family back when my kids were little, so they are eating off the kid menu. The waitress says, “so I dont have to keep going back and forth so much I can give your kids full sized glasses instead of the tiny plastic cups that come with the kids meal”, I’m like, “whatever easiest for you”

Bill shows up and I get billed for 3 extra drinks at $3.50, so I say, “you billed me for the kid drinks by mistake”, “she retorts, you said you wanted the big glasses for the kids”

I just took it out of her tip.

Fast forward a couple years, at the same chain restaurant but at a different location, a different waitress did the same fucking thing, it was deja cuz all over again...they must train their staff to gouge people. Here I am doing you a favor and you act like it was my idea.

I again took it out of her tip and have never gone back.

Perfectly reasonable, take it out of her tip. Instead of tipping $20 on a $100 tab you leave $15. Case closed, you got your $5 back with no incident. You definitely don't walk around the restaurant with your check at 6:30 pm, height of business traffic, and confront the manager and create an uncomfortable situation for everyone around you. If you feel compelled to do so, simply call the next day at 4pm when the place is opening and the manager is at his desk. He will hear you, likely agree with you and you get a free appetizer. Everyone wins. You get retribution, the restaurant gets repeat service and the waitress still gets tipped although not what she could have received.

False.

You speak with the manager, demand they take the BS charge off the bill, and then tip $0.00.

Taking $5 off a $20 or so tip isn't really punishing or showing the waitress that they're an idiot, since a $15 tip would also be seen as reasonable.

[mdj1980]

Glad you posted that...I have two small kids and my wife loves Carrabba's. If they ever try this on us I will literally show the server your post and they will get a 0.0 tip. What you are describing is different than accidentally overcharging you or making you wait a long time or the server being rude. As you described it, they are actually trying to steal from you and I don't think reducing the tip by the amount of the theft is going far enough.

To be fair, you can’t blame on it on the waitresses. They are probably trained per management policy in those chain stores to upsell in that manner and probably repeatedly get shit on by customers for those extra charges. But if they stop pushing the upsells, they might lose getting the better shifts. Corporate policies can be fucking brutal that way.

I totally agree that it is hard to blame it on the server when it is management that either pushed them to do it or at least gave them the idea. That's why it is a tough situation. In this particular case I would feel like if I complained to the manager they would take the charge off, but that basically equates to the restaurant freerolling me by putting an extra charge on my bill and then seeing if I complain about it. So either they screw me out of a few dollars or we're even. If I walked out without paying the check to see if they would notice, do you think that if they caught me they'd be ok with me just saying "Oops, you got me. Here's the money."? Or would there be further action taken? Maybe I get a pass once but if I ever tried that there again you can bet the police would be called.

To me, this kid's drink thing is more than just an upsell. An acceptable upsell to me would be like if the waiter had to bring out a dessert tray at the end of the meal, and they always told the customer that their personal favorite was the most expensive thing on the tray, even if it wasn't. That's kind of dishonest but whatever, it's ok with me as long as they know that some people like it. But if my kid gets an ice cream and they ask if I want the same ice cream put in a bigger bowl to prevent spillage and "help them out" by minimizing the mess, then they charge me an extra $3.50...when that check comes I'm getting back more than the $3.50 for sure, or never going back.

[AhoosierA]

In 2010 a co-worker of mine was playing in a band at a wing restaurant/bar on a Friday night. A group of us that all worked together called and made arrangements for seating for 12 people. We show up around 7pm and a waitress takes our food & drink order and we tell her how to separate the check, as some of us had our significant others with us.

We were there for approximately 4 hours or so and all of us were drinking. At the end of the night when we all asked for the bill. A waitress (not our original waitress) brings us a long receipt for $1.1k saying they didn’t keep track of who ordered what and that we had to figure it out.

