Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is considered a good tip for a drink?
Usually a buck a drink will do the trick.
I try to stack another buck on any time the tip will be <15%. You don't wanna be the schmoe tipping a buck for a $9 drink.
Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
151–160 of 183 posts
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#152[deleted]
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#153Here's another thread on HN:
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
seriously?
Seriously. The maitre d' isn't a public official in charge of a public or legal duty - this isn't a building inspector we're talking about. I suspect any bad feelings around tipping the maitre d' for a table come from lack of knowledge of the custom - someone who doesn't go to good restaurants regularly or is from another country where customs are different.
It's not a tip. A tip is what you pull your wallet out and count your bills for while giving it to the person. This is a bribe you secretly slip someone because you're circumventing the normal wait every other patron must endure. You're not "following a custom", you're secretly taking advantage of one person's greed and everyone else's patience and trust. If you did this at the DMV your fellow motorists would probably murder you in the streets.
You do this in Mexico to get out of traffic stops. Is it a cultural custom designed to get preferential treatment? Yes. But it's also called bribery.
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
I hope your friend also understands how much this will get people like me to come back. There is a bar in Phoenix that I used to go to all the time (when the weather calms down, I'll start going again [because I bike there]). One of the major reasons that I went back so often, is because I felt like a regular there. It was a very common occurrence for the bartenders to offer me a free drink. A lot of these free drink…
"I think it's important for business owners to remember this type of thing: you're absolutely not selling coffee, or beer, or dell computers, you're selling me a little temporary friend that makes me feel like they really and truly care about whatever problem I am coming to them to solve." This is only true in non-commodity markets. Yeah, the coffee shop is selling you the 'coffee experience' - the service, more than…
>I bypass dell and go to suppliers that don't want to be my friend, and I pocket the difference.
Do you? My relationship with dell isn't just about getting warm fuzzy feelings when I call our rep to order stuff, it's about knowing that, if I do have a problem, it's going to get resolved immediately when I call her.
There is another company that I work with, which is small, and specific to my industry, and I have a very good relationship with one of the sales people there (they're in Canada).
Well, one day, something went wrong with their product so, instead of calling and asking to talk to a CSR, I called and asked to talk to Al. Al apologized up and down because, unfortunately, the FedEx guy had already come and there weren't any more pickups for the day.
So do you know what he did? Got in his car and drove the part that I needed down to the fedex office at the airport. I had the part in my hands a little over 12 hours later.
Another one: Our office buys all of our toner from cartridge world. The guy that we talk to down there, his name is Kent, is really nice. One day, I called Kent and told him that I needed a toner cartridge for one of our printers, but I needed MICR toner (for checks). Unfortunately, he told me, they didn't have any that I could get that day, but they could ship me one in a week. But in the meantime, he would bring me a printer of theirs as well as a cartridge for it, and he wouldn't charge me for it, just thanks for always doing business with him.
This type of thing is absolutely invaluable to my business.
We'll be a Cartridge World customer for life because of this. We're not buying toner from them, we're buying the ability to print documents. I suspect that you're not buying RAM, you're buying servers that work. Do you think anybody from micron is going to jump in their car and bring you something when you need it? Or care that something got messed up and fix it for you immediately?
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
The effect on society can be much, much worse than neutral. If it happens enough, all of sudden it's expected and then people will start intentionally delaying service/making it difficult unless you pay them. (for reference, see any country with petty corruption/bribery problems) What's the difference between this and say slipping the building inspector a hundred dollars to "not have any problems"?
>"The effect on society can be much, much worse than neutral. If it happens enough, all of sudden it's expected and then people will start intentionally delaying service/making it difficult unless you pay them. (for reference, see any country with petty corruption/bribery problems)" A mitigating factor is that restaurant owners/managers will only tolerate this behavior from their employees when customer demand exceed…
In the DMV case, specifically they can hire more workers, or be open the times people actually need to go (outside of 9-5 M-F) by paying them more. I actually tried to do this when I had to take a quick test to transfer my license, I asked if a tester would stay late if I paid extra (the extra insurance on my out-of-state license was awful on my rental, and the wait was 2 weeks), I was accused of trying to bribe them -- but it was a 10 minute test, I'd stay 10 minutes late at work for $20 (or $50 whatever).
