Even Americans are getting sick of having to tip

Here’s a fact that will warm the Australian traveller’s heart: Americans are heartily sick of tipping.

According to a poll in USA Today’s Blueprint financial pages, 48 per cent of respondents are tired of being asked for a gratuity and 63 per cent say too many businesses are asking for tips.

Nobody begrudges the worker the tip; what people are questioning is the economic model.Credit: iStock

“Tipping is dead,” says consumer advocate and journalist Christopher Elliott. “At least tipping as you and I understand it. A mandatory 20 per cent gratuity on every restaurant meal? Obligatory tips for housekeepers, concierges and tour guides? Kiss them goodbye.”

My question is: what took them so long? Australians have not been tipping for decades.

This year, I made a resolution to tip more, especially in places where there is a lot of poverty. I know that sounds like madness, but my intention has been to increase what I spend where it counts, directly in cash to people providing a service or selling goods, often by paying more for an item, such as a roadside drink or handmade sarong, rather than giving the money specifically as a tip.

“I’ve come to believe that the direct exchange of wealth between those fortunate enough to travel and those on the ground who make things happen for us is one of the most positive aspects of travel,” I wrote at the time.

I still believe this.

What exactly is a tip? It seems we’ve found ourselves in a moment of time when the whole concept of giving a tip as an acknowledgement of good service has morphed into a kind of standover job where the tip is not related to quality of service at all.

It’s called a gratuity for a reason. It is not an upfront tax or levy you are obligated to before you get the service, with the unspoken threat that the person expecting the tip will spit into your soup, or similar, if you don’t.

In some places (notably the US), it can get very nasty if you don’t tip, even if your reason is sound. A few times in the past, I’ve experienced that excruciating moment when, upon hearing my Australian accent, a waiter has explained to me as if I were a child how they’re paid such a poor wage that they depend on tips and 25 per cent would be appreciated, thank you.

They are paid poorly. It’s as humiliating for them as it is embarrassing for me that they need to give this speech at all.

But nothing much has changed for worker conditions in decades (the minimum wage hasn’t budged in the US since 2009) and tipping is the structure of that economy. I don’t think anyone begrudges the worker the tip; what people are questioning is the economic model.

It’s one that’s prevalent in the hospitality industry, from restaurants to cruise lines. Effectively, the restaurant diner has become an unwilling co-employer, without receiving any of the profits of the business.

Working conditions aside, what annoyed Americans in the survey were the creeping gratuities on just about everything these days – the automatic costs added to restaurant bills, cruises and tours, without the guest having the opportunity to decide whether the service is worth it.

Irritations include tips added to an online food order before it reaches your plate. Tips automatically added by card machines for takeaways, when the service is only putting something in a bag. Tip jars at cafes – and dentists (yes, it’s happening). Even mandatory tipping of doormen, mailmen and hairdressers as an annual gift is common in the US. People have tip fatigue.

Australians have simply refused to go along with a lot of this – and we haven’t needed to, as our economy is structured differently, and our minimum wage is decent. But when we travel, mandatory tips can be a rude shock, especially when calculated daily in US dollars or euros on escorted tours. Even when it’s service compris [included] as in France, servers often expect more.

It’s less about the amount, as much as that’s painful when we travel, and more about the idea that a tip has become mandatory.

I’m not suggesting you withhold a tip in wealthy countries where it’s the major source of income for the server, and certainly not in poorer countries where it’s their lifeblood.

But let’s call tips what they are – not gratuities, but service levies.