The 1 Baht Insult Tip

[nkped]

Some of us go back far enough to remember when you left 25 or 50 satang if you were unhappy with the service. It was quite obvious because the satang coins were yellow/gold in color compared to the silver 1 and 5 baht coins. Around the U.S. bases where they knew about tipping, you wanted to be out the door before that was discovered or you would catch an ear full.

[Chanchao]

 

Right, I always thought the 'insult tip' was 25 or 50 satang.

 

Not sure if I would bother with this though. If service was really so-so then there's simply no tip, no need for insults. If on the other hand the waiter was actually rude or said or implied something in any way, then there will be a lot more hell to pay than a cheeky 'insult tip'. In that case it will most likely be a talk with the owner/manager and if he or she isn't real accommodating then the whole restaurant will know about it.

 

Fortunatly this doesn't happen often. ;-) Last time was at a singalong restaurant where they weren't so much rude but just very clueless, with wrong charges on the bill and so on, and insisting we pay for unopened soda bottles. (Normally those would just be taken back and not added to the bill; the good places to this by themselves, the rest you have to tell them, but this place just refused to take the bottles of the bill.... So we took them. :-) after all, we paid for them right? But then the issue was that empty bottles need to be returned to the supplier............ So that was a very nice scene in front of everyone where we gave them the choice: Sure no problem we don't really want to take those bottles anyway... just take them off the bill then. :-)) Needless to say we won't be going back to that place.

 

Oh, but the thing is: I DID actually tip 20 baht there! Not to the restaurant of course, but to the one shy little waitress who tried to do her job as best as she could the whole time we were there, even though her employers were clueless, rude and incompetent... Felt good tipping her 20 baht. And also made the point that all this was not out of stingyness or anything.

 

Cheers,

Chanchao

[Crash999]

Tonight went to Londoner to watch the Formula One race. Food was good but service was absolutely awful. I sat down and found that in the next section a friend was sitting nearby watching the race- his waitress was ok but ours was brain-dead. First issue was my appetizer and my GF's main course arriving at the same time- not entirely unusual in Thailand so I didn't mention it.

 

My main course took so long that I thought our waitress had forgotten. GF was almost finished with her dinner when mine arrived, after having asked our waitress twice to please chase. Again, thought perhaps it was the kitchen so kept quiet.

 

Wanted to order dessert and the waitress (who had the particularly annoying trait of talking only to my GF) made a mess of things. I ordered cheesecake and two forks for us to share it with. My friend in the next section ordered the same a couple of minutes later. After a while his dessert arrived while we were still waiting for ours. Time passed as we watched the race finish (Schumacher won again). Our waitress came over with two cups of coffee- I looked at my GF, asking her if she had ordered the coffee. She hadn't, so I asked the waitress if it's part of a set meal as there was a buffet going. Again, she looked to my GF who repeated exactly what I asked- the waitress replied that I had ordered two coffees, two coffees and a cheesecake. I responded that I ordered cheesecake with forks, not coffee and she then surprised me by trying to insist that I had in fact ordered two coffees!!!!

 

I repeated my request of two forks (not coffee) with a piece of cheesecake. Meanwhile in the next section my friend has finished his dessert and already has his bill in hand. Time passed.... Finally our waitress brought out two plates and two *spoons*. GF thought this was hilarious!

 

It was only at that point we realized that she had also forgotten to bring us our bread.

 

Got the check, paid in cash, and the change came back with the old bar trick of giving an excessive amount of coins- 40 baht's worth of 10s. Needless to say, I didn't leave a very big tip.

 

Looks like we got stuck with a bad waitress as my previous experiences have been fine, and my friend in the next section had no problems. The frustrating part was her attitude- not apologetic but hurried and indifferent.

[Zaad]

Finally our waitress brought out two plates and two *spoons*.

 

LOL you have got to be kidding me. I'd personally look for a hidden camera at that point.

That's really pispoor service which shouldn't be rewarded with any tip at all.

 

The frustrating part was her attitude- not apologetic but hurried and indifferent.

 

Agreed. That pisses me off too.

Had she been polite and apologetic then I wouldn't have mind to leave a tip for her effort.

[..]

I feel your pain. I have waited (I timed it!) an hour & a half for my dinner there one time. This was a quiz night, so I had no choice, but I was ravenous when I got to The Londoner at 7:45 right from work, let alone by 9:15! Not happy.

 

Other quiz nights the wait seems a bit excessive, but never as bad as that time. But for that reason (well, and the fact that I think that their food is way overpriced), I only go there on quiz nights where we normally get 1/2 the food and 2-4-1 beers.

 

Cheers,

SD

[torrenova]

I hate the way that the US notion of tipping has spread across the globe. In Japan, you don't tip. They are proud to get a decent wage and a tip is somewhat of an insult. In Hong Kong, a reasonable but smallish tip is appreciated in a moderate Chinese restaurant.

 

In London, I've noticed that the trip employed is to give you a bunch of papers with Chinese writing on and a figure quoted on the top. They have probably bill padded, they have already included a 10% service charge and the gratuity box on the credit card slip is open, thus inviting a second tip !!!

 

If we have anyone who is Chinese in the party or can speak Chinese, we always have them speak to the waiter about off the menu dishes. It serves a dual purpose as we get some better food and they know that they cannot pull the wool over our eyes.