Tip your blogger

We went on a horseback riding excursion on our recent trip to Hawaii. I'll let you take a couple moments to reflect on how awesome that last sentence makes us sound. Okay, that's enough. Now that you're filled with envy/hatred/awe, you're in the proper frame of mind to read this post.

Anyway, the excursion was 85 bucks per rider. Our beloved little boy was not with us, so that added up to a whopping 170 bucks. That may not sound like much to you, but we've been known to stretch 170 dollars into a week's worth of groceries, an extravagant trip to Costco, 5 mortgage payments, and a medium box of toothpicks. The excursion was into a remote valley called Waipi'o that has various waterfalls, farms, and was supposed to be very pretty. It was indeed pretty, and we enjoyed the valley, thank you very much. The guide was decent, at best, trying to be funny (the nerve!) all the time and wouldn't really give me a straight answer to my questions very often. I felt like I was annoying him with all my questions, which, if you're a tour guide, is not the feeling you want to be giving your tourists. Frankly, I don't care if you're annoyed with my questions, I paid a lot of money to be on this trip and I'm going to ask them anyway! He probably shouldn't be a tour guide if he doesn't like dealing with tourists.

At the end of the tour he made a few more canned jokes and then gave us a tip spiel, adding that "the customary 15%" was expected. His tip spiel was longer than ordinary, and it reminded me of the Simpsons bit where a park ranger gives a bland explanation about something and then enthusiastically thrusts his tip jar out, shaking it, with a big smile.

I don't like where this tipping culture is heading. Almost every store I go into has a tip jar next to the cash register. Most people just toss their change in there, but I pay with credit cards usually, and even if it's a cash-only place, I like to hoard my money like so many Genghis Khans (oh, it's "horde", you say?). You're probably thinking, "Tipping is optional, Kent, so just re-LAX!" Well, I'm here to suggest that tipping is no longer optional, and is now a Guilt Charge. If you don't want to feel guilty for not tipping, you tip. If you're fine with the guilt, then you don't have to tip. You're paying either with cash money or with emotional distress.

I would like to consider myself a guilt-free non-tipper, but I survived on tips for around 6 years of my life, so I can't. First, I was a pizza delivery boy, and then I was a server at TGI Friday's (flair!). So, therefore, I have the guilt and feel obligated to not only tip, but tip WELL.

I think some occupations certainly deserve a tip, especially because they are paid barely anything without tips. My base pay as a server was $2.15/hr. My paychecks were so worthless that I never picked them up until my boss broke into my car and stuffed them into my glove box. My base was a bit more as a delivery dude, up to $5.50/hr until I got promoted to manager, when I made a whopping 6 bones/hr.

The 15% rule should only apply to servers. The amount of work they're doing for the table, bringing out drinks, taking the order, cleaning up dirty dishes, etc, is certainly worth about 15% of the bill, especially considering their base pay, which essentially implies that the server works more for his customers than for the restaurant. I can't think of any other occupation where the provided service is worth 15%. As a delivery boy, I kept stats on my deliveries, and my average tip was $1.50, and my average delivery was about $15. Although I always wanted more than that, I can be a little more objective now that I'm a deliveree instead of a deliverer, and I say that the service provided is worth about 10% of the price.

What about valet parking, bellhops, and maids? I've always been iffy on this, and they say that you should tip 2-3 clams per bag, and I really have no idea what to pay the valet or the maid. If I'm on the company's dime, I'm much more generous than the norm, getting all my money back when I fill out my expense reports (filed under "sundry"). On my own dime, a few factors come into play: Did they have a good attitude? I don't feel compelled to give a tip to some surly bellhop; How many singles do I have in my wallet? I hate getting change just for a tip; How much money have I spent already on this trip (i.e. am I feeling rich or poor)? How essential was the service? How messy was my room?

I usually tip valets about 3 bucks for getting my car. For a few months back in 2007, I parked in a valet parking lot across the street from my building, as they were having a deal on parking. Because I was paying 200-ish bucks a month to park there, I didn't ever tip the valets. I was mostly fine with this, however, I did see other monthly parkers tipping, but I got over it.

I tip the bellhops about 2 bucks a bag, for a max of 5 bucks for lots of bags. In February 2010, we went to this "all-expenses included" resort in northern NH for a ski trip when Hench was 4 months old, and we had all sorts of junk with us. The bellhops were very helpful and I gave them 5 bucks or so and felt that they deserved it. However, when we got our final bill, there was a 15% Gratuity Charge tacked on the final bill, and the gratuity charge was over 100 bucks! Because it was an all-inclusive resort, every meal was in this pretty fancy ballroom with menus, servers and ushers and the lot. I also had to wear a sport coat to dinner, which totally sucked because who wants to pack a sport coat on a ski trip? You already have to pack enough winter equipment as it is. Anyway, did I get 100 bucks' worth of service there? Not even close. The most valuable thing I got was the help from the bellmen and I already tipped them. We only had 4 meals in the ballroom, and 3 of those meals were buffets with no need for servers, whose only responsibility was to provide drinks, which didn't come until 20 minutes after we sat down and finished our meal. I really could write a novelette about how much of a rip-off this place was.

I don't tip the maids unless we made some egregious mess, or if we hadn't spent much money on the trip (this is theoretical- hasn't happened so far). Once, on the company dime, I left a 20 accidentally on the shelf and the maid took it, thinking it was the tip. I figure that covers me for the rest of my life.

I certainly don't feel obligated to leave anything in a tip jar. Somehow people feel justified in putting a tip jar out and somehow deserving extra money for doing their job. The way I understand it, a tip is to reward someone for giving exceptional service. It's hard to give exceptional service while ringing up my sandwich for 6 bucks and taking my money.

