A few tips on auto-tipping
Read the fine print and fight back.
Automatic tipping is everywhere, and it’s time to do something about it.
I saw it at a pizza restaurant in Provo, Utah, recently. When I paid for my order, the electronic payment system asked if I wanted to tip 10% (cheapskate!), 15% (better!) or the correct amount, 20%. No, the touchpad didn’t actually comment on the choices, but the incorrect selection was clear: the “no tip” box that wasn’t highlighted.
It was a takeout order, for goodness’ sake.
Tipping is a confusing ritual for consumers. Coffee shops, hair salons and fast-food restaurants now actively solicit tips from their customers. But automatic tipping takes it to the next level. When a business either strongly suggests a tip or just adds a gratuity to your bill hoping you won’t dispute it, that feels wrong.
Tipping at the next level
Consider what happened to Joshua Zweighaft, a New York-based travel consultant. When he ordered a beer at a poolside bar at an upscale hotel in San Jose, California, it added an 18% gratuity for his “convenience.”
“I paid it,” he says. “But did not leave an additional tip. I hope the gratuity went to the bartender.”
Service charges for drinks are becoming common in resort towns, particularly Las Vegas. You can sometimes negotiate them off your bill, but do you really want to make a scene?
Even when a business doesn’t automatically add a tip, it still feels as if you have no choice. Wade Eyerly, CEO of an insurance company based in New Canaan, Connecticut, is unhappy
about the airport restaurants that solicit tips through a tablet-based payment system such as Square before you receive your food.
“It’s like a Mob threat,” he says. “Tip well, or who knows what happens, you know?”
The cruise industry may be the worst when it comes to auto-tipping. Cruise lines such as Carnival, Princess and Norwegian automatically add fees of up to $23 per person, per day to your bill. You can remove these tips before you disembark, but once you’re off the ship, there’s nothing you can do.
Should tipping even exist?
A lot of service employees believe tips ought to be mandatory. If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you the hate mail I’ll get after this story appears. Before chewing me out, they’ll inform me that a tip is part of their salary – and that by encouraging readers to withhold a tip, I’m an accessory to theft.
That’s nonsense. Tips always have been optional. But the servers and tour guides are right about one thing: Gratuities are starting to feel like an undisclosed tax.
“I think you hit the nail on the head by calling it a tax,” says Tanner Callais, editor of Cruzely.com, a website about cruising. “These fees are all but mandatory, especially on a cruise.”
So what should you do?
If you see an automatic tip on your bill, do something about it quickly. No one should pay a tip before they receive the service.
Don’t let a business tip shame you. Remember, a tip is for great service. It’s not an entitlement.
What if it’s too late? Elaine Thompson thought it might be after a conference dinner at a fancy restaurant. Thompson watched the dinner’s host write out a $200 tip.
“It dawned on me the next day that, as a party of more than eight, there was likely an automatic gratuity, so I called the (dinner) host to let her know,” she says. “Sure enough, she had accidentally tipped the waiter about $425 total. The restaurant was gracious enough to refund the additional tip.”
Sometimes, that’s all it takes.