If I were a waiter people like me would be my favorite customers.
I don't limit my tips to 15 or 20%.
But at the same time if you really suck you could get 0.
I have tipped more then 100% before. And I have tipped zero.
100% is extremely rare and so is zero. I've done both about 3 or 4 times.
80% of the time it's between 15 to 30%
i tip by habit, 15-20%, unless i've had "tee many martoonies", in which case i accidentally tip 30-35%. The problem with the crappy waiter is he doesn't know he's crappy. He just thinks the customer is a bastard for not tipping enough. Small tips don't send the right message. As far as helping someone make a living, it's there fault for choosing a "profession" that only takes 2 hours to learn.
What I really fucking hate is when I go to a place with with a group of people and you get great service and the people you are with give a shitty tip. This forces me to go behind them when they are not looking and throw an extra 20 out my pocket to make up for there shit tip. Because when you go with a group of people it makes you look bad regardless if you tipped well or not because when all the tip money is thrown in the middle of the table the waitress does not know who tipped what. So if the shitty tips is mixed in with the good tips it brings the overal average down for the whole table.
I never tip more than 20 percent.... usually less
Its not my fault their bosses dont want to pay them. Besides for the amount of actual work they do, they make waaayyy too much.
People who do backbreaking jobs for minimum wage, get my sympathy.
All those college dropouts and wanna be actresses do not. The dishwashers do 10x the work, yet dont get a cent of the tip.. which they clearly should)
(I am talking about places like NYC)