All of us were pretty drunk. After awhile we figured it all out except about $100 that notbody would take responsibility for. I approached the manager and explained the situation and their response was, “well if the bill is not paid in full, I’ll have to call the cops”

I didn’t want to get the cops involved because again, we had all been drinking. Eventually me and one of my other co-workers split the extra as we were managers and the others were our employees.

We left a $0 tip of $1.1k and I’ve never stepped foot in the establishment again.

[Dan Druff]

In 2010 a co-worker of mine was playing in a band at a wing restaurant/bar on a Friday night. A group of us that all worked together called and made arrangements for seating for 12 people. We show up around 7pm and a waitress takes our food & drink order and we tell her how to separate the check, as some of us had our significant others with us.

We were there for approximately 4 hours or so and all of us were drinking. At the end of the night when we all asked for the bill. A waitress (not our original waitress) brings us a long receipt for $1.1k saying they didn’t keep track of who ordered what and that we had to figure it out.

All of us were pretty drunk. After awhile we figured it all out except about $100 that notbody would take responsibility for. I approached the manager and explained the situation and their response was, “well if the bill is not paid in full, I’ll have to call the cops”

I didn’t want to get the cops involved because again, we had all been drinking. Eventually me and one of my other co-workers split the extra as we were managers and the others were our employees.

We left a $0 tip of $1.1k and I’ve never stepped foot in the establishment again.

This sounds similar to a situation I had with a bunch of poker players at FIX at Bellagio about 10 years ago.

We had a huge party, like 30 people, split up into two tables of about 15 tables each.

Each table was responsible for its own bill. I don't know what happened with the other table, but our table's service was awwwwwwwwful.

Super slow. Took over 40 minutes to even place orders (!!)

They were constantly forgetting drink orders, and then bringing the wrong drinks when they did show up with drinks.

When servers were told of their mistakes or omissions, they got nasty and belligerent.

This wasn't just my impression. Everyone was getting furious. I remember Gobboboy and Brett Richey were at our table. I forget who else.

Near the end of the meal, I complained to the manager. He was also nasty about it. He denied that it took 40 minutes to order, and proudly told me, "I see here that we put your order in at 9:47pm, and you sat around 9:30, so it was less than 20 minutes."

I told him, "No way it was 9:30 when we sat. It was around 9."

He said, "There's no way it was 9. I remember when you sat. It was very close to 9:30."

I then whipped out the receipt, which actually said, "Seated 9:06pm".

Owned.

Guy was still a complete asshole and wouldn't take anything off the bill for the horrible service, and it was even a struggle to get him to remove the errors on the bill, such as drinks never received or ordered.

Anyway, the bill came out to like $1500, and we had to leave an 18% tip because of the party size. I so wanted to leave 0.0, because the servers were awwwwwwful, and it pained me to leave $270, even though most of this was going to be from others in the party.

So I made sure I collected the amount to the penny, so we didn't leave anything above the 18%.

Later I complained to upper management of FIX (it's owned by a restaurant group), who informed me that we actually had a right to take the 18% off. I had no idea. I wish I knew at the time.

I asked for some credit BACK (I was going to find as many people as I could and give them their share), and the manager told me to wait while he investigated. I told him, among other things, he could see in the computer that we sat at 9:06 and the first order (for drinks, no less!) was at 9:47.

He looked into everything and told me it was "inconclusive" what happened. He wouldn't take ownership of anything that occurred, and basically told me I was getting zero point zero, but thanked me for providing him a "coaching experience" (lol)

Obviously I never went back.

This saddened me because I had a soft spot for this restaurant. I went there with neverwin the night before the $3k Limit Holdem in 2005, and we talked about how we really both wanted to win that bracelet. That was the one I ended up winning -- still my only bracelet to date.

Anyway my point here is that apparently you do have the right to remove the 18% if you want, at least in Nevada.

