Originally Posted by
JohnnyColombia
As Coolcoil points out, he is asked if he wants to add the propina to the check and so far as I am aware, this is a legal requirement. It is also a legal requirement to post a notice about the propina and your rights to refuse it.
I think culturally it is a little bit different from the USA, although the servers won't "work you" for the tip, they are on COP$2000 per hour most of them. I have never refused to pay it when added to the bill and frankly the service is sometimes plain shocking.
It is indeed a legal requirement to ask, and many restaurant bills spell out in text that the propina is optional. It's been about 18 months since this started and there were newspaper articles that explained the law, but I also seem to remember that the revenue is shared with all of the staff, including kitchen workers, so the waiter does not have a huge stake in your individual decision to pay or not.
[UPDATE] - There is no requirement to put a service charge on the bill. See my explanation in a later post.
You should also know that not all restaurants follow the requirement to put the propina on the bill. We live in a smaller town, and one restaurant we frequent does not add the propina, even though they are legally required to do so. They still get overtipped
But the food and service are great.
I would say that in our little town, probably only two or three of the restaurants follow the law and offer to add the standard propina. In my experience, the servers in our local restaurants rarely receive tips.