The Hotel Employees Federation of India has dusted off a hardly old perennial and sought to rekindle the debate on it. The union wants tips banned and replaced by a 10 per cent service charge added to the bill. Why? A tip is a favour a customer may or may not extend; whereas all earnings should be a matter of right.
Down with customs and practices of class-ridden societies, it could have added. But I have a less ideological reason for sometimes wanting to support the demand. A good experience for a meal is invariably made up of good food which is well served. The tip rewards the waiter, leaving the back-room folks in the kitchen out in the cold, left to labour in the heat of the ovens, unsung.
To all the other reasons for doing away with tips was added one more during the Great Recession that began a couple of years ago. In New York, it seemed, waiters’ earnings had plummeted because not only were people dining out less, they were tipping less even when they did dine out. This was playing havoc with waiters’ earnings as restaurant managements had gotten on to paying them less as wages, assuming they would earn a good bit from tips.
A debate is a good thing when you can’t make up your mind. But your back is up when you feel there is little choice on a matter that should be a result of the feel-good factor, as and when it takes hold of you. Particularly heart-rending was the tale told to me by an impecunious Indian scribe who went on an MNC-organised junket to Britain with not much more than a few pennies in his pocket and got into debt with fellow junketeers from having to keep borrowing small change to tip the hotel doorman, or else “you won’t imagine the look he will give me”.
My globe-trotting friends tell me that tipping has become such an entrenched Anglo-American practice that in this matter the distinction between class-ridden Britain and classless America has been wiped out despite the expanse of the Atlantic that physically divides the two worlds. They also say things are a bit better in northern Europe. The traditionally melancholic Scandinavians will be wallowing in their angst in any case so as not to take too seriously the damage that a non-forthcoming tip may do.
The question of tipping caught up with me in recent years when I joined a club where you could break the law by tipping. On one occasion, the president of the club admonished me the same way a school master would — despite being somewhat younger than I was — when he caught me trying to tip a rather humble-looking waiter.
Tipping in clubs, I found, helped you solve an attendant problem. A club is all about knowing everyone around. Ideally, those who serve should offer to bring you your usual drink without you having to say so. And ancient members who have been around for decades will get not just a spontaneous greeting but immediate attention on coming in. In such a situation what does a new member do, particularly when during the weekends the staff shortage becomes palpable? The only way he can get some attention is by developing a mild reputation for being a good tipper. But here also the balance has to be carefully struck. Over-tip and you will earn not so much of quick attention as condescension.
I have been quite ambivalent on this whole matter. After a hearty meal during which I have been attentively and courteously attended upon, I have felt like and left behind a generous tip. But I have also realised that I have not been fair to the good people in the kitchen who made the meal possible in the first place. One solution I have toyed with is, there should be a system that combines the two. Let there be a minimum service charge added to the bill and then, should you feel particularly expansive, you could add a little topping to spread the good cheer. But there is a problem in this. You don’t always know if the particular establishment adds service charges to the bill or not. I have on occasions tipped well, only to look at the bill later and realise that there was a service charge added.
About the only occasion when I have been happy about not tipping was once when the doorman at the fairly posh hotel considered it the end of his duty to just keep the door open for me and needed a goading look to scurry out in the rain to hail a cab. And the one occasion when I have felt acutely embarrassed about not tipping was when the fine-looking girl in the Amsterdam restaurant returned the change and immediately walked off, while I took a split second more than customary to make up my mind about how much to tip.
As fair and rational as the demand of the union may be, civility and grace are really a part of being a good host and entertaining well. It seems wrong that you should not be able to say thank you in a material way to someone who earns a lot less than you do even when he has been a part of your good experience.