[Sherman Logan]

That’s not a tip, it’s a service charge.

Perfectly legitimate for a restaurant to charge in this way. The market will decide whether it will work. Personally I wouldn’t eat at a place that charged this way. Let ‘em raise their prices and then pay their workers a living wage.

[Winstons Julia]

The government COMPELS me! To give you 25% even though the service was bad.

I don’t eat out much, but when I do...it’s 15 - 20%.

Is that cheap? Well... I don’t have a lot of money.

[Amagi]

That’s not a tip, it’s a service charge. Perfectly legitimate for a restaurant to charge in this way. The market will decide whether it will work. Personally I wouldn’t eat at a place that charged this way. Let ‘em raise their prices and then pay their workers a living wage.

I knew someone would hit this out of the ballpark early on in comments. Well done, Sir.

[cuban leaf]

—That’s not a tip, it’s a service charge.—

That is exactly what it is. If I ate at a place that did that I would just consider it part of the price. I’ll order my food knowing exactly what my food will cost. As far as I am concerned, it is technically just the new price.

Oh, and it is the ONLY tip I would give. It IS the tip.

This is kinda sad because I’ve heard many stories of restaurants charging the mandatory tip for groups over a certain size, and the wait staff gets none of that. That is the potential devil in the details of this.

[Vermont Lt]

Well, I guess we are turning into Europe.

Anyone there with any get up and go, got up and left 400 years ago.

[RedEyeJack]

“not a tip, it’s a service charge”

Agree and correctly...”market will decide whether it will work”

The problem I have is how much to tip the wait staff when we go to a buffet-type place or a brunch where they bring beverages and take away plates as we work thru the courses.

The service level is less that a full-service restaurant so I think it should be less than 20%... but what is the standard?

[Vaquero]

has a lunch after the funeral for Mom 2 weeks ago...as it was a planned catered affair for 25 people in a local restaurant...they added a 20% gratuity to the credit card slip...

but under that gratuity, there was a line I could fill out that said additional gratuity(which I lined out)....

I do believe that 20% was sufficient and even asking for additional gratuity was nervy....and had I wanted to give an addional gratuity I would have approached the maître d'

[pyx]

I didn't complete understand your reply. Please explain what you mean by a QUOTE living wage UNQUOTE.

Thanks in advance.

[Reeses]

Let ‘em raise their prices and then pay their workers a living wage.

To leftists the problem with prices is then everyone pays the same no matter their income or minority status. Prices aren't progressive. Rich people would get off easy, low income black people would have to pay more. No fair!

[ken5050]

Anyone's who ever been in a casino, knows that tips for the dealers/croupiers are all pooled..and shared equally, or accordign tgo some predetermined formula. This is done to remove any possibility that a dealer would do something illegal to benefit a BIG tipper....

So maybe now casinos will instead start adding a service charge to each wager you place?

[wbill]

Personally I wouldn’t eat at a place that charged this way

Yep, I hate places that have a policy of "Mandatory 18% on parties of 6 or More".

1) Because tipping is never "manadatory".

2) (mostly this) Because I generally tip the server waaaaaay more than 18%. Particularly at places that I eat at often. They're really just stiffing themselves.