The following guest post is by Dominique Brown.
waitress in white (Photo credit: zoetnet)
What an interesting title. When you click this post I’m pretty damn sure you were thinking, “What the heck is Dom talking about?”
Why would European waitresses love fat, overweight and overconfident Americans?
You see the answer is rather simple but interesting. I’ve never been to Europe before, so when we went on our European vacation I knew that tipping your waitress after a meal is customary. What I didn’t know was that European tipping practices are drastically different than American tipping practices.
A simple Google search could have solved this, but let’s be frank, I had more important shit to worry about before going to Europe.
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I should have known I was doing something wrong when waiters and waitresses were treating us like celebrities.
What Happened
For example, in Amsterdam we ate at the same restaurant for dinner two days in a row. The reason we did this was because this restaurant was amazing, and there was no way in heck we wanted to take a chance on another restaurant after finding such a stellar one.
Anyways, the server from our first Amsterdam dinner happened to work on day two, and when I tell you this guy was happy to see us… That’s an understatement. I thought he was going to name is first born after me or ask me to adopt him.
Why?
Well…umm, I used to tipping 20% all the time regardless of the bill.
Americans might be thinking, big deal! That’s what you’re supposed to do. Remember, in America, servers make $2.15 per hour and live on tips.
In Europe, this is different. Europeans are paid a salary, excellent benefits, etc etc. So a 20% tip is a huge bonus to a person already receiving a pretty good salary. Secondly, tips and all that jazz is baked into the price of the food in Europe. That’s why everything is so damn expensive.
I didn’t learn until we made it to the last leg of our trip in Belgium that we are over-tippers.
Apparently, a tip of 1-3 euro is what you give when you get stellar service… Not 20-40 Euro.
Whoops!
Oh well, you live and you learn 🙂
There are two things that can come out of this.. I perpetuated a stereotype of Americans in Europe being big tippers or I crushed the stereotype of black people don’t tip. [Kevin] I’m surprised personally! I thought Europe wouldn’t be too different, but I guess it is. Always pays to learn your customs! In Asia, they can actually get offended under some circumtances if you do tip.
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Dominique Brown is the CEO of DNB Financial Planning, landlord, financial educator and non-profit owner. He enjoys working out, helping others and everything about finance. His sole purpose for creating the website yourfinancessimplified is to share his passion of personal finance and to help as many people as he can.
I had no idea European tipping practices were like this, but it somewhat makes sense. Up here in Canada I don’t think servers get paid as little as they might south of the border, so tipping practices around where I am are usually around 12-15%.
When I was travelling in Asia many places had no tipping at all — it’s not in the culture there the same way it is here, though if you’re in an area with many white foreigners then they may come to expect it, too.
That happened to me at a restaurant in Austria — we tipped 20% (like fools!) and the owner, the chef, and all the employees came out to shake our hands as we were leaving!
hahah.. I guess I’m not the only one huh. it did make me feel like a rockstar or celebrity for a bit. 🙂
Hehe, I knew what this article was going to be about when I clicked on it! The various tipping practices across industries and geographies have always perplexed me. It’s on my list of topics to cover in a future blog post, but I haven’t gotten around to doing the research yet.
Yep, true story. I was recently in Paris before I learned this little tidbit and we had a mediocre dinner with pretty crappy service and I left what I considered to be a mediocre tip to somewhat rude server. After receiving that, he gave us a nice smile and a wave as we were leaving the restaurant while he was smoking his cigarette on his smoke break.
I had no idea what prompted such a drastic mood change until after we met an older couple from the USA. While talking to them over dinner at the Eiffel Tower they filled us in that tipping in Paris isn’t customary and you only give a small tip if the service is excellent. At that moment, the light bulb came on!
I’m an Austrian living in the UK, and while I do tip, I never exactly calculate how much tip i give. Say the bill in Austria came to €13,29 – i’d tend to just round it up to €14, or, if i really enjoyed the service it would increase to €15. I’ve never had any issues regarding my tipping, but as you mention in this article, European waiters and waitresses are paid a salary and get bonuses. In the UK, i’ve experienced that many establishments put their tips in one pot and split it at the end of the day. But i’ve also come across restaurants that make their waiters and waitresses give up their tip. So now I tend to ask who gets the tip!