This is a rant inspired by recent threads on tipping, excess service charges in restaurants, wedding gifts, greedy airlines charging astronomical prices for seats and carry on baggage, and the like.
I am so tired of all the money grabbing that seems much more “in your face” than ever before. Since when am I expected to shell out 30% tips for a dinner (yes, that really is a regular tipping option on the card reader), pay an extra $100 on top of the price of the airline ticket to bring on a bag (aren’t overhead bins already there? Who travels without ANY kind of luggage?), shell out maybe $300-$400 for a wedding gift (did they invite me, or my money?), tip the girl who rang up my book in the bookstore (isn’t she doing what she’s hired to do?), tip the trash guys (don’t they earn a wage?), pay more and more surcharges for getting the lawn mowed (can’t the owner just put the price of gas increase into the bill? And he never lowers it once gas goes down!), etc???
It’s insane now. And the worst part is, no one ever has cash these days (well, I do, but lots of people don’t.) So the people who could maybe benefit from a bit of cash in my pocket (girl scout cookies, Alex’s lemonade stand, the animal shelter bucket in the local hardware store, the person who maybe went the extra step to help out and really deserves a few bucks) don’t get anything. But credit card companies and banks rake it in. Honestly, people should continue to use cash because at least the local business owner gets more money. (Yes, I know about robbery and burglary concerns, but when a 16 year old who has no credit card can’t buy a sandwich, that’s just wrong.)
Anyway, rant over. I’m not expecting any concise replies, because my post is all over the place. Happy New Year to all!
The one that has been getting me lately is the tips for things that never were tippable before. I forget exactly which place I was at recently, but I bought something and put my credit card into their card reader and it came up with the tip screen and I’m just there scratching my head. I think it was at a stand at an outdoor holiday market thing.
Also, I can sort of understand the higher tips at a restaurant. I was on a beach vacation with my ex like 10 years ago and it was slow so we were chatting with our waitress. The restaurant had just opened for the season like a week earlier and we asked how business was so early in the year (it was empty when we were there) We learned that there was a huge college volleyball event there the weekend prior and some team came in for the whole evening. We were like, oh, that’s great - something to bring in some traffic for you all. Then we learned, none of them tipped! The worst part was, when we asked which school came in, it was a local college from where we lived! We were 4 hours away from home! No way anyone would have known! We gave her a 100% tip on our meal and apologized for the kids.
So, when I see that stuff - I think of it as more of an exception scenario.
Of all these, the one that brings out my inner miser the most is the tipping option offered when paying for just regular stuff. Like your book store example.
Asking for tips for non-service servers also bothers me - all the ice cream and froyo places seem to have that option now. I don’t tip at fast food, and I’m not tipping for a scoop either.
This summer my daughter played in a tournament (at a big stadium and then the field around the stadium). It was ‘cashless.’ There was a ‘festival’ in the plaza area and while a few food trucks took cash, everything else required a credit card. There were lots of little kids (say age 8 and up) running around but they couldn’t buy anything unless they had a parent standing right by them.
On the first night it was US v Canada in an exposition game, so pretty crowded. It was about 320 degrees (really, I’m not exaggerating) and they made you dump out any food or water from your backpacks. The people working concessions had no idea how to do it (I’m sure they were lunch ladies running the place) and the lines were at least an hour long to get a $5 bottle of water. With a credit card only.
They at least learned from that first night and allowed people to bring in water for the rest of the time when the temps for a noon game rose to 512 degrees. I believe I got a water and a pretzel and it was $13. Credit card only.
Exactly the kind of thing I am talking about. Pure greed.
Plus, I hope they lost a ton of money by insisting on cashless. Not all those 8 year olds would have been successful in getting a parent to buy something with their cards.
@Lindagaf if I ever have another wedding, I’m inviting you. You are very generous !!
I would suspect and hope that someone would be glad for your presence - that if the gift was modest or non existent, they’d still appreciate you.
I think you can continue to be yourself. But given the wages needed, maybe some business
owners are hoping for a few bucks here and there to supplement worker salaries. But it is absolutely
uncomfortable for sure but you just need to develop comfort and be yourself.
