Tipping

[Midpack]

I tip the maid.
A lot of works need to be done in short time. We see it when we walk along the corridor, during cleaning hours.

I was in Denver for a business convention.
The maid came all the way to thank me for the tip, when she saw me walking out of my room to the elevator.
She saw me checking out and expressed her appreciation again and wished me coming back in the future.

It’s funny, I’ve had quite a few hotel housekeepers find and thank us personally.

We stayed in a Hilton Tru a couple years ago and left $5 each day, when we came back to the room each day there was a Post-It note thanking us with a short but witty comment. After the first day, we left a Post-It and $5 each day with a (hopefully witty) reply - and had an ongoing dialogue for 4 days. It was hilarious, and made a big impression - we left a bigger tip on our last day. We told management how much we enjoyed housekeeping, like no other hotel we’ve stayed at.

 

[Unpaintedhuffhines]

I tip housekeeping when I remember to do it, but often I'm scrambling to get out and just forget. Usually $20, but I do it when I leave the final day. I don't tip daily, but maybe I should start doing that. $5 or $20 has a far more positive impact to housekeeping than it has a negative impact to me.

A couple of times when I was working (and making a fortune), I'd leave a $100 tip. I viewed it as a random act of kindness - I like to think about how they reacted, going home that night and telling their families, telling other housekeepers, etc.

 

[Midpack]

I tip housekeeping when I remember to do it, but often I'm scrambling to get out and just forget. Usually $20, but I do it when I leave the final day. I don't tip daily, but maybe I should start doing that. $5 or $20 has a far more positive impact to housekeeping than it has a negative impact to me.

A couple of times when I was working (and making a fortune), I'd leave a $100 tip. I viewed it as a random act of kindness - I like to think about how they reacted, going home that night and telling their families, telling other housekeepers, etc.

We tip 2-3x around the holidays for anyplace we’re at all regulars, always well received. However, I tripled the tip on my haircut last week, with a stylist who I hadn’t done this with before. She looked concerned when she noticed, I think she wondered if I was hitting on her or something, so I told her we tipped more around the holidays - then she was relieved/pleased…

 

[Jerry1]

Me and a buddy did something similar before the holidays. We had breakfast. I got the bill and was expecting I’d drop a tip of $10. Then my buddy said he’d get the tip. I said I was going to give her $10 so he dropped a $10 down and I just said whatever, I was going to tip $10 so why not still do it. So, a $20 tip at a breakfast joint hopefully was well received. Feels good to do that once in awhile.

 

[braumeister]

a $20 tip at a breakfast joint hopefully was well received. Feels good to do that once in awhile.

+1
I love to do that now and then. Especially at places where they don't expect it.

 

[SecondAttempt]

We tip 2-3x around the holidays for anyplace we’re at all regulars, always well received. However, I tripled the tip on my haircut last week, with a stylist who I hadn’t done this with before. She looked concerned when she noticed, I think she wondered if I was hitting on her or something, so I told her we tipped more around the holidays - then she was relieved/pleased…

I'd have winked first just to see what happened

 

[SecondAttempt]

Tipping is not about wage levels. Tipping is traditional and longstanding.

While I completely agree, in the US, whether tipping the chambermaid is traditional is debateable. I personally do not think it is traditional. Never in my personal or professional experience has this been something that was normal. I am generally a very good tipper when a tip is normal but have never tipped maids.

I expect hotels to pay them well to maintain high standards for my stay and then to charge me accordingly in the room rate.

If traditions have changed I can play along but I do not get a sense from this dialog that there is any consensus.

 

[SonofCohoes]

10 a night

 

[Midpack]

While I’ll admit Covid has changed things, it’s hard to believe we’re debating leaving $3-5/day for hotel housekeeping among many with 7-figure portfolios (or pension values). Housekeepers are low paid, often part time without benefits, mattresses are heavy, cleaning bathrooms isn’t inspiring work, often people who don’t have great employment options. Tipping housekeepers has been going on for decades. If you disagree with the tipping status quo that’s your choice and by all means act on it, but punishing housekeepers isn’t going to change the status quo. Promote living wages, challenge hotel management, etc.

 

[marko]

.... it’s hard to believe we’re debating leaving $3-5/day for hotel housekeeping among many with 7-figure portfolios (or pension values)..

How do you think "a man with my money" got to be "a man with my money"!?

