Belated Birthday Brunch and Battersea Bonanza : comments [A Bug's Life]

When I was young and worked as a waitress in the States, it was legal to pay wait staff well below minimum wage, with the assumption that the balance was made up in tips. I don't know if that is still the case or not. I used to make really good tips, but I don't think that the system is particularly fair. The only up side of it from a customer standpoint, is that you can reasonably expect a fairly good level of service, because you get to decide how much the server gets paid. The down side if you are a server is that many people think of tips as optional, especially tourists from another country where tipping is not the norm.

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Amusing information about tips and gratuities and whether PAYE/privately declared income tax or NI contributions are due on them:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/helpsheets/E24.pdf

The crappest thing is that waitstaff can be employed at a rate below national minimum wage, and shared tips can then be used to bring it up to minimum. (If there aren't enough tips, the employer has to make up the difference)

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I was chatting to a smartly-turned-out barman in a hotel in Charlotte a couple of years back, and was absolutely horrified to hear that he actually only got minimum wage, and relied on tips to make him a decent living.

I think it's a cultural thing. In this country, the preference is for the price to be paid to be shown up front. So we usually show prices inc taxes, too.

(One of the things I liked about Japan is the horror there if you attempt to tip.)

I

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If he was getting minimum wage he was doing well. Most bar and wait staff don't even get minimum wage in the States.

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