Dare to tip

Dear Journal,

I couldn’t help but recount my last conversation with Tope. Who would have thought that conversation would eventually drive me to write about it. Or maybe, I’m just looking for an excuse to do so. Oh well, I can’t help myself now, can I?

“When we go out to a restaurant, I expect excellent food and service. I’m an easy customer. So anyone that makes me happy at the end of the day will definitely get a generous tip.” It was this off-hand statement by me that brought up the discussion.

What tip? she asked me. If I go to a restaurant, I don’t tip anybody. What for now? Didn’t I pay for the food? she asked again.

The simple answer to that question is that the waiting team rendered a service. Like most people in this world, they deserve to be appreciated for their efforts. “But that service is included in the price surely!” one person said. Sometimes, the restaurant puts it at the bottom of the bill and call it the service charge. At other times, they leave it to your discretion.

Look, I’m no saint at all, trust me. Before I arrived England or met my boss, Michael, I never tipped a single waiter in all my life. I watched him in the nearly three years I worked with him reward excellent customer service by leaving tips. Like the English that he is, he would leave a tip of at least 10% of the bill. I wondered why in pete’s name he was doing that and I did not really appreciate it but I followed. Not quite as generous as he is, I managed to leave 5% tip occasionally as I struggled with this new ‘culture’.

It wasn’t until three weeks after my arrival in London that I realised the power of tips. I had just taken up a job as a waitress with a staffing company. Needless to say that this job took me to places around England that I wouldn’t ordinarily have visited. Like when I first saw the queen of England at Ascot, or when I visited Reading FC or when I chatted with Ollie Murs and his buddies at Tottenham FC.

Since I was a foreign student, I had to work only 20 hours a week else I’ll get in trouble with the Home Office. The pay of minimum wage every month was an average of £540- £600. When I started to visits racecourses and actually wait tables, I understood the importance of tips. Most of the customers at my tables were sweet enough to say thanks and leave at least 10% tip. I waited on 5 tables every time I was at Kempton Park and left every shift with a minimum of £50 in tips after splitting it with my fellow waitresses.

It might interest you to know that these tips are not taxed by the government at all. So they’re all yours to keep. I thought that was a good deal until I worked at Goodwood racecourse where I got at least £80 in tips everyday I worked there. Better still, they moved me to boxes at football and rugby stadiums and my tips increased. At the end of the last Twickenham game, I got £300 in tips and a good number of hugs and kisses and cards from my hosts! My friends easily made £700-£1000 in tips.

If one adds these tips to the monthly pay one receives, it makes the whole act of waitressing worthwhile. I try to give the best service that I can. All my hosts reward me with compliments about my beautiful smile and then tip me generously. As a student, this reduced the struggle to make more money as I could plan my month more effectively and concentrate on studying.

So I come back to her question? Why should I tip them? Haven’t I already paid for the food? Yes you have paid for the food but you might want to consider that through this tip, you might be helping a student focus more on studying and less on struggling. You might be keeping one more person under a roof instead of them sleeping out in the cold, begging for money. You do not have to tip. But it is more humane to do so. Would you rather give a beggar who already have lost his room instead of tipping that same person before they lost hope?

There might be no law compelling you to tip, but there is one thing that the human race can still boast of- compassion. That’s really why you should tip. The rich people I met, most times tipped because a service was seamless and fantastic. But they also tipped when the service wasn’t as great and I believe it’s all tied to compassion. So think about it, if you can afford to eat in a restaurant, you definitely can afford to leave a tip.

Note: Americans are the most generous tippers that I know. They actually tip 15%. If you don’t tip in the presence of an American, you risk getting a look of contempt!

As always, I’d like to know your views on tipping? Do you tip? How many percent is appropriate? When do you tip? What is the percentage in your country?

Love

Sharon