I am a notoriously bad tipper when it comes to taxis. I hate taxis with a violent passion, and every time I have to take a cab, I can feel my lifespan getting shorter by the month. Cab drivers are the absolute worst drivers. The reason why they are so horrible is because they are from crazy countries that pretty much have anarchy on the streets. The worst country I've been to is Egypt, where crossing a street requires an arm and a leg and a hope and a prayer. After each and every cab ride, I feel dirty, violated, and nauseous. Dirty because the back of cabs are next to outhouse toilets in filthiness. Violated because I paid 40 bucks to go 3 miles across the harbor to the airport in a smelly car. Nauseous because the drivers don't know the meaning of the word "gradual". I have 2 memorable cab stories:

1. In 2007, I took a cab from the airport on a Sunday afternoon to my apartment in Somerville. I got a Bulgarian cab driver who deliberately took me on the worst, round-about route. Once I saw him going to the wrong freeway, I asked what he was doing and he said he was taking the best way. We argued the entire way home, about 20 minutes, him insisting that it was the best route, me angry that he was running up the meter and taking minutes away from my precious Sunday. I was on the company dime, so I didn't care about the fare, but it was the principle. The guy turned off the meter to "appease" me, even though I would've just appreciated it if he admitted he was trying to dupe me. At the end, he asked me how much it usually cost, I said 45 bucks and I gave him 40. He was livid, but I just grabbed my stuff and got out of there before he punched me. He would've beaten the crap out of me, too.

2. In 2008, I was in Manhattan and had to catch the Delta shuttle at La Guardia. I wasn't in a huge rush, but that didn't matter to the cabbie. He drove like an absolute mad man, honking at everybody, flipping off pedestrians and grandmas, driving over sidewalks, on shoulders, etc, using the F-word with each breath, and just being that crazy driver that everybody sees and rolls their eyes at. I was embarrassed to be in the back, as if this was somehow my fault. Also, I was about to puke. I didn't want to leave him a tip, but I was scared of the repercussions if I didn't, so I did. Once again, company dime. This is the part where that annoying person who lived in NYC for 6 months laughs and says, "Oh you silly non-New Yorker, all cabbies are like that!" My retort is that I've been on enough cab rides in that city to know that's not true.

So what is my general rule for cabs? I rarely take them when I'm paying, but my hatred is so deep that I am a lousy tipper regardless of who's ultimately paying for it. For a 40 dollar ride to the airport from downtown, I tip 5 bucks max. For an 80-dollar ride to Whitman, I pay 5 bucks again. I just can't give these cabs a good tip, even though cabbies are notoriously confrontive about bad tippers.

What about guides, though? I took a 6-day trek through the Himalayas in Nepal with a porter and a guide. The whole package, all-inclusive, was 100 bucks for all 6 days. The porter took my pack, the guide kept me company, and all I had to do was carry my day-pack and hike. I was still a poor student at the time, but I believe I gave them the equivalent of 20 bucks each at the end. I read somewhere that the average yearly salary of a Nepali was 150 bucks, so I was feeling pretty good about myself after that. They certainly deserved it, doing all that work, and they didn't even ask for a tip, although the company I booked it with suggested that I tip my guide and porter. Which is exactly the way it should be, because I have no idea what these guys are getting paid. I'm pretty sure the company guy said, "Make sure you tip these guys, because we're not paying them jack."

I've been on a couple Boston Duck tours here. There's about 20-30 people on the ride, and the price is 25 bucks, and I believe I gave the guide 2 bucks, and felt fine with that. Also, when I did it, I just handed it straight to him, not doing the "secret tip handshake" with the bills tucked in my thumb fold like a drug exchange.

Which leads me to the horseback excursion. First of all, we weren't feeling rich at all. Hawaii is DARNED expensive, and this excursion wasn't cheap. Secondly, the guide did a decent job with the information/jokes, but his overall demeanor was condescending and arrogant. Thirdly, there was this other native dude that was his helper, and that guy was much nicer and friendlier. Fourthly, the guide didn't really DO anything except point and talk. He just sat on his horse, brought up the rear, and said factoids every 5 minutes or so. And finally, his last tip spiel was way too forthcoming, and it was apparent to me that he was mailing it in. As we got out of the van at the end, back at the ranch, I noticed the other horsebackers were giving the secret tip handshake with the guide, with what appeared to be twenties. I had left my wallet in the car, so I had to go back to it to get some cash. We only had about 20 bucks, but I gave Mel 12 bucks to give to the guide. I didn't want to give it to him myself because I didn't like him. When Mel gave it to him, she handed him the money like a normal exchange, but he quickly shook her hand in the process and stealthily took the money, leaving Mel with an ounce of cocaine in her hand to finish the transaction.

All in all, our tip amounted to 7%, less than half of his suggestion. And you know what? I still felt like I was ripped off. I am generally known to my friends as a cheapskate (although my family thinks I spend money like the Kardashians), but I think I'm a fine tipper. I just don't feel like giving money to people when I didn't get any value from it. I would've been fine giving him only 5 bucks, as I felt that's how much value I received from his services, but the other 7 bucks were for the Guilt Charge. I would've preferred that the company either baked his tip into the price or suggested giving him a tip via credit card, making it obvious that we should be leaving a tip, and sparing us the awkwardness of the transaction. The company also had a misleading sign out front that said something like "Tip your horse, pet your guide" which I thought could be meaning that we weren't expected to tip the guide.

Despite that, the horseback excursion was quite fun, one of the highlights of the trip, the others being seeing the volcano glow at night and the black sand beach. The Waipi'o Valley was stunning and riding the horses through the jungle and through rivers was fun, and I would recommend it. Just bring some cash for your guide.

Now, it's customary to tip your blogger 15% of your monthly internet bill. I accept Paypal, checks in the mail, and stomps on the head.