As for credit cards, I appreciate them myself - I don’t have to carry money anymore. While there is an expense to the business, I assume it’s priced into what I pay.
What I would love to lose ? Tolls - just add 5 or 10 cents to a gallon of gas.
Many went to cashless/non-contact as a result of COVID, and now that life has returned to quasi-normal (?), they’re hanging onto to cashless for the convenience to them, even with the 3% vendors forfeit to the credit card companies.
How are little kids supposed to learn about how money works if they can’t conduct purchases themselves? Any purchase just doesn’t seem as, “real,” if you haven’t had to save your pennies and nickels and crack open the piggy bank.
Young adults don’t carry cash anymore. Venmo transaction from a user’s bank account don’t have any fees and that’s how majority of the tipping done on services. For example my DD uses her credit card to pay for haircut and then Venmo tip to her hairdresser.
We tip as we want to, when we want to, and a ton depends upon who’s getting the money and how much we want to support them. It can be fast food, maids in hotels, or anywhere. Occasionally those tips will be 50% or more, but certainly not always. I like to support people working for a living.
We also almost always tip in cash even if I pay by card because I want to be sure the person I want to get the money is getting it.
We never give money to individuals holding signs and asking for it, esp when there are Help Wanted signs all over.
Groups holding fundraisers are again at our whim. Do I like what they’re raising money for or not?
I have no plans to change. For me, it’s not greed. It’s sharing the wealth. I don’t see where those we tip deserve less in wages than those of us who make more from our jobs, yet I understand the business owner can’t afford to pay a ton either - and still stay in business anyway. We just use our $$ to support who/what we like.
Hey, I was a 63 year old at the event and I like to use cash. I don’t like getting home from a vacation and getting a $1500 credit card bill - all the meals and hotel room, then all the stuff at the actual event like a sweatshirt (oh I had to have that as the temp may have fallen below 300 degrees), snacks, admissions, etc. I’d prefer to have $200 with me and have the credit card bill only be $1200, because when the $200 is gone, I’ll stop spending and thus save myself $100.
I’m a little cranky with all asks for tipping too. I live in a place where the minimum wage for everyone is $14.75. No lower wage for waiters or anyone. I am old enough to remember when $15/hour was considered the goal for a liveable wage. It was only a few years ago. Now, I agree that inflation and the pandemic changed everything, but I just don’t think I need to tip servers who are getting $14.75/hour base pay 20%. I’m not compensating for a lower minimum wage! And I’ll tip 5% on a pickup order because someone has to package up my food but it doesn’t really take that long to put food into a container and I’m not tipping 20% on that! I do get how expensive housing is here. Still, I worked in child care when I was in my early 20s. I changed people’s children’s diapers and rocked them when they cried, and I worked for minimum wage. Never got a tip. And I had roommates because I couldn’t afford my own apartment. So there is some kind of disconnect between wages and expectations right now. In my humble opinion.
$17.29 (went up yesterday) in Denver. I don’t usually tip at fast food but did yesterday at Chipoltes because I had enough points to get a free burrito.
I am with you 100% on some of these, and can at least sympathize on others.
In the end, you choose which places to patronize and which to avoid. I find the extra restaurant charges especially aggravating – and luckily, we don’t see that very often in Iowa. I figure if there were a place charging a standard 20% overage fee, I would skip it. And I wouldn’t be the only one.
WRT the airline bags, not all airlines are the same. Most reputable airlines let you carry on two things, like a smallish roller suitcase and a purse or other small bag. One of those can go in the luggage space above the seats. Spirit charges for anything larger than a backpack.
If demand slips, owners/management will have to figure out a way to bring it back up… and often, that means decreasing price.
The traveler who uses one of those vests or jackets with dozens of pockets in lieu of a carry-on bag?
Handling cash does have costs for businesses (e.g. banks charge businesses for cash deposits due to the cost of counting, security, etc.). Do credit card fees stay high because of the cost of handling cash by businesses?
Cashless costs a business some $$, but it works as a crime deterrent of sorts. Many pot shops here would love to go cashless. Because these businesses are cash only, they have been disproportionately targeted by smash and grab thieves. Almost every night the local news shows surveillance camera footage from yet another such raid on yet another such small shop.
