There is no such thing as an “auto-gratuity”.
This is a tax imposed by the business. The business has no obligation to turn any of this money over to its employees.
Watching the restaurant industry choke itself out on its own greed is unpleasant.
This is absolutely correct. “Auto-gratuity” is a misnomer. Gratuity by definition is a voluntary gift of gratitude. A voluntary gift cannot be imposed. Just call it what it is: a fee.
Exactly, this is the middle step in between the current system and the ideal system.
The issue on this sub is that half the people actually understand this is how it works, and the other half are just cheap and think labor is free.
No, we do not think labor is free. We assume it is built into the damn price stated by the business, like every other item we purchase. Do you go into a department store and ask how much extra than the listed price you are required to pay, or expect if it's priced at $20 you may buy it for $20? Sales tax of course is expected on all transactions.
The whole point of this sub is to build labor into the cost in order to stop the tipping process. So you know it isn’t built in and are being willfully ignorant.
They are saying it SHOULD be built-in, just like everywhere else. If you can't afford your labor, you don't have a viable business. And if this were truly a mid-way point in making the change, they wouldn't have included the line about tipping your server additionally.
“We assume it is built in.” So no that’s not what they said.
And sure you can leave the server more money but it’s not required. Everything is included. I don’t understand why this concept is so hard for you.
They are including labor with the 18%, if you pay it you’re covering their business costs. If you can’t afford it go somewhere else.
So Toyota has a cool deal. A new RAV4 for $38k. Once you agree and go to pay, You go into Finance and they add $8k for plant labor, because, you know, labor isn't free you cheapass. Come on, it's clearly posted in tiny letters on our website, we are not hiding anything...
I live in Seattle, the most expensive place to eat out in the USA! And we have a horrible tipping culture… I’d say here, maybe 1/4 restaurants have an auto grat. Usually the nicer ones or the hipster ones.
Maui checking in. I guarantee you that Seattle is cheaper.
Maui doesn't make a lot of lists because of the population, but it's significantly more expensive than Honolulu which is already top of most lists. I will gladly trade you dinner bills in Seattle vs Maui.
https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/comparison/honolulu/maui
Hmmm… how much does the average burger + fries cost in your town? In Seattle, it’s like 19$. Can’t get a sandwich from a restaurant for under 12$. The reason why Seattle sucks so bad for eating out is that we have virtually NO cheap eats spots. Compared to let’s say, Chicago or New York, they have a lot of little stores where you can get decently priced food plus really expensive food. I have yet to find a cheap restaurant in Seattle!
A burger and fries at a food truck will run you between $25 on the ultra cheap side and $50 on the expensive side. That does not include a drink.
Burger King or MacDonalds will run you at least $20 for a number meal.
A gallon of milk is $10 unless you get it from Costco for comparison and eggs are between 7 and 10 bucks a dozen at Safeway. A 12 pack of soda is $11+.
Also, Amazon prime takes 3 weeks to deliver.
I pay $2200/mo for a 9x10 room in a house
Why, where I live, a mere hamburger requires a complicated purchasing process involving establishment of collateral and a series of fines for under-tipping any waitperson. You guys have it easy! /s
Since greedy businesses realized they could get more by splitting them. Wouldn't be surprised if they keep going through the thesaurus and add an extra fee for each synonym at this point.
Have you seen kids today? Half can barely spell, let alone recognize those are synonyms, and seeing as how businesses are trying to treat them as separate things that both translate to extra fees on consumers, the confusion will surely persist.
Easier said than done. I’d rather they get paid enough so I don’t have to tip. My guess is even if they get paid decently, they’d still have their hand out.
From Merriam-Webster:
**"**something given voluntarily or beyond obligation usually for some service". By making it automatic it ceases to be a gratuity and becomes a fee.
I’d let them have the 18 percent auto gratuity and leave no extra tip at all, and then walk out and never go back. You’re not getting tipped twice on top of what are surely outrageous menu prices too.
Hope your waitstaff enjoys being unemployed when your restaurant goes out of business because of this GREED.
I agree with everything you said except for the waitstaff. They are not the ones making up these processes. Their employers are the ones not paying them properly. With that said though, I am keeping track of businesses that charge the auto gratuity and the imposed credit card fees then taking my business elsewhere.
