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'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

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171–180 of 215 posts

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I'm making an assumption here but... how many orders of magnitude separate your pay and that of the people making your food? Also: how much spit do you estimate you've consumed when eating at places where you're a regular who is known to never tip?

So you see the tip as a sort of bribe to stop those filthy poors contaminating your food?

Tipping and bribes goes hand in hand...

https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty-research/publications/h...

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#172
post #104

I am frustrated with articles like this that keep pushing a higher and higher "acceptable" tip percentage. 20% is not normal. 20% is very high for very good service. 15 years ago, 15% was normal. Now the minimum on these pos pos's is 18. I tip 15% and no more unless service was well above normal. And I have no qualms about hitting 0 for anything that isn't sit down service, including Uber and Lyft. We have to fight t…

I noticed this yesterday at dinner. The lowest suggested tip on the receipt was 20%! So psychologically I kind of felt bad for "only" giving 15%.

Honestly, when I see this I go out of my way to not tip at all. I appreciate the tip "shortcut" buttons, but when you're missing the most common option (15%) that's just in bad faith.

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#173
My personal rules are:

1) If I pay before I get service (fast food, coffee shop counter, etc), there's no tip. The point of tipping is for service, I'm not pre-tipping you for service you haven't given me yet.

2) The vast majority of the time I tip 15%. It's extremely rare I see service that's outstandingly poor or outstandingly good. Most are just average.

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#175
post #104

I am frustrated with articles like this that keep pushing a higher and higher "acceptable" tip percentage. 20% is not normal. 20% is very high for very good service. 15 years ago, 15% was normal. Now the minimum on these pos pos's is 18. I tip 15% and no more unless service was well above normal. And I have no qualms about hitting 0 for anything that isn't sit down service, including Uber and Lyft. We have to fight t…

What’s your Uber/Lyft rating these days? I imagine it’s not good if you don’t tip.

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#176
post #104

I am frustrated with articles like this that keep pushing a higher and higher "acceptable" tip percentage. 20% is not normal. 20% is very high for very good service. 15 years ago, 15% was normal. Now the minimum on these pos pos's is 18. I tip 15% and no more unless service was well above normal. And I have no qualms about hitting 0 for anything that isn't sit down service, including Uber and Lyft. We have to fight t…

What’s your Uber/Lyft rating these days? I imagine it’s not good if you don’t tip.

How would one know such a thing?

The absence of tipping was one of the big advantages uber and lyft offered over conventional cabs when they first came along, and I've stuck with it; I'm not going to tip.

If that eventually gets me blackballed so I have to go back to old-fashioned cabs, well... perhaps I'm not missing out on much.

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#177

Defaults matter. If the 'default' tip on the app is 15% or 20%, then you need to make an affirmative choice to not tip. Yes, you can (usually) opt out, but the screen is telling you in no uncertain terms that tipping is probably a social norm here—if you choose to opt out, you are making the extra effort to break the norm . Otherwise, why bother setting the default at all rather than force the user to enter an explic…

It's such an obvious ploy that it is actually offensive, and makes me feel like I want to tip less just to punish the system designer for their presumption.

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#178
post #164

In this scenario, especially in SF as a tech worker, you should feel guilty if you can afford to spare a dollar for someone on minimum wage for a tip but are reaching for the zero button. Having the iPad highlight your stingyness is not a problem with the technology.

Couldn't agree more. Don't like tipping an extra dollar for a coffee once in a while? Make it at home. If you can't spare $15 a week to tip service employees when you're sporting a six-figure salary, shame on you.

If you're a regular at a coffeeshop/fast casual place, another perk of tipping is that you quickly become known as a tipper and employees will come to like you. If you need a selfish reason to tip beyond having the employees like you, sometimes they'll even hook you up with free/discounted stuff.

It's easy to just eat out one fewer time a week and redistribute the would-have-been-spent-anyway money as tips to service employees, regardless of how much you think they actually 'did' for you.

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#179
post #104

I am frustrated with articles like this that keep pushing a higher and higher "acceptable" tip percentage. 20% is not normal. 20% is very high for very good service. 15 years ago, 15% was normal. Now the minimum on these pos pos's is 18. I tip 15% and no more unless service was well above normal. And I have no qualms about hitting 0 for anything that isn't sit down service, including Uber and Lyft. We have to fight t…

That's ultimately the problem with tips. It ends up being about coercion, and extracting the maximum amount from customers.

Besides the issue of people trying to convince you that the "standard" tip amount is an ever higher amount, new industries try to add tipping. Notice tip jars appearing everywhere.

Re: 'Coerced into tipping'? How apps are changing the culture of tipping in SF

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I fully support taxing the crap out of cars, Singapore and the USA are hardly comparable. It's the third most densely populated country on earth, and you can walk the circumference of the entire island in about a day. Not even factoring in the comprehensive public transit..

This can't be stressed enough. Large swaths of the US population would immediately become immobile. I think OP has never lived and worked in a rural area, say 30 miles outside of the nearest town, where survival depends on your ability to transport yourself.

In a way, the invention of the automobile made our lives worse. It meant grocery stores and services could be placed further and further away, stretching out areas rather than condensing them.
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