Waitresses and Waiters

[B_Stronzo]

I remain puzzled why waitstaff are considered entitled to tips but not other service employees. Why not the dishwashers?

Again SpeedoGuy-

Waiters and waitresses do not receive minimum wage. Dishwashers and the counter people at Dunkin' Donuts do.

to tripod-

Your explanation of the food service "art" is something that rings very true to me. Much as GoneA said how much you can learn of another's character by how he treats his or her server - I'll say your post reflects precisely the way I feel about this underrated profession.

The only thing you left out is that many have to serve as "mini psychiatrists" to adapt and maneuver a potentially bad situation into a good one. As I recall from those days each party needs to be immediately "read" upon initial greeting. Some want to be chatty and personal and others I'm quite sure are looking to have a crappy time (or as you say 'work out there predatory personalities').

Hell .. you need to be part actor too.

I really enjoyed reading your experience tripod espeically since its hands-on.

 

[avalonjim]

I have been in the restaurant gamenow for 20 years. Dishwasher, cook waiter, bartenderand owner. I have been lucky enough to either work in turn and burn places where the table will get sat as fast as you can clean and reset it, and in major high end restaurants where $400-500 bucks a night is an average. It is part of the reason why i stay in the game. Tonite alone, I waited on 32 people and walked home with $251.00.

I also live in an extremely exclusive and expensive town, the restaurant is in the same town, and quite expensive. Dinner for 2 will be $75-120. I have found that because I actually live here, and have a nice home, and people know me, that they treat me completely differently from some of the staff that don't live on the island. There is a certain amount of superiority that goes along with peoples views of waiters. There is also the fact that, if i make a mistake, i am not getting any money out of you, so there are people that look for any reason NOT to give you a fair share.

I am extremely good. I could sell you dog shit on melba toast, and you would wonder why you didn't like it. I have had a lot of pretentious and rude customers, but if you had ANY idea the way we talk about you behind your back, and the things that happen.... LOL everyone would be a 20-25% tipper that would be perrenially pleasant. I have been really lucky to always get a good job that pays well, with customers that have followed me from place to place over the years. I would say that 85% of my customers over tip me, but even if they didn't I would still treat them great, because they are wonderfully pleasant. I have never worked in an IHOP or anything like that, so I have no idea what its like there. I do feel that people that eat there are pretty miserly. What is 20% on a 15 dollar check. $3.00. that poor waitress would have to do 100 tables to make what i made before tipping out on 6 tables tonite.

I have a great career selling real estate here on the island, entry level condos start at about a million bucks, with oceanfronts selling for about 9-15 million dollars. But I can't give up the cash, and its steady. I guess i qualify as a career professional waiter. Hell i can pay the bills based on what I earn just doing that. So i guess i am lucky.

 

[B_Stronzo]

I am extremely good. I could sell you dog shit on melba toast, and you would wonder why you didn't like it. I have had a lot of pretentious and rude customers, but if you had ANY idea the way we talk about you behind your back, and the things that happen.... LOL

This is KEY! :biggrin1:

Shit yes jim... if they only knew the things one can watch an unsavory customer consume. :biggrin1: :biggrin1:

I'd forgotten about silent revenge.

Good for you. Makes me kind of miss the craziness of the job.

 

[Gisella]

I like to tip and tip good for a good job well done and less for not good job when is really no good. But I never will leave coins.

And I'm an emotional tiper too..bcause I use to work in positions that I was supose to be tiped and remember the disapointment to have nothing or just few coins..and when received paper money was very happy. I need any extra money I could get. But I work in hotels and was hostess and cashier in restaurant..no tips..

But I'm emotional when I see people that is in already retired age working to cover life cost or health care and etc..and young hard working students too..and mothers and single fathers..than I look at them and keep imaging what their situations..than I remember cost of bills and etc and they could be my brother, mother and etc..than I extra tip...

 

[tripod]

And I'm an emotional tiper too..bcause I use to work in positions that I was supose to be tiped and remember the disapointment to have nothing or just few coins..and when received paper money was very happy. I need any extra money I could get. But I work in hotels and was hostess and cashier in restaurant..no tips..

