Well, here’s another contentious issue… tips.
If you believe your service is so exceptional that you’re entitled to add a mandatory tip to a customer’s bill, then let that service speak for itself. If you feel the need to impose a compulsory gratuity, it signals a lack of confidence in your staff, your service, or your product. At that point, the corrective measure is obvious—and it certainly isn’t taking advantage of your customers. Train your team properly, and the tips will take care of themselves.
If you’re adding an automatic percentage to the bill as a gratuity, be prepared for the consequences. This shortsighted, self-inflated entitlement will inevitably backfire. How could anyone genuinely believe this is a sound idea? How could anyone assume it will keep customers coming back? Tips are subjective. They should never become part of a business’s structured revenue model or a tool for attracting or retaining employees.
The purpose of a tip is simple:
“A subjective amount determined by the customer to acknowledge the superior or inferior effort, service, or product provided by the business, with the amount of the gratuity reflecting the customer’s overall satisfaction.”
Yes, that’s right, the customer controls it. And how long do you think a customer will continue to shop somewhere if their experience is poor (which would normally be reflected in the tip), yet the business adds insult to injury by imposing an additional “gratuity” they had no say in?
If your business allows customers to choose how much they want to tip (as it should), that subjective amount becomes a clear indicator of their satisfaction. Wouldn’t that information be valuable? How can you possibly gauge customer sentiment when you force a gratuity onto the bill? I can confidently tell you: they will not appreciate it, and you may never see them again. That alone is a clear signal of dissatisfaction—and why would any business willingly create dissatisfaction?
Businesses are free to adopt this strategy, but I cannot understand why any would choose to. In this situation, I appeal to common sense. For anyone to believe their service is so exceptional that they are justified in making that decision on behalf of the customer is, frankly, unreasonable. I urge every business to rely on common sense and allow customers to express their opinion through their own tipping decision. If you’re afraid of what that might reveal, review your products and services.
As a business, you have complete control over the level of service you provide. And here’s the irony: if you take care of that, the tips will take care of themselves, and you will KEEP your customers.
