I took my daughter to a Ruths Chris for her birthday. The waitress had no idea what "Pittsburgh rare" was, brought us a salad we did not order (then she picked it up and took it to another table). We ordered an expensive bottle of wine for the occasion and she had no idea how to use the "french" wine opener. And she brought the wine about 10 min after the runner brought the meal - despite our asking for it on ordering and once more.
The bill came to about $350. I left no tip and wrote "terrible service" on the check. As I was leaving, my daughter not thinking I saw, gave the waitress a $100 bill I had given her for her birthday. I went back in and demanded it back from the waitress and had a talk with the manager (as well as my "knows everything" college daughter)

Re Durbin Amendment
 

The Durbin Amendment required 2 unaffiliated networks be present on US debit cards. So a Visa branded debit card for signature purchases would need a network like NYCE for pin purchases. So US banks who had been intending to implement the same EMV standard used in the rest of the world had to create a new standard for their debit cards, new software for chip terminals a whole new routing protocol for the payment networks. Very expensive and delayed the implementation of chip cards in the US by 3 years. However it doesn’t prevent pay at the table.

Living the Bay Area during the apogee years, I was socialized by my friends to leave 20 per cent on top of
subsidizing their health care with another charge. I moved to Portugal several years ago after living in Zurich and wow. Now if I leave 5 Euro on a 40 Euro for two person dinner Ill hear wait staff whisper he isn’t British he has to be American.
Why should people enter into a salary sharing agreement with management? Mandate a living wage and then tip a bit for outstanding service. The US system will never end unless pressure is applied. Another factor in some Euro zone countries like Portugal wages are taxed on first euro earned, not like the US where income must approach 22-24 k before even a dollar is taxed. Maybe then you wouldn’t have to subsidize their healthcare.

Sorry, but I would've asked to speak to a manager well before receiving the check. That gives them time to rectify the situation so you don't suffer through a disastrous meal.

Welcome to FT!

Anyway, I think a heavy reliance on integrated POS systems did more to delay EMV than anything else. In addition, routing is a merchant choice, so they could have easily just used the Visa/MC portion of the chip (as a lot of places never did route over debit networks pre-EMV).

Going back on topic, low margins (and lack of regulatory mandates) in the restaurant industry are probably the biggest contributor to a lack of pay at the table, followed by customers simply not liking the concept. I'm not sure the latter dislike is all that strong, though, and may be something that can be worked around.

The talk with your daughter or the manager is your business. But demanding that they RETURN money that YOU DIDN'T GIVE, is outrageous. It was your daughter's choice. Once given, it belonged to the waitress. This was truly crass behavior.

Unless the daughter was 12 years old, it was certainly humiliating for the daughter, as well.

Actually it was the manager who demanded that she return it and as it was MY party, he told her she should not have accepted it and she would be fired if she ever did such behavior again. He then not only comped my meal but also the person to whom she put the "used" dish to.

The technology is there, it is just that we had so many more cards than Europe and Canada "had" that they are phasing them in on all new cards.

I was at a Harris Teeter grocery store and the person behind me put the divider up and his groceries and a little black box next to the divider. Having a hunch what it was, I picked it up and showed it to the manager. They arrested him. So beware, the scanners are out there

My friction point is the 4% surcharge. Since when does the price of an item not include all components of business overhead? Restaurant owners should "man-up" and adjust retail prices to cover these costs rather than hiding them into the fine print at the bottom of the menu.

LOL

service in the UK and rest of Europe for that matter is light years behind the US. One cannot even begin to compare service levels between them.

Thank you for a good laugh :D

And thank you for the laugh too! ^

Apparently it's not just restaurants.

I recently took a taxi from Denver International into the city of Denver and when I went to sign the receipt, the LOWEST choice for a tip amount was 25%. I was so irritated I almost didn't leave a tip, but ended up putting in a lower dollar amount.

That seems like such a stupid move by the server in that of course the customer would immediately notice the card not being returned and call the credit card company to cancel the card, perhaps calling the police too or at least the manager/owner of the restaurant. If it were an AmEx card, there would be a good chance of AmEx sending investigators to the restaurant.

Each to their own. When I go out
1. I do not want to be fawned over
2. I do not want to be the servers new best friend
3. I do not want to share my day with them
4. I do not expect to be patronised with "Perfect... Great choice.... or Great" when I order

I do want them to interact minimally to do the basic task they are charged with. Having the server act like an over excited Labrador puppy wanting to be loved in order to extort wages from me is just excruciating. So uncool as I know the instant i walk out, I am nobody to them. Sucking up to my ego just to get a wage is nothing short of legalised prostitution.

I would tip far more to the server who reads my intentions than I would to one who forces their personality on me and my party.

Dial up!
 

Yep, laughing here in Australia too, at the s-l-I-w acceptance of technology. We only use hand held readers, tap and go. Also can adjust the $ value of a tip. OR... sometimes just pay the bill and hand the waiter a cash tip. Agree tho, 25% is madness