But I'm emotional when I see people that is in already retired age working to cover life cost or health care and etc..and young hard working students too..and mothers and single fathers..than I look at them and keep imaging what their situations..than I remember cost of bills and etc and they could be my brother, mother and etc..than I extra tip...

Well said Gisella, you put into words the empathy that makes the world go around. It is the very crux of what tipping is all about.

 

[Shelby]

Hetenders do. Hotenders probably do pretty well too.

Remove 'pussy' insert 'sex'.

All better now?
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[Shelby]

So did any of you fellow servers ever exact revenge?

I know I have.

Once these bunch of cowboys basically made me screw over my other tables with promises of, "We'll take good care of you if you take care of us."

I did and they left about $.87 on a tab over $150.. I took really good care of them. I think they were just fucking with me because I was young.

A month or so later I saw them waiting to be seated. I took the hostess aside and asked her to seat them in my section.

I drowned their house salads with about a pint of stinkyass blue cheese, didn't turn their food order in for about twenty minutes, and basically ignored them.

Funny thing - they got it. Tipped me about 50% that time.:biggrin1:
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[SpeedoGuy]

Again SpeedoGuy-

Waiters and waitresses do not receive minimum wage. Dishwashers and the counter people at Dunkin' Donuts do.

Stronzo:

I fail to see the distinction. I worked at a moderately priced restaurant for a year as a dishwasher. Minimum wage or not, I worked hard for my wages. So did the waitstaff. They got tips. I didn't.

 

[D_alex8]

Is this not the thread asking whether waiters and waitresses are better endowed than those in other professions?

I worked 'front of house' in an upmarket Italian restaurant for about six weeks when I was 18. It used to attract a certain kind of post-theatre clientele who really wanted the staff to 'serve' them in the most medieval sense of the word. Not to mention that the place was supposed to close at midnight, but was frequently kept open by these slow-eating, finger-clicking gourmands blathering at their tables until well after 2am.

Anyway, I found that I was soon developing far too many incredibly detailed and intricate fantasies about poisoning the food or running amok between the customers' tables with a gun ... and so left to find a means of earning extra cash as a student that wouldn't leave me in prison for the rest of my life. Please don't think I'm trying to be humorous; my sense of revenge and retribution is far too pronounced for me ever to consider this kind of work again.

 

[Lex]

Stronzo:

I fail to see the distinction. I worked at a moderately priced restaurant for a year as a dishwasher. Minimum wage or not, I worked hard for my wages. So did the waitstaff. They got tips. I didn't.

Wait staff in MD receive $2.10 a hour and must report their tips. They receive their hourly wage times hours worked per week only when it is less than their reported tips.

So in essence, good wait staff survive soley on their tips. Most wait staff receive a weekly check of $0.00.

The difference then, is that an hourly employee can count on his her check being , say $150 that week as long as s/he shows up and works while wiat staff have to hope that the restaurant/bar gets a good crowd, the crowd spends money and leaves good tips, etc.

 

[D_Sheffield Thongbynder]

My sole experience as a waiter occurred the summer before I went to college, and if nothing else, it was an education in human behavior. By the end of the summer, having been stiffed by a few and shorted by many (it wasn't a fine eatery by any means), I indulged in petty measures to get even that I won't detail here (funny at the time but in retrospect, they were gross). Since then, I have an appreciation for wait staff that is competent, and I never tip less than 20%, also making sure to let them know they did a good job. Professional servers aproach their job with skills and pride, and they deserve to be treated well. Temps can be either eager or blase; I figure they're just trying to make a few bucks to get by and appreciate the former and overlook the latter work ethics.

 

[Shelby]

the cool thing about bartending was that your pay was directly proportional to how hard you worked.
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[DC_DEEP]

So many anecdotes to contribute here...

Lex, thanks for clearing up the common misperception so many people have about how the tipping system works. It isn't just in Maryland that the below-minimum wage starts accruing. It's really sad that the state minimum in MD is $6.15, and "food-service minimum" is $2.10. A "greeter" at one of the local "superstores" will earn $246.00 before taxes in a 40-hour week. Theoretically, a waiter would earn $86.00 before taxes in the same pay period... but only if his reported tips were less than that. The end result is that if he only makes $80.00 in tips for the week, his total hourly pay for the 40 hours worked would be $6.00.