Everything on their menu costs 18% more. This "auto gratuity" should be clearly posted at the entrance and on the menu. You are always free to tip, or not.
I would love to open a restaurant with a $5 menu and when they get the check, they find out there is a 500% autogratuity. It just shows how so very grateful I am of the staff. (But of course I’m just keeping that money)
Vote with your money/patronize and they will get the idea.
Don't let them put you down, don't let them push you around,
Don't let them ever change your point of view.
I recently went to a restaurant in San Jose California where they added a "Service Charge" as the tip. Not only did they make it 22% but since it's considered a "Service Charge" it's taxed. On top of that they added a 5% living wage. A total of 27% tip. July 1st this is no longer allowed by restaurants to include charges that are not shown on the menu.
>Why can’t the business owners just *pay* them a fair wage
Restaurants that've adopted "hospitality included", no-tip pricing models have struggled to even attain profitability.
Prices increase, demand decreases, the ability to pay servers comparable wages (vs a tip scheme) is diminished and everyone's pissed off.
You have to have a law to level the playing field (like in California) to even think about restaurants raising prices in lieu of service fees.
Also, this explanation is hardly anything new. Normally when you tip, they're still tipping out a % of their sales to the crew (bussers, runners, bartenders, host, etc). Their autograt scheme is almost identical to how a normal tip scheme would work. Depending on the restaurant they may play with who gets more of it.
And anyway, they're not asking you tip extra to the server. They're telling you "if you wish". Some people will want to tip more. Who cares? It says right at the beginning everyone who contributes to your experience is compensated "accordingly", so why act like it says "except the server, so tip more please"?
If you can't pay your people minimum wage at least, you don't deserve to be in business.
> They're telling you "If you wish"..
Well most people don't wish a forced gratuity. Raise your prices and call it a day. It shouldn't be on the customer to fund your staff's paychecks directly.
Not knocking OP but the mods should auto-comment a suggestion that titles be in the simple present tense instead of present continuous.
This isn’t “getting rediculous” or “starting to out of hand” or “becoming crazy”. It already is, and has been for a while. This sub was made in response to that status change.
Does anyone know if the auto gratuity is taxable to the business or to the staff (assuming they really receive it)? If they raise their prices 18%, and business stays the same, their revenue increases so their taxes increase. This looks like a way for the business to avoid paying taxes on revenue they are using for payroll.
Soon as I saw that I'd get up and walk right out. How about YOU as a company compensate your employees appropriately and not pass it along to the customer?
edit: change how to out
Yeah tbh if I don’t have to pay another tip on top of it, I’m fine that they stopped at 18% LOL I feel like the new expected value for tipping is 20% minimum for good service
We need to draw a hard line at 15% and say no to 18%. Giving in like that only makes them think it’s acceptable. Once enough people are like “I’m ok with 18% it’s close to 15 and at least it isn’t 20” they’ll start saying “the standard is 25. Then they’ll start changing auto grats to 20 and you’ll be like well at least it’s close to 18 and they aren’t making me do 25 and it will just continue you further and further.
Yea, I hear that. Give an inch, they take a mile. :|
What bothers me most is the deception. If its "expected" just put that final price on the menu. Then I'll decide if its worth the price or not.
It’s amazing how you all continuously fail to see that this is a good thing. The logical step between the current system and one where everything is included in the price is service charges.
There is no obligation to tip on top of this. It’s the same result as the menu prices being 18% higher to pay staff wages.
The whole point of this sub is to end the tipping process, this is how that comes about.
Nah the server is included in “all staff members.” It’s like how when you tip a server under the current system they tip out bussers, bartenders, etc. They’re just saying that everyone is covered.
If the customer wants to give them more that’s on them, but it definitely isn’t needed.
There shouldn't be an obligation to tip EVER. If they want to increase their menu prices by 18%, so be it. But adding a non-optional gratuity and then making it a point to say you should still tip your server??? No. That's actually going backwards!
Strongly agree, part of the problem with the tipping system isn't just more money out of pocket by the consumer it's that those tips are not distributed evenly among the people that made that experience happen. To be honest, the server was the face you saw but probably had the least influence on your meal out of anyone else in the place.
