cestmoi123

Out of curiosity: if you're at a restaurant in another city, where the odds you'll return to the city are slim, and to the restaurant are essentially nil, do you tip?

WrightHI

Since we all tend to be biased toward our own interests, others' reaction to our behavior can be a useful indicator that we're behaving badly and ought to adjust, whether or not we're ever going to see them again. Not definitive, but useful.

jrl767

of course there's the underlying assumption that the individual in question even notices, to say nothing of cares, about how others react to their behavior ...

fliesdelta

Yes, if the service warrants it. It's the waiter's livelihood.

Proudelitist

Depends on the service, as usual.

I am not trying to be a jerk. I just have no problem being one when the situation calls for it..seat poacher, seat swap request, poor service..the worry of what someone thinks of me when that someone is a person who has no real influence and who I am unlikely to have to deal with again (although this isn't always the case, I can be a jerk to jerks I have to deal with regularly) is not a worry.

Tizzette

Move the purchaser of the good seat back to BE to sit by the child. If that means somebody has to give up their seat, upgrade that person up to good seat.

MSPeconomist

I really hope this is the way airlines handle the requirement.

PTravel

That's a really odd question. Though, technically, tipping is "optional," it is expected. Leaving a tip, at least in the US, isn't a question of "being nice" or "doing a favor," but an obligation, albeit one that is unenforceable. It's how the waiter or waitress who served you earns their living.

So, to answer your question, of course I leave a tip.

cestmoi123

It's not an odd question at all. If someone's fine with being thought to be a "jerk" so long as it's by someone with whom they won't have further interactions, then that could readily extend to an interaction like tipping.

Maybe I'm wrong about this, but I would bet that a survey of the general public (of which FT is clearly not a representative sample) would show that the majority would view declining a polite request to swap to a comparable or better seat to allow a parent to sit with a child as being impolite. Maybe I'm wrong.

jeet

General Public and FT members are two subsets of overall population which do not intersect at all... at least not based on members that we come across on these threads regularly(including myself)

we are all part douche-bags, part DYKWIA, part special flower/snowflake.. whatever have you.

And you are right majority of human population would think that a polite request should be met with a polite response.

MSPeconomist

There's a difference between responding politely and responding affirmatively. Politeness isn't the same as being a pushover. Also, IME many seat swap "requests" are far from polite in the way they're demanded.

NotHamSarnie

Douche-bags we may be but we are still part of the General Public...

jeet

I am afraid you missed the point... we are part of overall population but general public? I think not..

I'd hate to see douche bags generally in general public

you see, general public is the people I run into in my neighborhood, in the supermarket, at the stadium, airports, movie theater, work place, gas stations etc. and on a general scale members of this group are far nicer then most of the FT members.

PTravel

Well, a couple of points:

1. In the thirty years or so in which I was a frequent flyer, I never, not once, had a parent (a) ask politely, or (b) offer a comparable or better seat. It's always been phrased as a demand ("You HAVE to change seats so I can sit with my child"), a threat ("If you won't switch, then YOU'LL have to take care of him for the flight"), or a whine ("What am I supposed to do?"). In two instances, my seat was poached and an FA had to intervene. You've stacked the deck by including inherent bias in your hypothetical.

2. "A polite request to swap to a comparable or better seat," is asking for a favor. Leaving a tip is not a favor in any sense of the word. It is compensation paid to the waiter or waitress. In the US, this compensation is provided by the diner. In other parts of the world, it is provided by the restaurant in the form of a reasonable salary.

3. A tip is a quid pro quo for competent service, i.e. the waiter or waitress has provided a service to you which is compensated in the form of a tip. That is why it is acceptable to leave a small tip or no tip when the service is sub par. There is no quid pro quo in changing your seat to accommodate a family.

4. You're right. FT is not a representative sample of people of the general public. The overwhelming majority of the general public are casual- or non-flyers, and do not understand the ins and outs of air travel. That makes their opinion as to what is or is not polite when traveling by air an uninformed opinion. I have no interest in anyone's uninformed opinion about anything, whether it is about politics, science or what's polite behavior when traveling by air.

5. There is a class of parent, which, fortunately, is a small minority of all parents, that not only believe that their child is the most important thing their life (as it should be), but also the most important thing in everyone else's life. They expect the world to revolve around their offspring, and become frustrated and hostile when it does not. This subset of parents, most often, overlaps with the subset of people who want to sit together but will book middle seats thinking they have an inherent right to require people to swap with them on-board (see my first point). They are demanding an entitlement when no such entitlement exists, either de facto or de jure. I find such attitude offensive and rude and not meriting acknowledgement.

NotHamSarnie

I suspect you run into us all the time because we also live in neighborhoods and go to sports and movie events and even fill our cars with gas when we're not too busy flying

The anonymity of the internet makes azzes of us all...