[big dick]

sounds like that manager somehow managed to out cheap the cheapest man in America
gotta give him credit that is no easy task

[Texter]

This is the beauty of tipping culture. If you have a dickhead waitress, then you just don't leave a tip. Simple. Maybe she'll put 2 and 2 together and think, "Maybe if I weren't such a bitch, people would actually tip me." Tipping the staff when they provide bad service is 100% unacceptable...all it shows is that they can be terrible people and still get tipped. It grinds my gears when people still try to tip after getting very poor and undeserving service.



Druff, what would you have done if they didn't remove the $3 charge? Let's say you're by yourself and not with a party.

Perfectly reasonable, take it out of her tip. Instead of tipping $20 on a $100 tab you leave $15. Case closed, you got your $5 back with no incident. You definitely don't walk around the restaurant with your check at 6:30 pm, height of business traffic, and confront the manager and create an uncomfortable situation for everyone around you. If you feel compelled to do so, simply call the next day at 4pm when the place is opening and the manager is at his desk. He will hear you, likely agree with you and you get a free appetizer. Everyone wins. You get retribution, the restaurant gets repeat service and the waitress still gets tipped although not what she could have received.

False.

You speak with the manager, demand they take the BS charge off the bill, and then tip $0.00.

Taking $5 off a $20 or so tip isn't really punishing or showing the waitress that they're an idiot, since a $15 tip would also be seen as reasonable.

Technically it’s $10.50 off a $18 tip....but I see your point.

[Dan Druff]

The "take the $3 off the tip if the waitress refuses" sounds like a good solution on its face, but it's really not.

Why?

Two reasons.

First, it rewards the RESTAURANT for a crappy policy which screws the customer, and punishes the server for enforcing the policy.

A talk with the manager will clear it up either way. If the manager quickly removes it, then it was probably the server's fault. If the manager argues at all, then it was probably the restaurant's fault for telling the servers to charge this and not take it off.

But you really need the answer on whose fault it is (as much as you can surmise) before deducting from the tip.


The second problem is that deducting from the tip just sends the message, "I'm a cheap asshole" rather than, "This is what you get for upcharging me and not taking it off."

In fact, the server will first remember you being an asshole arguing with him/her about $3, and then you'll leave a crappy tip. And he/she will think, "Ah, makes sense. This fucking cheapskate who wanted $3 off the bill ALSO is a bad tipper! Glad I didn't help him!"

So it will send a completely wrong message.


In general, I am not a fan of deducting from tips.

I leave one of three types of tips:

1) A good tip if the service was good
-or-
2) A standard tip if the service was mediocre to okay. (I'll even leave the standard tip if the service was flawed but not horrendous.)
-or-
3) No tip plus a management complaint if the service was bad.

As far as I'm concerned, if I'm at the point of deducting from the tip, honestly the person deserves no tip.

[rum dick]

I woulda skipped the aggravation and more importantly the 15 wasted minutes and just left her my standard 25% tip minus the $3.00. You're gonna give yourself a heart attack with all of these confrontations you get yourself in by worrying about relative pennies and always dying on the hill because of "the principle of the matter" or whatever. You should consider taking up drinking. It might mellow you and be good for you.

[MumblesBadly]

I woulda skipped the aggravation and more importantly the 15 wasted minutes and just left her my standard 25% tip minus the $3.00. You're gonna give yourself a heart attack with all of these confrontations you get yourself in by worrying about relative pennies and always dying on the hill because of "the principle of the matter" or whatever. You should consider taking up drinking. It might mellow you and be good for you.

I don’t think you understand Druff’s psyche. Because if he doesn’t vigorously pursue on-the-spot justice in the many cases like this that he experiences, the accumulation of the memories of such events and his in-the-moment acquiesence to be cheated and mistreated would surely drive him to a state of life-threatening anxiety. I, for one, want a mentally healthy Druff.

So, keep on fighting the good fight sir. And don’t let those unscrupulous restaurant employees go unchallenged!

[MumblesBadly]

Watch this to learn how to save a bundle on tipping!