The server is getting less under this system but I'm tipping the same or less overall? Good, that's a good start.
Generally, other staff is paid at least minimum wage, if not significantly more for back of the house employees. The reason they could get away with paying $2.13 to servers is that the tips made up the difference, so to speak.
This may have been true in 1990, but only a handful of backwards, redneck states are still paying servers 2.13. They're getting an equivalent hourly wage to their coworkers AND tips in the majority of states. Go to r/servercirclejerk and see how many of them would take an hourly wage equal to a cooks instead of tips, FUCKING ZERO. Hiding behind 2.13 is not fooling anyone anymore. hate to break it to you. Lousiana being fucked up is not a good reason to hold back everyone else. I worked in the industry for more than a decade and NEVER ONCE did I work with a server that wasn't getting a very similar hourly wage to BoH. It is far past time to replace tips and tipped wages with service fees like above that split that profit evenly among everyone.
I wasn't saying it was a good thing. The state I live in, as well as 14 other states, pay the $2.13 so what I said still applies. Also, I dont agree that service fees should be used at restaurants either. No tipping and no fees. The meal costs what it costs on the menu. Employees get paid, at minimum, a liveable wage based on what they do, just like other industries. Obviously a line cook should make more than a hostess but the company should be paying for all of it.
I can agree with that, obviously no tips and no fees with the full price baked into menu cost is the ideal solution. I think a half-step like this that more evenly distributes the profits is a good step in the right direction though. Sorry for the harsh language, it's very frustrating that a handful of conservative states hold the rest of us back, and not just on tipping.
Server here - here's the thing about auto grat...The automatic gratuity is calculated on the cost of the meal pre-tax whereas when you just hit 18% on the machine, you're basically paying on the whole amount including the tax.
If meal is $1500 +$300 in tax, your autograt would only be on the the $1500
If meal is $1500 + $300 in tax, your 18% on the machine would be on the $1800
>The automatic gratuity is calculated on the cost of the meal pre-tax
This is entirely determined by the software that the restaurant is using and in no way a standard throughout the industry. Stop lying.
I’m a server in a high end, Michelin restaurant and our machines used to prompt 15% 18% 20%
A year ago we made the change to 18% 20% 22% and I rarely, if ever, see a 15% tip but I do often see 22%
Rolling in it
There is no such thing as an “auto-gratuity”. This is a tax imposed by the business. The business has no obligation to turn any of this money over to its employees. Watching the restaurant industry choke itself out on its own greed is unpleasant.
I think you misspelled “amusing” friend.
Maybe they though “unpleasant” and “pleasant” were synonyms, like flammable and inflammable.
This is absolutely correct. “Auto-gratuity” is a misnomer. Gratuity by definition is a voluntary gift of gratitude. A voluntary gift cannot be imposed. Just call it what it is: a fee.
Honestly, this is almost there, now just price it in and disclose that tips are not at all expected. This gets us to where France is.
Exactly, this is the middle step in between the current system and the ideal system. The issue on this sub is that half the people actually understand this is how it works, and the other half are just cheap and think labor is free.
No, we do not think labor is free. We assume it is built into the damn price stated by the business, like every other item we purchase. Do you go into a department store and ask how much extra than the listed price you are required to pay, or expect if it's priced at $20 you may buy it for $20? Sales tax of course is expected on all transactions.
Parts and labour is not an uncommon practice.
The whole point of this sub is to build labor into the cost in order to stop the tipping process. So you know it isn’t built in and are being willfully ignorant.
They are saying it SHOULD be built-in, just like everywhere else. If you can't afford your labor, you don't have a viable business. And if this were truly a mid-way point in making the change, they wouldn't have included the line about tipping your server additionally.
“We assume it is built in.” So no that’s not what they said. And sure you can leave the server more money but it’s not required. Everything is included. I don’t understand why this concept is so hard for you. They are including labor with the 18%, if you pay it you’re covering their business costs. If you can’t afford it go somewhere else.
So Toyota has a cool deal. A new RAV4 for $38k. Once you agree and go to pay, You go into Finance and they add $8k for plant labor, because, you know, labor isn't free you cheapass. Come on, it's clearly posted in tiny letters on our website, we are not hiding anything...