That's why I usually like to pay by credit card, and ask my waiter if he minds the tab paid by credit card, but the tip paid in cash. They usually look at me a little funny, until they realize that they can report a $0.00 tip on $100.00, but actually receive $20.00 that does not have to be reported. Most are usually quite happy to have the credit card receipt show the zero-dollar tip.

It sucks, it really does. And the part that really confounds me is that waitstaff get rewarded or punished, depending upon how expensive the menu is... and between the moderate restaurants and the high-end restaurants, the difference is not in the food, but in the decor and ambience. So a waiter in one restaurant carries the same number of plates, gives identical service as a waiter in another restaurant, does the same amount of work, but one gets a a $14.00 tip, the other gets a $30.00 tip.

Once, I did loudly and abusively accost another customer who was really harrassing our waitress. She was working very hard, and was friendly and accurate, but the man two tables away from me (with his wife and 3 children) was just downright rude and abusive to her. After his second spate of venom, I walked over to his table and gave him hell for treating her that way, for disrupting my dinner, and for setting such an ugly example for his children. Heads were turned toward us from all over the dining room. I left without finishing my dinner, but paid my tab, left a sizeable tip, and spoke to the manager about what transpired.

 

[Lex]

...

That's why I usually like to pay by credit card, and ask my waiter if he minds the tab paid by credit card, but the tip paid in cash. They usually look at me a little funny, until they realize that they can report a $0.00 tip on $100.00, but actually receive $20.00 that does not have to be reported. Most are usually quite happy to have the credit card receipt show the zero-dollar tip...

Yup. I do this too. At my favorite sports bar, I have also been known to slip my favorite bar tender cash when he or she got off duty (in addition to tip I gave them) since bar staff typically have to put all tip money earned during their shifts in a collective pot and split amongst themselves and the bar-backs.

 

[Lordpendragon]

"I love children, but I could never manage a whole one."

Actually, it's usually the parents that I want to slap.

 

[DC_DEEP]

"I love children, but I could never manage a whole one."

Actually, it's usually the parents that I want to slap.

Well said, old chap... well said!

 

[SpeedoGuy]

So in essence, good wait staff survive soley on their tips. Most wait staff receive a weekly check of $0.00.

The difference then, is that an hourly employee can count on his her check being , say $150 that week as long as s/he shows up and works while wiat staff have to hope that the restaurant/bar gets a good crowd, the crowd spends money and leaves good tips, etc.

Thanks for clearing that up, Lex. I never knew the difference.

 

[tripod]

Bartenders and the wait staff do have to tip out the expediters and busboys, the dishwashers usually don't get tipped out at about half of the restaurants or bars. Nobody is over the shoulder of the bartenders when they use their special spoons to get the money out of the tip jars, they are fairly autonomous and usually well trusted.

The biggest problem with waiters and waitresses is the fact that the IRS has assumed that an average of 20 percent of the wait persons sales (they are like a retail store) are recieved as tips for their service. When people don't tip atleast 20 percent, the wait person pays tax on money they didn't recieve! This is not something that is widely known, and is the major source of frustration among career employees of the restaurant industry.

 

[Pirate Wench]

This site is for comments and complaints from waiters and waitresses......
It's interesting to read how irrational and combative customers can be.

Some of the experiences with asshole customers require extreme self control.

I'd want to kill the bastards.....(and it seems most of the bad customers are males)

http://waiterrant.net/?p=187

 

[invisibleman]

Children: I HATE going to nice places when young children are present. I a kid is noisy I will demand a new seat away from the brat, and if that isn't done, I inform the manager that I will not return until a strict policy about badly behaved kids is implemented. Some places I go will actually ask the parents to either control the brat or leave. Personally, I wish all restaurants (and stores, airplanes, theaters) would have a twice-monthly BFD: Baby Free Day, when adults can go out knowing that there will be no distracting kids. It's not that I hate kids, but I believe strongly that children should be seen and not heard, and not being seen is even better. There's a place for children, but a 5-star expensive, elegant restaurant isn't one of them!

They could have a separate section of the restaurant for couples and their kids. Or a baby consolation room with kid friendly TV and games. Like when a host asks whether people want non-smoking or a smoking section. You just have an additional option: Family non-smoking. Non Smoking and Smoking sections.