Ask George: Should you tip at fast food restaurants? — Steph Z., St. Louis
Over the last few years, I’ve written at least 14 Ask George articles on the subject of tipping, but none that specifically address the fast food model. Whether one should tip in a fast food (as opposed to fast casual) situation is straightforward to me. Here’s how I look at it:
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At chain restaurants, where staffers are paid minimum wage or better to take and fill orders, there’s no tipping allowed—and no tip jars (score one for the chains). In some independent fast food restaurants, there’s an opportunity to tip at the register (and often a tip jar present), even though the service level is exactly the same. In both cases, since there’s no continuum of service being offered, I see no reason to offer a tip.
But here’s where it gets dicey: I was in a bakery the other day, my order was taken and filled, I paid with a credit card, and an iPad was presented with the sales total and boxes for a tip to be added (in three percentage amounts). Had it been a traditional hard copy with a line for a tip, I would have been tempted to write “for what?” But like most people in the industry, I have a tendency to be overly generous, so I broke my own rule, yielded to the pressure and tipped 15% (the middle amount)…for absolutely no reason at all.
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