(I'm making the possibly flawed assumption that the DMV cares about customers)
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#157I was reading Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics, and he talks about being liberal and magnificent with money. I'm in Vietnam now, things are cheap-ish anyways, so I decided I'm make the transition towards doing that. I wrote up my first experiences here - http://www.sebastianmarshall.com/?p=161 Since then, it's been even more crazy. I was just trying to be gracious - I wasn't trying to bribe for favors like the author…
They're motivated by future tips, and by the extra opportunities they'll get from forwarding your generous business to people they know. The incentive is your money.
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
I hope your friend also understands how much this will get people like me to come back. There is a bar in Phoenix that I used to go to all the time (when the weather calms down, I'll start going again [because I bike there]). One of the major reasons that I went back so often, is because I felt like a regular there. It was a very common occurrence for the bartenders to offer me a free drink. A lot of these free drink…
My favorite local coffee shop is like that. I know the owner fairly well, and he always drops by to chit chat whenever I come in. I refuse to go to any of the other coffee shops in town, even if the coffee is cheaper or marginally better, because I've built a relationship with the owner. When I was shopping for a new motorcycle, I bought one from the dealership that's 45 minutes away instead of the one that's 5 minut…
People get tricked into thinking that they're buying something good.
When I go to a coffee shop, a lot of times I'll sit there with some of my friends and work on a project at their tables, or I'll use their internet, or read a book, or whatever. The $2.5, or $4 or whatever that I'm paying for a cup of water run through ground up beans is mostly paying the for a barrista to ask me how my day is going so far, and for the table. It's like a day-hotel; the table is my room, the person at the counter is the front-counter clerk, and the $4 is my room fee.
This is fine, I'm more than willing to pay $4 for a coffee when I'm going to be sitting there for 5 hours working (in fact, if I'm staying this long, I'll usually buy more than one cup of coffee even though I don't need it.). The $4 is insane for a cup of coffee, but I'm buying more than just coffee.
Starbucks is the same thing, but a bit more interesting (I think). When people go into starbucks, they're paying $4 because they want to feel like members of the cool kids club. The coffee has names that you have to be a member of the little club to understand, the interior is very starbucksy, there is obscure "art" on the walls, etc.
This makes sense. Yeah, you could go to the gas station across the street and get something that tastes about the same, but then you wouldn't have access to the cool kids club. The $3 difference between a gas station cappuccino and a Starbucks "coffee flavored milkshake for adults" is the membership fee.
The trick here is that Starbucks (as well as their competitors) now also runs coffee shops where you can't even go inside. You can't stay there, there is no obscure art, no atmosphere, no nothing. You drive up, get your coffee, and leave. You probably even finish your coffee in the car before anybody has chance to see the familiar logo that means "cool kid".
So why do people still go there and pay the $3 membership fee to a club that doesn't exist?
Because they've been tricked into thinking that they're buying coffee.
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
That money doesn't go to the business, it's pocketed by that one person.
Same for table tips - the owner gets no additional money if I tip the waitress well for attentiveness and competence above and beyond the standard for that class of restaurant. Look at it this way - the owner has X tables and Y seatings per evening. Let's say P is the number of people who want tables, R is people with reservations, and S is the number of people who show up looking for a spare table. So long as S > X…
So, that should be X plus Y above. Apparently plus signs are HN-ese for italics.
Re: Bribing maitre d' to skip the line
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
An excellent point. Besides the inherent scale, what makes this author's experience different from a senator or representative who takes money in exchange for preferential treatment? Both screw over a number of people who are playing by the rules.
Actually, I think this article made me realize that in any situation it is important to ask "what are the rules?". It's not like there is a sign posted above the door saying "do not tip for better seating". Who says it's wrong to tip for priority seating?
You probably haven't experienced corruption. It takes away the level playing field that would exist otherwise. When the rules involve bribing, those without the means and capacity to bribe but who deserve their chance are simply left watching.
Sure, in this case the bribing rule may be okay since they are all standing in line at an expensive restaurant and presumably could afford the $50 bribe. What if the rules were made public and now everyone starts to bribe the maitre d'? Imagine what that would do :)