Flattery could get you much bigger tip

Rapport key to generous reward: study

We often tip taxi drivers and waiters, but not always.

Nor do we tip as generously on some occasions as on others.

What accounts for this apparently erratic behaviour?

The British Psychological Society’s Research Digest recently highlighted the work of Michael Lynn, who has studied tipping behaviour for many years.

In one study, Lynn presented a list of 122 service providers — from architects to X-ray technicians — to nearly 1,200 online participants and asked them to rate each job on measures including estimated income and working conditions.

Participants were also asked to estimate how likely they’d be to tip each provider. Lynn found a tendency to tip individuals who were considered to be low wage earners. Participants were also more likely to tip those who offer a personalized service — for example, masseurs and hairdressers.

He also noticed the relative good fortune of service providers and customers plays a role in our decisions — in other words, customers are more likely to tip when they feel the service provider has less to look forward to than they do at the time. They were more inclined to tip a taxi driver who was taking them to the airport for a holiday.

Most experimental work has concentrated on tipping in restaurants.

Lynn and his team found that if a waiter offers a customer a piece of chocolate with the bill, the customer is likely to reciprocate with a higher tip than a customer not offered a treat. And two pieces of chocolate result in even higher tips.

Previous research by Bruce Rind and Prashant Bordia found that if waiters smiled at customers, wrote “thank you” or scribbled a smiley face on the bill, or introduced themselves by name, they were more likely to receive higher tips — but only if the person serving was female.

The researchers suggest this may be because such “friendly” behaviour was considered inappropriate in males in America at that time (1996).

We’re likely to tip more if the service provider compliments us.

Researchers John Seiter and Harry Weger asked waiters to compliment half the parties they served on their “excellent choice of order.”

As long as customers felt the compliment was sincere, they tipped significantly more than did those who were not complimented. This only applied to parties of two or three, however — in larger groups, these compliments had no effect. This makes sense. When there are a number of people involved, it’s harder to believe a compliment is genuine, given that it’s offered to everyone.

And when it comes to the size of a tip, we’re more likely to give more if the server attempts to establish a rapport.