If the suggestions are wildly incongruous with what people actually tip, the restaurant's intention is to exploit a cognitive bias and guilt customers into overtipping. It works and turns your admirable $6 into an insult from the server's perspective. Of course you have no reason to be ashamed, but the server will find you cheap, because many other people succumb to the unethical psychological trick.

By the way, most young people tip on the total after tax, so regrettably that might become (if it is not already) expected. Certainly in Manhattan or in Silicon Valley, 15% pretax is an insult, just because few people in those locales tip so little. In sleepy middle America, 15% pretax is adequate.

What I think many on either side of the pond forget is that Americans have a much stronger ethos of automatic tipping than Europeans and it's much more expected and automatic. We're catching up.

In this situation my threshold of tipping simply rises a notch. If the person has been friendly and better than average I'd probably shrug and tip. If not then I may not Tips aren't really as automatic an entitlement here. I don't really feel any guilt about it as I do not feel a sense of obligation except for better rather than standard level of service. In many parts of Europe tipping is far from automatic particularly where service is automatically added.

I remember reading a study published specifically about the effect of this with suggested tips displayed on taxi cab screens. The study found, unsurprisingly, that programming the suggested percentages somewhat higher (say, 15-20-25% instead of 10-15-18%) resulted in greatly increased tips but getting too aggressive with the percentages suggested (e.g., 20-25-30%) did not.

25% :D

and including tax - wonder if restaurant gets that portion

i recall discussion of this (giving tip calculations on receipts) on FT

I personally do no have any issue with the suggestion within reason. I will undertip when the suggestion is too aggressive.

I would have tipped $6 also, if the suggested tip lines were not there. So I guess they are working because after seeing them I would have tipped $7!

Because over here, unless you're in a place that mandates the same minimum wage for waitstaff and bartenders as everyone else, the typical server makes $2.13 an hour from the establishment with the expectation that tips will bring them up to minimum wage. And I'd say most people have heard about how the IRS taxes tipped in lieu of wage employees- the feds assume that you're getting 10% of the bill in tips, and if someone doesn't tip at all, then the employee still has to pay income tax on the non-income anyways.

It's pretty much different than how most other civilized places do it, and the reason why you sometimes hit the mandatory tip/service charge at some restaurants heavy with foreign tourists. I do kind of wish it was done in another way, but a lot of restaurant employees do like it because they feel like they're more in control of their own destiny- do your job well and provide great service, and you actually are likely to get a higher tip and all.

YES! This.

This seems to be a common thing in LA, and it's effing annoying. I honestly tip lower when I see it - it just preys on the fact that humans like to follow the path of least resistance. I see this nearly every time I dine out in LA, whether I eat in or take out.

UKers are more responsible for the export of ridiculous tipping than US... because of 'more'/'farther' travel, generally speaking.

i was kind of surprised when i first saw this. but maybe its the colonial/imperial history? in terms of ridiculous tipping in asia, 3rd world, former colonies, etc.

Get this: my waiter tonight wrote a checkmark by the tipping suggestions. Not sure what to make of it.

http://i.imgur.com/F5TgWPM.jpg

FWIW, I tipped $3.

I might consider leaving $14 cash in that situation

Thought of this thread today when I got this passive aggressive bill:

http://cmk10.smugmug.com/Travel/Flye...IMG_0012-L.jpg

Pretty tack if that's not on a bill that a large party is getting

My employer's check printouts include 15 18 and 20 percent suggested amounts. I like when places do it so it gives me a baseline to make my calculations easier. I used to start at 20 percent, but since working the in the restaurant industry, particularly as a server who makes federal tipped minimum wage (2.13/hour), I have been tipping starting at 25 percent. Occasionally I've left 50-70 percent in cases where there has been great service, and rarely up to 100 percent.

:rolleyes::rolleyes: Your money, your choice, but this feels like puffing up the practice in case other people will adopt it.

One annoyance about the suggested amounts is there's no consistency about whether they do pre-tax or post-tax. Of course, there's no particular consistency about whether people want to use the pre-tax or post-tax amount, and on small bills, the difference is rarely enough to matter, but as prices go up, the likelihood that it will make a difference does as well.

i think one the problems is that the media discussion in US/UK has been so completely off base that it has impacted what public perceives as 'average' when i suspect any actual statistics would show the actual average is nowhere near what media describes

as well as 'guilting' people for not tipping 'enough' - so people emphasize that they do tip enough / tip 'generously' / respect workers / etc