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I tip my transit bus driver and my attorney, when they provide excellent service.

Always do if they help with my bags - $1 or $2, depending on ## of bags & how nice they are.

FWIW, I have never tipped a rental car employee -- bus driver, counter agent, or dropoff clerk -- and I have never witnessed anyone else tip any rental car employee. I have also never had a bus driver help with luggage, but that is probably because I travel lightly, any my luggage is stowed before the driver could even get out of his seat.

I am always surprised at the new places where tipping occurs/ is expected in the US. I am still waiting for my first tip. ;) (I am in the business services industry).

One to two dollars, if they help me with the bags, or they are extremely cheerful/helpful/friendly

In DFW to the Hertz rental this guy sang all the way, making jokes, an extremely jolly fellow.

How can you not be grateful for that ;)

I see it all the time - if they help with your bags, they deserve a tip I think. Minimum wage is not a liveable existance.

I wonder if these answers would change if the tip comes out of your own pockets and is not expensed.

The cost of the shuttle is included in the outrageous surcharges for airport rentals. The only time I tip the shuttle driver is for extraordinary service, e.g., when he floors the gas because I am running late for checkin. In those instances I tip much better than what has been described above. :D

Do you tip fast food workers? Janitors? Carnival workers?

There are lots of people that earn minimum wage, and it's because they are working at minimum wage jobs.

Feel free to give them your money, but please don't tell me they "deserve" a tip just because they're low paid. That's not tipping, it's feel-good-ism.

If somebody goes beyond his expected duties (like helping with my bags), I tip for good service. I'm stunned by those who keep their wallets tight in their pockets under the same circumstances.

Yet another example of how this tipping thing is completely out of control in the US.

Incidentally, I want to be tipped for this post.

When travelling alone, I do not carry more than a roll-aboard and a briefcase; I handle my own luggage.

That said, I have never witnessed (as least as far as I recall) anyone tip a rental car shuttle driver. Maybe this is because I travel largely via business airports, where people are not carrying lots of luggage. Not sure.

This strikes me as a new place to practice the US tipping custom. For years, I have argued that tipping relates only to sub-minimum wage employees that are excepted from the US minimum wage laws (mostly waiters and bartenders), and for really exceeding the call of duty -- like when my doorman went out to the pharmacy and picked up my medicine because I was sick as a dog.

But for normal, workaday stuff, I do not tip.

I travel all over the US on business. I have my pullman bag, my laptop bag, and my purse. I cannot lift heavy things and yes the pullman and laptop can be heavy at times for me. A driver doesn't have to leave his seat in order to pick up my bags and put them on the shelves. When he does, he is giving me an extra service. That is why I tip. And as you mentioned, I imagine that a driver's salary is quite low thus he has the incentive to go the extra mile to help out passengers. This is not an argument for keeping salaries low but the fact remains, they are not high.

So whether I'm at a business airport (as you call them) or a "leisure" airport (MCO may be considered "leisure" but Orlando is a convention town), if a driver lifts my bags for me, I give him a tip.

This is hardly a new custom. My parents taught me to tip when travelling if someone like the driver helps me out. And that lesson was learned over 25 years ago.

Analise, you may have started tipping bus drivers 25 years ago, but that doesn't mean it's been a custom for 25 years. It's not even customary now, given the number of people on this thread who don't tip nor have seen anyone else tip a rental car shuttle bus driver.

What annoys me about this non-standard tipping (standard would be for people who make $2.15/hour waiting on tables or tending bar) is the implication that if people do just the bare minimum required for their job, they get paid the regular salary, and if they do anything extra, they should receive a tip.

Whatever happened to a good work ethic (see Asia) and making customers happy? Happy customers are return customers, and return customers often make the difference between profit and loss.

It's new to me :)

My parents taught me to tip only those who truly go above and beyond -- if I had four or five large bags, and someone helps me with those, sure. When I was commuting BOS-SFO, I had to take huge volumes of work product back and forth in my oversized Russian Babushka bags -- at least 200 lbs of checked luggage. I would give the airline porter $20 at the taxi stand, and everything was whisked away, checked, and never an excess weight fee.

But for standard, workaday service, I do not tip.

