Service charge in restaurants - yes or no?

DigSunPap

If you feel uncomfortable leaving a tip, I usually just say can you take the service off we want to leave cash. There's no way any server can turn around and refuse. I think you just cant be afraid to speak up, it doesn't have to be confrontational.

DigSunPap

DigSunPap said:

If you feel uncomfortable leaving a tip, I usually just say can you take the service off we want to leave cash. There's no way any server can turn around and refuse. I think you just cant be afraid to speak up, it doesn't have to be confrontational.

@paul2louise

Eldi_Dos

Drinking a bottle of wine while dining with a kid is equivalent to more than nine measures of spirits.
Our local will not serve more than two drinks to a table that has kids dining at it, funny how wine seems more socially acceptable.

paul2louise

Eldi_Dos said:

Drinking a bottle of wine while dining with a kid is equivalent to more than nine measures of spirits.
Our local will not serve more than two drinks to a table that has kids dining at it, funny how wine seems more socially acceptable.

So if you were dining with a teen they would still be as strict. Tbh if one of us was driving then the other parent could have a few drinks. We shared a half litre carafe when we ate out with our nearly teen lad. We stayed local so neither of us had to drive

Eldi_Dos

paul2louise said:

Eldi_Dos said:

Drinking a bottle of wine while dining with a kid is equivalent to more than nine measures of spirits.
Our local will not serve more than two drinks to a table that has kids dining at it, funny how wine seems more socially acceptable.

So if you were dining with a teen they would still be as strict. 

Yeah the rule would apply to everyone without favour,and everybody who uses the local respects and supports the Landlord in this policy.
The point I was trying to make is if a couple tried to have five G&T each while dining with a child they would not be allowed, indeed they would be frowned upon, but the same couple can go into a restaurant, order a bottle of wine and consume the equivalent amount of alcohol and it seems to be more socially acceptable,

arnoldy

In many respects I would far prefer a system where we could pay a proportion of tips in advance to ensure good service. Eg £10 down at the start and then make it up to 10% at the end etc. Tipping is a good idea, incentives the staff.

Muttleythefrog

arnoldy said:

In many respects I would far prefer a system where we could pay a proportion of tips in advance to ensure good service. Eg £10 down at the start and then make it up to 10% at the end etc. Tipping is a good idea, incentives the staff.

Is the problem with that not that it incentivises different treatment of different customers depending on how much if anything they've paid for 'good service' in advance. I would say anywhere that you need to incentivise staff as a customer in order to ensure good service is probably a place worth avoiding. That's the responsibility of the business to reward and employ as suitable.

Digest

I don’t mind the concept of increasing wait staff wages a bit. The industry standard is 30% revenue is staff wages.
When I tip or add an optional service charge I don’t want to tip on the 70% costs of running the business - council tax, electricity, pest control, profit and of course buying in the food and drink.
I also don’t want to tip on the VAT.

So here is the maths. To pay 12.5% on the wages only I will take a quarter of the optional SVC on my bill and say “make that £x”. I can roughly divide by 4. Last meal out the Optional Service Charge shown was £10.59 so I made it £3.

It’s easier to pay something rather than a blunt “take that off.”
But of course most workers only get the wage.

DullGreyGuy

Seeing as someone else dug up the thread...

There is one advantage of a discretionary service charge... it's free from VAT. So when the service charge is £10 were it to be just built into the price of the food as others have suggested it should be then you'd end up paying £12 on the bill 

Digest

We are waiting for the Allocation of Tips Act 2023. It’s very clear -tips and OSC  [ optional service charge] are to do with Earnings, of the team, not the business.

It’s important to isolate the wages allocation for the team, in my previous post, is 30% of the revenue. Tip the wait staff wages.

Divide the OSC - which is labelled 12.5% in most restaurants- by 4 and say ‘make that £x’ eg with an OSC of £12 ‘make that 3’…

Unusually the service charge could be labelled mandatory. That’s the contract-pay it.