At a recent dinner party I hosted, a diner wanted to set me straight on the practice of restaurant tipping. Taking a $20 bill out of his pocket, he declared, “I put one of these on the table the minute I sit down. When my waitress comes over, I tell her, ‘You see this? Every time my water glass isn’t filled, I take away a buck!’ ”
This may not win him many friends or even a guarantee of water when he dines out, but there are many who might cheer him on.
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Should we have the right not to tip our server? There is no requirement, legal or otherwise, to leave a tip. We tip, we say, because we want better service. But the tip is left at the end of the meal (except for my friend), after service has been rendered. And tips are usually based on the amount of the bill.
The Rhode Island Hospitality and Tourism Association estimates that there are nearly 11,000 servers employed in the state, earning a significant percentage of their annual wages from tips. Nationally, the National Restaurant Association estimates that tips earned by American restaurant workers run into the billions of dollars. “Unfortunately,” says Molly Altman of the NRA, “due to the fact that many servers don’t declare all their tips [as income], it is hard to determine an average.”
According to Heather Singleton, vice president of operations for the RIHTA, tipping “is the way that the industry is run today.” Restaurateurs plan their cost of doing business, particularly wages, on servers making enough in tips to pay themselves a living wage.
Singleton says one reason for our love/hate relationship with tipping may be that the tip amount that is expected has increased in recent years. The norm used to be about 15 percent of the bill. But now, it is assumed that the amount left on the table will be closer to 20 percent.
It was not until after the Civil War that tipping became widespread. At the time it met with large-scale public opposition. Six states actually banned the practice.
The argument against tipping always includes the European model. Many Americans who return from vacation on the continent rave about how restaurants have a built-in service charge, then lament that we don’t. Actually, we do. Many restaurants add a service charge for a so-called large party [of as few as six people]. The charge is usually in the neighborhood of 18 percent.
Locally, some of the leading restaurants that apply such a charge are The Spiced Pear at the Chanler Hotel in Newport, which advises on its menu that a 20-percent service charge will be added for parties of six or more. And Gracie’s in Providence adds a 20-percent service charge for parties of eight or more. Proprietor Ellen Gracylny says this is “solely for the convenience of our guests,” which seems to me to be a very diplomatic move. How many dinner parties have been ruined when the guests can’t agree on how to divide up the tip?
The tipping mystery is not so complicated. It is simply a result of a satisfactory business relationship between server and customer.
While nationally, according to the NRA, the average server is less than 30 years old, in Rhode Island we have many veteran servers – men and women – who have had long, successful careers. Known on a first-name basis, characters like Eddie at Twin Oaks, who parlayed his goodwill into a run for Cranston City Council. Or Celeste, who has been at Pinelli’s Cucina and The Grille in North Smithfield for the last 12 years. Or the charming waitress at Sogno in Cranston who is known simply as Auntie, to name just a few. Something tells me my friend’s ransom money for water would not be necessary with these folks on the other side of the table. •
Dining Out with Bruce Newbury (bruce@brucenewbury.com) can be heard on Talk Radio 920 WHJJ-AM Fridays at 6 p.m. and Saturdays at noon.
