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That is, beyond what the owner is paying them to do.

my *job* is to bring you a drink, bring your food, bring your check and not screw up. period. like mcdonalds, but i actually carry it out to your table.
the reason you tip me is for coming back to check and see if you need some extra dressing on your salad. if you need a refill/ another beverage. make sure your steak was cooked to the right temp- and fix it NOW if its not. to see if you want desert. to bring out little extras for your kids, and clean up your mess when you leave. and most importantly, to KNOW the menu.
if you have a question about an ingredient- say you're allegic to MSG- i can answer that off the top of my head. you want to know what's in our house dressings? i can tell you. i know what we're out of, what's on special, i'll make suggestions on better ways to order you meal to save you a couple bucks.
i'll be your best friend and bend over backwards to give you a good experience- not just "here's you food."
there's a reason why i have people come in asking for me to wait on them. why there are people who know my schedule and won't come in when i'm not working. why i have non-smokers that come sit in the smoking section just to have me wait on them.
and for all that extra. yeah. i make really good on tips.

>>my *job* is to bring you a drink, bring your food, bring your check and not screw up. period. like mcdonalds, but i actually carry it out to your table.<<

And to be clear, carrying it out to my table is part of the job as well.

Regarding the extra stuff, I have no problem with getting it myself if someone would tell me where it is. I’ve done it on more than one occasion, even at McCormicks in Seattle and Bellevue.

I look at it this way: I prefer self service gas stations because the service is faster.

It is hard to find a “buffet” type restaurant with good food, but that paradigm is by far my preferred method to eat out. You pay, you get your food, you get your “extra” stuff when you need it, you eat and converse with your friends WITHOUT INTERRUPTIONS, and then you leave. Maybe you pay after you eat.

For me, that is the ultimate restaurant experience. I’ve eaten a lot at Ruth’s Chris, Daniels Broiler, Most of the McCormicks and Scmicks in the Seattle area and a host of other nice places around the country. My favorite place is an Irish pub a few miles west of Parsippany NJ. And I eat at the bar. Good food, good service, and very friendly staff AND customers. And yeah, they get 20%. It still rubs me the wrong way though.

>>...yeah. i make really good on tips.<<

My daughter in law was a waitress in Chicago. She was really good and made really good tips. Are you her, by any chance? ;)

The stuff you listed is all good reason for tipping. For me, I just need the high quality food delivered to me when it is still hot.

And if I order a side of jalapeno’s I expect to get them. I’m batting about 400 on that annoying item.

We met friends for dinner last Sunday night at a restaurant that we frequent. The lady half of this duo can really be abusive to wait staff, and she chose to be that night. She accused the waitress of messing up her order. I had heard the order, and the waitress may not have heard the word “broccoli”, but the lady in question made a big deal of it (after she had already eaten her whole plate of pasta except the olives).

Then she confronted the waitress to demand if it had been her mistake, or the cook in the kitchen, who had left the broccoli off and had put too many olives in her sauce. She said all these mean things in the vein of “this is a lesson to you if someone else made the mistake and you’ll get bigger tips in the future”. She carried on and on to this lovely girl until the girl (college student) went back into the kitchen to talk to the manager.

THe waitress came back and “comped” the meals (which had been perfectly fine for the rest of the table) for the entire table. My husband caught the waitress on the side and slipped her a nice tip for our part. The next day he called the male half of the duo and told him how miserable this scene had made us. The man said that he’d already spoken to his wife and that she’d apologized to the waitress.

But, I’ve seen this woman do this before — ream out an employee about some small slight and then approach them with a big grin and tell them to not take it personally. I don’t know what my husband gave her (probably $20), but twice as much would have been too little for what that poor girl went through. I don’t think that we’ll be going out to dinner with them again any time soon, and I’m embarassed to go back to that particular restaurant.