This is a fascinating story about consumer rights. A local pud in Bethlehem, Pa. had a couple arrested for not paying the tip! What is interesting is that the couple complained about the service and still the restaurant insisted on the mandatory gratuity. Now…the pub manager did not think that this whole issue could come back on him. The local news picked up on the story…and well so did Yahoo, a featured story on the Yahoo home page! So now everyone in the world has the possibility to find out how poor the service really was at the local pub! So was all this bad publicity really worth the whole $16 tip? Bad move restaurant manager…not only will that couple never be back…but a whole bunch of other people may never be back or even bother to give the pub a chance.
Tipping is ALWAYS a reward for great service. The word “TIPS” stands for “To Insure Proper Service”. You should always tip when served in a proper manner…remember that most wait staff work for $2.13 an hour…so they should be hustling for your tip in every way. But I have indeed been to a few places where it seemed the wait staff was more concerned with their smoke break then with serving their clients. In these rare cases…rewarding poor service will only cause the poor service to continue. Do the restaurant a huge favor…find out who is in charge or who owns the restaurant and report the problem. In the long run you are really doing what is in the restaurants best interests. A savvy restaurant owner will take whatever steps to get you to come back and give them a second chance at impressing you! You can read more about the story here. And of course…you can tip our drivers if you like…but I promise you will never be required to!