Where Do You Stand?

As I was driving Colby to school this morning (it's waaay to cold to be walking anywhere!), I listened to a blurb of Donald Trump talking about tipping in restaurants. That led me to thinking about my own tipping practises. Well, I guess I should say my non-tipping practises. I have quit tipping in restaurants unless the service is absolutely amazing and exact to my expectations and let me tell you, this does not happen often.

I just think that far too many servers have begun to expect a tip, no matter what level of service they provide. When I was a gas jockey, tips were few and far between. The occasional time that I would receive a tip, I honestly stopped and thought about what I did differently with that customer to deserve the tip. It was during my years at Husky that I quit tipping restaurant servers. When I stopped and compared how hard a server works as to how hard a gas jockey works, the gas jockeys came out ahead. Granted, this is not true for all gas stations. Some jockeys barely grunt out a hello as the dawdle to your vehicle, fill it up, spill gas down the side and then walk away as they forget to close your gas lid. But where you have great management, you will have great employees and this was definitely the case at Husky.

So allow me to compare a gas jockey's duties and a server's duties when they each have one customer. When performing full service, a gas jockey could very well: fill the vehicle; wash the windshield, back window, headlights and tail lights; check the oil; fill the oil; and check the tire pressure (and possibly fill the tires). A server, when performing full service, will: bring you a drink; take your order; bring your order; bring you ketchup or napkins. The server does not seat you, cook your food or clear your table. He/she just has to walk back and forth from the kitchen a few times. Granted, the server is also juggling four or five other tables. BUT, as a jockey, we were juggling six different pumps. I'd like to see a server be able to pump $5.00 worth of gas on Pump 1, a fill and oil check on Pump 2, $15.00 and a gasline anti-freeze on Pump 4, fill a slip tank with diesel (Pump 6), fill a jerry-can with premium from Pump 3, go into the store and find the customer that pulled up the wrong way to Pump 5 and yelled "Gimme $10.00!" and ask them to turn their vehicle around AND to do all of this while battling the freezing cold (or the heat and bugs in the summer).

I know that some servers work very hard and are very good at what they do. The point that I'm trying to make is that I am tired of servers feeling automatically entitled to receiving a tip. I no longer feeling bad about walking out of a restaurant and leaving zilch. If the server does the bare minimum, they get nothing. If, for some reason, they go above and beyond what they're duties are (and I don't mean just having to fetch a few extra napkins), that is when they will get a tip. Honestly, I tip gas jockeys way more regularly than I tip servers. I could go on forever about what a sad state the service industry is in today so I better just stop there.

Where do you stand? Do you tip all the time, even if you get poor service? Do you ever tip anyone besides servers?