Here's your tip, Droneklax...Don't bet on the horses. :)

Seriously, though. I agree with the posters who say that tipping is out of hand. Outside the U.S., tipping is rarely or seldom practiced. In some places (such as better Beijing hotels), tipping is actually forbidden. I tried to tip the porter at the Traders' Hotel in Beijing for bringing my three bags to my room. He actually got mad at me!......and then took the money anyway. :p

Over the years, I've asked the "who do you tip" question to colleagues and friends. Here are some of the unusual or surprising occupations that I have heard about:

Chambermaids (at a regular hotel, not on a cruise ship or in Vegas, and leaving the tip for them to find when they come clean your room).

Your mailman (or letter carrier, to be PC).

The guy who pushes the button to send your car through the carwash.

The parking garage attendant.

The person who checks in your rental car.

The information desk attendant at the airport/convention center/other place.

The grocery store clerk (with a "keep the change" flourish)


And try this scenario on for size. Trace a hypothetical trip from start to finish and add up all the tipping - and just the more "usual" tipping, not including the unusual stuff above.

Drive from home to airport. Park in economy lot. Take shuttle to airport terminal. TIP DRIVER $2 FOR HELP WITH BAGS. Check in at SkyCap to avoid long lines inside. TIP SKYCAP $3 FOR YOUR TWO BAGS. Stop at Starbucks for a coffee before going to the gate. TIP BARISTA ( :p ) BY PUTTING $1 IN THE "TIP BOX." Go through security, buy a newspaper at the newstand. TIP CLERK BY PUTTING CHANGE (say $0.25) IN TIP CANISTER. Fly to your destination. Take rental car shuttle bus. TIP DRIVER $2 FOR HELPING WITH YOUR BAGS (only because that is the subject of this thread). Drive to hotel. Valet park your car (it's a nice hotel or in a big city and they have no self-parking). TIP PORTER $3 FOR TAKING YOUR BAGS TO YOUR ROOM. Have the concierge make reservations for dinner with your client/colleague/customer the next night. TIP CONCIERGE $5. Order room service or grad a bite at the hotel bar. TIP 15% TO THE ROOM SERVICE PERSON OR THE BARTENDER/WAITER, say $3 here. Have a nice sleep and get up in the morning for your meeting. TIP THE VALET $5. Drive to your meeting, do your thing all day, take client/colleague/customer to dinner. TIP $4 TO COAT CHECK GIRL FOR TWO COATS. TIP MAITRE D' $5 FOR GETTING YOU A QUIET TABLE AWAY FROM THE KITCHEN. TIP 15% TO WAITER, say $15 here. Drive back to hotel, valet park again. Breakfast in the morning, either room service or at the hotel restaurant. TIP WAITER 15%, say $2 here. Check out of hotel. TIP VALET $5 AGAIN. Drive back to airport. Take rental car shuttle back to terminal. TIP DRIVER $2 FOR HELPING WITH YOUR BAGS AGAIN. Check in at Skycap again. TIP SKYCAP $3. Skip the Starbucks because the whipped cream on your Mocha made you feel queasy the other time (that's a subject for another thread...) and read a newspaper in the airline lounge. Get a drink while waiting in the lounge. TIP THE BARTENDER $1 FOR THE DRINK. Get on the plane. Take shuttle back to parking lot. TIP DRIVER $2 FOR HELPING WITH BAGS. Drive home and wonder what happened to all the cash in your wallet.

That's a grand total of $63.25, if I added correctly. Sure, you wouldn't normally have 2 bags for an overnight trip. And you might not incur all these tipping occasions. But this is a hypothetical, and a reasonable one IMHO. 60 bucks is twice the per diem for some business travellers. Take that 60 bucks and multiply it by all the people taking all these kinds of trips per year. That's a ton (or tonne, for my Euro friends) of extra cost added on that is somewhat invisible. Europeans and other visitors to the U.S. often complain about how much tipping adds to the cost of things. Most Americans don't seem to think much about it. And now it seems you can't go to any store without the "tip cup" prominently placed in front of the register, nor can you receive many services without the expectation of a tip. So has tipping in the U.S. gotten out of hand?

Just because I may be a minority of one on this thread does not mean that I am in the minority in general. No, this kind of tipping is way older than I am. I have seen people tipping the drivers all of my life when they have helped with bags.

If people are annoyed that I pay for doing an extra service, that's their problem. The drivers seem extremely appreciative. I haven't seen as much driver iniative lately (within the past 6 months) so perhaps when they went the extra mile, nobody tipped them so they stopped lifting bags for people. Why do more if you don't get paid for it? I don't blame them at all. When they don't offer and I do need the help, I just ask the driver. He always does and then I tip. They again are very appreciative.

If all I get is the drive, no tip is given. That is what they are paid to do.