Yesterday night, when it was raining heavily in Pune, I ordered a Veg Thali from a nearby restaurant. A kid in his teens rang my doorbell after half an hour. He was partially drenched in rain but kept the food from being soaked.

oOo

I generally tip a waiter as a voluntary incentive for a job well done and seldom as a social compulsion.

A quick search on the Internet on the Why?What?How(much)? of tipping would throw up the following opinions:

1. In America tipping is almost a mandate where the servers get paid lower than the minimum wage & hence the tip make up as a compensation. The business owner can keep the prices of food low & pay the servers less. Good work, good tip. Bad work, bad tip. But tip it is. (Generally varies from 5-15% of the bill)

2. If you don’t tip, the business owner will have to hike the food prices to pay the servers better. In other words, you’ll have to pay for the service in one way or the other.

3. Some communist consider it as a colonial hangover. A quick research on the origin of tipping leads us to England from were it spread to colonial countries. As one only tipped one’s social inferiors, which ideally shouldn’t exist in the brave new world. Tipping is a way of treating servers as servants and not employees. Ideally, if paying for a job well done is the only motto, then we should also pay dentists, doctors, govt. employees(ironically, it’s called bribe in govt. office parlance ) or any other employee who does a great job; but we don’t.

oOo

The bill was Rs. 70. I handed a hundred rupee note & the delivery boy took out 3 ten rupee notes from his pocket. I took only two. He replied in English, “Thank you, sir”

Please share your opinions.