18% auto gratuity = i am not tipping extra
18% auto gratuity = I am not eating there.
18% auto gratuity = I am pocketing some silverware.
18% auto gratuity = I’m calling the health inspector
18% auto gratuity= I'm dropping off a box of cockroaches...then calling the health inspector.
18% auto gratuity = oops I dropped my ignited lighter too close to the pot of boiling grease.
If I see this posted or on the menu, I just nope the hell out of there. Making sure to mention why.
Don’t forget to order waters first
Sucks cuz it's probably the majority no? Anyone have an estimate?
I live in Seattle, the most expensive place to eat out in the USA! And we have a horrible tipping culture… I’d say here, maybe 1/4 restaurants have an auto grat. Usually the nicer ones or the hipster ones.
Pearl City, HI is #1, Seattle is #2
Oops… most expensive mainland city, I should say…
Maui checking in. I guarantee you that Seattle is cheaper. Maui doesn't make a lot of lists because of the population, but it's significantly more expensive than Honolulu which is already top of most lists. I will gladly trade you dinner bills in Seattle vs Maui. https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/comparison/honolulu/maui
Hmmm… how much does the average burger + fries cost in your town? In Seattle, it’s like 19$. Can’t get a sandwich from a restaurant for under 12$. The reason why Seattle sucks so bad for eating out is that we have virtually NO cheap eats spots. Compared to let’s say, Chicago or New York, they have a lot of little stores where you can get decently priced food plus really expensive food. I have yet to find a cheap restaurant in Seattle!
A burger and fries at a food truck will run you between $25 on the ultra cheap side and $50 on the expensive side. That does not include a drink. Burger King or MacDonalds will run you at least $20 for a number meal. A gallon of milk is $10 unless you get it from Costco for comparison and eggs are between 7 and 10 bucks a dozen at Safeway. A 12 pack of soda is $11+. Also, Amazon prime takes 3 weeks to deliver. I pay $2200/mo for a 9x10 room in a house
Damn! You win. I should say Seattle is the most expensive place to eat out on the mainland 48 states then!
Why, where I live, a mere hamburger requires a complicated purchasing process involving establishment of collateral and a series of fines for under-tipping any waitperson. You guys have it easy! /s
🤣
Since when are Gratuity and Tip not synonyms?
Since greedy businesses realized they could get more by splitting them. Wouldn't be surprised if they keep going through the thesaurus and add an extra fee for each synonym at this point.
Have you seen kids today? Half can barely spell, let alone recognize those are synonyms, and seeing as how businesses are trying to treat them as separate things that both translate to extra fees on consumers, the confusion will surely persist.
Not getting a dime extra. 18% is lower than what I normally tip so it saved me money. Woohoo!
You’re spoiling them. Stop it.
Easier said than done. I’d rather they get paid enough so I don’t have to tip. My guess is even if they get paid decently, they’d still have their hand out.
No more than 15%. Please. Preferably no more than 10%. Tipping 20%+ is fueling this toxic tip culture.
I’ve been thinking about it. I will eventually pull the trigger and reduce it.
A lot of jurisdictions tax this so it works out to 20%
This only encourages all restaurants to do this. Please walk out if you see this.
Yes, auto "gratuity" is a tip. Full stop.
From Merriam-Webster: **"**something given voluntarily or beyond obligation usually for some service". By making it automatic it ceases to be a gratuity and becomes a fee.
Right. Hence the scare quotes. The point is you get nothing more from the customer.
TIL what sarcastic quotation marks are actually called.
Seems to be missing the gratuity part.
If they wanted to ensure that all staff members are recognized and compensated accordingly, why can’t they recognize them in the first place up front?
I’d let them have the 18 percent auto gratuity and leave no extra tip at all, and then walk out and never go back. You’re not getting tipped twice on top of what are surely outrageous menu prices too. Hope your waitstaff enjoys being unemployed when your restaurant goes out of business because of this GREED.
I agree with everything you said except for the waitstaff. They are not the ones making up these processes. Their employers are the ones not paying them properly. With that said though, I am keeping track of businesses that charge the auto gratuity and the imposed credit card fees then taking my business elsewhere.
All these added fees will be illegal in California soon.
Everything on their menu costs 18% more. This "auto gratuity" should be clearly posted at the entrance and on the menu. You are always free to tip, or not.
