puntamita

I find some of you that a couple of dollars for someone, like you said, puts out food and perhaps brings you a drink does not deserve a tip crazy. How do you know what they make per hour? I hope someday you work in a lounge and see what tips mean. I watch some of you mess up tables in lounge, make a mess of food area, etc and leave no tip. To me, no class.

dingo

I am straight, and I don't tip for someone to watch me serve myself in the lounge...proving it is in fact a gay thing to tip.

dingo

If this happens to me, I hope no straight people frequent the lounge where I work! That's all I'm saying about that...lemons, meet lemonade.

puntamita

You are funny! I am seriously gay as well. Maybe we should take a poll. Looks like 2 gay people tip. Dingo can't be a gay name so I knew you were on the other side

xooz

I may be wrong but I don't believe that the hotel workers are making $2.38/hour and relying on tips. I suspect there is no expectation that they get significant tip money and would not be subject to the reduced wages you find in the US for food service workers.

Giving me a bill for $0 with a tip line would make me keep in my pocket any tip I may have otherwise considered leaving.

MSPeconomist

Increasingly I take food back to my room, especially if the lounge is overrun with kids or a large rowdy group.

sbtinme

The only time I tip in club lounges is when it's at a property I frequent often and there's a dedicated, quality staff that makes an effort to make me feel appreciated and well taken care of.

clarkef

I tip in a lounge under 2 circumstances.

1. Its a lounge that I frequent and the attendants know me.

2. If the lounge attendant provide a service. For example, at one Marriott, the lounge attendants kept our area clean whenever we got up to get food, drinks, etc. They got good tips. At another hotel, the lounge attendant basically refilled the food and disappeared. No tip.

MSPeconomist

I've always thought of lounge dragon positions as being on a hotel career path, perhaps with the next step being a guest relations supervisor, concierge, in house elite program coordinator, front desk supervisor, dining room manager, etc. So I wouldn't tip. OTOH, if there's someone working in the lounge who seems to be a food service worker (removing disty dishes, cleaning tables, etc. as well as delivering food), I would assume that person is getting close to minimum wage and I would tip for polite excellent service. Maybe this is the wrong approach.

However, if someone rudely asks for a tip, they will not get one. Nor is my decision influenced by the prominent clear tip jar containing relatively large bills.

camsean

You what now?

dingo

I've re-thought my position on this. Typically, I tip servers who bring me food and clear away plates. In these lounges, I serve myself and take my plates to those obvious big round trays positioned where they are easily seen as a hint. To that end, it really seems that...

...the lounge attendant should be tipping ME for performing most of their job.

Please keep in mind however, I am straight and therefore unable to tip.

Dr. HFH

For me, this is the crux of it. Isn't what you describe their job, what they're there to do? As several other posters have pointed out, why is it expected in the U.S. that guests should tip for nearly every service which a hotel provides? And for those who reply with something about how little the employees are paid, it's far from my responsibility to ensure that employees of hotels I patronize are paid a "living wage." And I'm offended that hotel management would think that they can shift the responsibility for paying their employees to the guests by paying them less and counting on the guests to make up the difference.

When I tip, it's to recognize exemplary service above and beyond what is expected of an employee as part of his/her job, and is based on my generosity, not any obligation or expectation. And when I tip, it's always accompanied by a "Thank you." If housekeeping has gone above and beyond for me, I leave some cash in an envelope along with a note which says something along the lines of, "Thank you for making my stay here so comfortable."

And what do I consider "exemplary" or "above and beyond"? When housekeeping cleans and straightens up my room in the morning, cleans the bathroom and changes the linens/towels, that's part of his/her job. When the housekeeper assigned to my room notices that I spend my days working in my room on my laptop and starts showing up around 2 every afternoon with some lemon tea and fresh cookies (as happened at a LC property last year), that's above and beyond.

3rdworldresident

i hope this 'culture' will not spread into europe and asia.

Dr. HFH

Which culture? That of tipping employees for doing what they're supposed to do, or that of tipping only for going above and beyond their job responsibilities/description? Don't mean to be pejorative at all, it's just not clear from your post.

dtwdoc

I don't tip because society says I have to. All right, if someone deserves a tip, if they really put forth an effort, I'll give them something, a little something extra. But this tipping automatically, it's for the birds. As far as I'm concerned, they're just doing their job.