Tight friends taking my tip to cover their meal costs

[alid117]

Just been out for a meal with group of friends & some of their friends for a shared birthday. Lovely evening all agreed at start just to pay for what we have to eat and drink as some driving and some not - quite organised. Four out of the 14 of us worked out our share plus £5 tip added on each (great service from staff) then pasted on the receipt down to next lot. At the end heard one of the girls go to the waiter ‘sorry it’s not a huge tip’ and when asked how much had they left was told just £6!!! WTF!!! I was literally gagged by friend who didn’t want a scene...CF alert!

Mummy I'm sure the server just figured that as I was from abroad, they could get more money out of me. I go to US for business all the time though and no, 20% for shitty experience is not a mandatory fee.

This is vile behaviour. They have stolen from the waiting staff to subsidise their meal.

I have no time for stingy bastards people who don't tip.

Tipping in restaurants in Australia is perfectly normal. They don't tip in bars/ hotels (much like the UK) and sometimes people take this advice too literally.

Horrible behaviour. Totally stingy and entitled! Is there any response to the text?

It's just theft from both the staff and her fellow guests...

I recall something very similar happenkng to group I used to regularly eat out with...

One woman would ALWAYS volunteer to pay at bar with all the cash... As she ' only had card' .... This helpfulness was entirely out of character with the rest of her behaviour...

It took ages for the rest of us to realise...in fact only when an acquaintance was serving there... And another member of the group mentioned it in passing ... 'gawd we leave a lot of empties for you - still we do leave a reasonable tip! '.... Um no... There's never any tip...

She's been pulling this stunt monthly for about 18months... When we tackled her on it her response was jaw dropping :

There's always enough left over (from our tips) to pay for me- I don't have any money as I'm saving for my California holiday.... ).

She always skipped her round (we don't need another drink do we??)...

Oh I would have made a scene, cheeky fuckers

Or if she was forced into it, she would say 'let's just do cokes this round we've had enough alcohol...'

It's amazing we hadn't twigged.... Although luckily we through her out of our group after it turned out she had been having a long term affair with another pal's husband

This will be in the Daily Mail tomorrow op

Looking back she was on the periphery of the group... She was someone's work pal.. The rest of us had met at school...

All round a really horrible person!

THis isn't about the rights and wrongs of tipping. Its theft, pure and simple. Its indefensible. People that do this should firstly be called out there and then and secondly ostracised. What else would they nick given the opportunity? I wouldn't have someone that did this across my threshold.

American waiters/waitresses are scary. All that fawning over you and the intense eye contact when they give you the bill and make sure you know what an absolute pleasure it has been for them to put your food in front of you so don't you dare even think about not giving me my full 20% (they definitely expect 20 as a minimum I'd say). I find it all very uncomfortable. It's so artificial.

I remember going on a special interest group holiday a number of years with people i hadn’t met before. We ordered drinks at the first hotel we stayed at and I duly put down my money and waited for my change (think £10 for a soft drink with at least £8 expected). No change appeared so I queried it only to find that several other people had not paid anything. I insisted on the change, and no i wasn’t going to give a tip for pouring me a Diet Coke. I was told i had caused bad feeling with the staff and other group members for doing this. Did I care no.

People do this type of thing because they can get away with it abs nobody pulls them up during the act.

I would not have made a scene but absolutely would have got up and spoken to the person doing this. Needs must.

Abs = as

Wow! It's one thing not to leave a tip - that's mean. But to use other people's tips to pay for your own meal - that's theft.

I had a similar experience many years ago, and got stuck paying for all the expensive wine 'someone' (not me) ordered. Now when the group goes out we have a fixed menu, agreed and paid for in advance. Restaurant always knows to charge individuals for drinks and extras. More work beforehand, but no hassle after.

DevilsAvacado What happened? Did you get her to pay the money back? or kick her out of the group?

There's a reason most restaurants add a 12-15% service charge on for large groups, and that's precisely to stop the CFs shortchanging people.
Arseholes. I hate stinginess. If you can afford £20 for a meal you can afford £22 (10% minimum).

That’s theft. The money was meant for the wait staff. No way I’d be going out with these people again.

I was told i had caused bad feeling with the staff and other group members for doing this. Did I care no

I don't blame you! Trying to charge that much for a coke.
I don't understand how it could cause bad feeling with everyone except those who tried to rip you off!!

There's some knobs in the world!

I don’t understand why nobody said anything at the time.

This will be in the Daily Mail tomorrow op

So? It's not like she's said "And it was SANDRA from DERBY who did it!". It's on the public internet.

American waiters/waitresses are scary. All that fawning over you and the intense eye contact when they give you the bill and make sure you know what an absolute pleasure it has been for them to put your food in front of you so don't you dare even think about not giving me my full 20% (they definitely expect 20 as a minimum I'd say). I find it all very uncomfortable. It's so artificial

When I was America last year I was brought a bill that had 3 smilie faces on it, each with a varying degree of smile, and under neath each smile there was a suggested percentage of tip. So 20 percent was like a tight lipped smilie, 25 percent was a smile showing a small amount of teeth and 30 percent was a big grin smilie. I left 20 percent and drew a big grin smilie under neath it. I tip really well but to present a bill to a customer with smilies drawn on it was absolutely not on and not just because the 20 percent was all the service was worth on a coffee and a coke.

Thanks for the lesson Wild

It was more pointing out to the op how revealing the details are, and just a heads up in case. If the op isn't bothered either way then no harm done.

Are US waiting staff remunerated only by tips?

Are US waiting staff remunerated only by tips?

For the most part.