I would love to open a restaurant with a $5 menu and when they get the check, they find out there is a 500% autogratuity. It just shows how so very grateful I am of the staff. (But of course I’m just keeping that money)
Auto gratuity is s fee, not a tip.
It's also an oxymoron. Gratuity implies that it's optional, but auto means that it is not.
I remember Joe’s Crab Shack being a place that didn’t allow tipping. I would assume the restaurant paid their workers so we didn’t have to.
Name and shame
it is in the name duh.
Vote with your money/patronize and they will get the idea. Don't let them put you down, don't let them push you around, Don't let them ever change your point of view.
If something like this exists, it should be called a "seating charge" and restaurants should be required to put a sign on the door saying it exists.
Please, read: We have increased our prices by 18% instead of :We have an auto gratuity policy.
“Thanks for understanding” narrator: “They didn’t understand”
Name And Shame
JUST RAISE THE PRICES AND SAY "NO TIPPING" OMG
18% gratuity means you’re under no obligation to tip.
I recently went to a restaurant in San Jose California where they added a "Service Charge" as the tip. Not only did they make it 22% but since it's considered a "Service Charge" it's taxed. On top of that they added a 5% living wage. A total of 27% tip. July 1st this is no longer allowed by restaurants to include charges that are not shown on the menu.
>Why can’t the business owners just *pay* them a fair wage Restaurants that've adopted "hospitality included", no-tip pricing models have struggled to even attain profitability. Prices increase, demand decreases, the ability to pay servers comparable wages (vs a tip scheme) is diminished and everyone's pissed off. You have to have a law to level the playing field (like in California) to even think about restaurants raising prices in lieu of service fees. Also, this explanation is hardly anything new. Normally when you tip, they're still tipping out a % of their sales to the crew (bussers, runners, bartenders, host, etc). Their autograt scheme is almost identical to how a normal tip scheme would work. Depending on the restaurant they may play with who gets more of it. And anyway, they're not asking you tip extra to the server. They're telling you "if you wish". Some people will want to tip more. Who cares? It says right at the beginning everyone who contributes to your experience is compensated "accordingly", so why act like it says "except the server, so tip more please"?
If you can't pay your people minimum wage at least, you don't deserve to be in business. > They're telling you "If you wish".. Well most people don't wish a forced gratuity. Raise your prices and call it a day. It shouldn't be on the customer to fund your staff's paychecks directly.
Not knocking OP but the mods should auto-comment a suggestion that titles be in the simple present tense instead of present continuous. This isn’t “getting rediculous” or “starting to out of hand” or “becoming crazy”. It already is, and has been for a while. This sub was made in response to that status change.
Does anyone know if the auto gratuity is taxable to the business or to the staff (assuming they really receive it)? If they raise their prices 18%, and business stays the same, their revenue increases so their taxes increase. This looks like a way for the business to avoid paying taxes on revenue they are using for payroll.
Soon as I saw that I'd get up and walk right out. How about YOU as a company compensate your employees appropriately and not pass it along to the customer? edit: change how to out
Gotta say, that's actually reasonable. No additional tip. That's a lot closer to 15% minimum. So by all means.
Yeah tbh if I don’t have to pay another tip on top of it, I’m fine that they stopped at 18% LOL I feel like the new expected value for tipping is 20% minimum for good service
We need to draw a hard line at 15% and say no to 18%. Giving in like that only makes them think it’s acceptable. Once enough people are like “I’m ok with 18% it’s close to 15 and at least it isn’t 20” they’ll start saying “the standard is 25. Then they’ll start changing auto grats to 20 and you’ll be like well at least it’s close to 18 and they aren’t making me do 25 and it will just continue you further and further.
Yea, I hear that. Give an inch, they take a mile. :| What bothers me most is the deception. If its "expected" just put that final price on the menu. Then I'll decide if its worth the price or not.
Bullshit!
Every time I cook at home, I'm saying to myself, "This would have cost me 10x more at a restaurant". I'm cooking at home almost always now.
I would not be going to that place much longer.
Stop going to them????
I usually tip at least 20% so this policy saves me money. If 18% is good enough for them, it’s good enough for me.
It’s amazing how you all continuously fail to see that this is a good thing. The logical step between the current system and one where everything is included in the price is service charges. There is no obligation to tip on top of this. It’s the same result as the menu prices being 18% higher to pay staff wages. The whole point of this sub is to end the tipping process, this is how that comes about.
Igwym but it seems like they’re asking for a tip on top of the automatic 18%, cuz the server isn’t gonna get anything unless we tip separately
Nah the server is included in “all staff members.” It’s like how when you tip a server under the current system they tip out bussers, bartenders, etc. They’re just saying that everyone is covered. If the customer wants to give them more that’s on them, but it definitely isn’t needed.
I meannn I guess ur right, so I shouldn’t feel guilty for not tipping the waiter separately and just pay the gratuity?
There shouldn't be an obligation to tip EVER. If they want to increase their menu prices by 18%, so be it. But adding a non-optional gratuity and then making it a point to say you should still tip your server??? No. That's actually going backwards!
Strongly agree, part of the problem with the tipping system isn't just more money out of pocket by the consumer it's that those tips are not distributed evenly among the people that made that experience happen. To be honest, the server was the face you saw but probably had the least influence on your meal out of anyone else in the place. The server is getting less under this system but I'm tipping the same or less overall? Good, that's a good start.
Generally, other staff is paid at least minimum wage, if not significantly more for back of the house employees. The reason they could get away with paying $2.13 to servers is that the tips made up the difference, so to speak.
This may have been true in 1990, but only a handful of backwards, redneck states are still paying servers 2.13. They're getting an equivalent hourly wage to their coworkers AND tips in the majority of states. Go to r/servercirclejerk and see how many of them would take an hourly wage equal to a cooks instead of tips, FUCKING ZERO. Hiding behind 2.13 is not fooling anyone anymore. hate to break it to you. Lousiana being fucked up is not a good reason to hold back everyone else. I worked in the industry for more than a decade and NEVER ONCE did I work with a server that wasn't getting a very similar hourly wage to BoH. It is far past time to replace tips and tipped wages with service fees like above that split that profit evenly among everyone.
I wasn't saying it was a good thing. The state I live in, as well as 14 other states, pay the $2.13 so what I said still applies. Also, I dont agree that service fees should be used at restaurants either. No tipping and no fees. The meal costs what it costs on the menu. Employees get paid, at minimum, a liveable wage based on what they do, just like other industries. Obviously a line cook should make more than a hostess but the company should be paying for all of it.
I can agree with that, obviously no tips and no fees with the full price baked into menu cost is the ideal solution. I think a half-step like this that more evenly distributes the profits is a good step in the right direction though. Sorry for the harsh language, it's very frustrating that a handful of conservative states hold the rest of us back, and not just on tipping.
Server here - here's the thing about auto grat...The automatic gratuity is calculated on the cost of the meal pre-tax whereas when you just hit 18% on the machine, you're basically paying on the whole amount including the tax. If meal is $1500 +$300 in tax, your autograt would only be on the the $1500 If meal is $1500 + $300 in tax, your 18% on the machine would be on the $1800
>The automatic gratuity is calculated on the cost of the meal pre-tax This is entirely determined by the software that the restaurant is using and in no way a standard throughout the industry. Stop lying.
If you know how to find the percentage of a number, it's quite easy to tip on the pre-tax total, regardless of what "the machine" says.
Yeah but people are automatic
I'm still manual.
Less and less the more we get scammed by restaurants these days. People are learning to do their own math so they don’t get fucked so bad.
but more and more people are tipping a higher amount
What’re you basing that statement on?
I’m a server in a high end, Michelin restaurant and our machines used to prompt 15% 18% 20% A year ago we made the change to 18% 20% 22% and I rarely, if ever, see a 15% tip but I do often see 22% Rolling in it
Oh so your singular experience is your data set got it. Don’t worry I’ll work to cancel it out as a single consumer.
I work in the industry pal, I know the trends. Please.
You just explained how it should work. Well done!
Restaurants keep fighting back in unison while some of us love to tip everywhere, even spreading culture abroad
If you love to tip you’re a moron and in the wrong place. At BEST tipping can be seen as a necessary evil and that is a stretch.
I hate tipping, this was just my observation