But seriously, I fully agree. We're talking about a few bucks to some people who work really hard, long hours.

 

[Montecfo]

I wonder how many here who stiff a hotel maid have no qualms about handing a couple bucks to some creep panhandling who's not even trying to get a job.

Do you really see those as similar?

 

[marko]

Do you really see those as similar?

Let's try to keep the thread on topic. I'm going to delete that part of my comment. Sorry.

 

[FIYes]

I have on rare occasions tipped the hotel maid. However, I’m also not in favor of the widespread tipping culture in the USA.

Now even though I don’t like tipping I always tip for service in restaurants because I know that is how the wait staff is paid. I would prefer if prices were increased and the staff paid a fair wage. So yes, the wage that the person is making does influence my tipping.

 

[FIYes]

This has me thinking..why don’t I like tipping? Well, partly because I wonder if I’m tipping the correct amount…too little or too much? I don’t like the idea that an employee’s wage is dependent on the whims of the customer that day.

 

[captain3d]

Exactly. The uncertainty of tipping is why it is annoying. Imagine if every task required you knowing what the other person gets paid in order to work out the final bill.

 

[Midpack]

Exactly. The uncertainty of tipping is why it is annoying. Imagine if every task required you knowing what the other person gets paid in order to work out the final bill.

That's why there are readily available tipping guides, you don't have to know what the person gets paid. Who doesn't know that 15%-20% is the norm at a restaurant? Frankly tipping housekeeping isn't a new idea, goes back decades. Tip jars and touchscreen tipping are newer, but I don't mind learning about those situations because I don't want to short service people - they don't make the rules in most cases. In most cases we are talking about people at the bottom of the economic food chain, I don't mind tipping any of them for decent service or better.

Tipping is a very old practice, too late to claim we don't know. And if you wonder about any specific situation, there's guidance online I am sure...

https://money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/articles/tipping-etiquette-101
https://emilypost.com/advice/general-tipping-guide
https://www.wsj.com/buyside/personal-finance/holiday-tipping-guide-01666898498
https://www.realsimple.com/work-life/money/money-etiquette/tipping-etiquette-guide

 

[Montecfo]

Thanks Midpack. Excellent comments.

 

[Aerides]

Frankly tipping housekeeping isn't a new idea, goes back decades.

I used to be the Mini Bar re-stocker in a hotel in the 80's. I often got to the room before housekeeping did, and frequently saw a few bills on the night stand, clearly left with a purpose. It's been a "thing" for as long as most of us here have been visiting hotels.

 

[explanade]

While I completely agree, in the US, whether tipping the chambermaid is traditional is debateable. I personally do not think it is traditional. Never in my personal or professional experience has this been something that was normal. I am generally a very good tipper when a tip is normal but have never tipped maids.

I expect hotels to pay them well to maintain high standards for my stay and then to charge me accordingly in the room rate.

If traditions have changed I can play along but I do not get a sense from this dialog that there is any consensus.

THat's basically the crux of the issue, a lot of workers are deliberately underpaid and patrons are expected to tip to make up for it.

IN other countries, these kinds of workers are paid well enough that they're not dependent on tips. People either do not tip or round up their bills, but nothing like 15-20% more.

How profitable are these hotels, restaurants, stores?

Now there are a lot of family-run hotels, which aren't part of some big international chain. But I believe they're bound by laws in these other countries to pay decent wages.

 

[jpeter1093]

we tip at the same rate the day we check out - e.g. for a 3 night stay we leave $15.

Problem with that is the cleaner on the last day of your stay gets the entire tip; we tip daily to get around that

 

[davidfin]

Yes, we tip the room attendant.

 

[tenant13]

I have a serious anxiety around tipping because I travel a lot and I’m never sure if my research is good enough. In addition I go through threads like this one (“don’t be a cheapskate”) or get chastised by friends living in other countries - they tend to be on the “don’t overdo it, you ruin it for us” spectrum. So I end up making completely erratic decisions: sometimes not tipping at all, other times leaving 10% of my bill (usually when I know I’d be back).

I used to wait on tables in my twenties and I remember how much tipping mattered - we were paid less than $2/hr. But I hated being dependent on forced generosity of others. My favorite customers were foreigners - because we were allowed to ask them if they wanted service charge included in the bill, or large parties that knew the service charge was going to be added.

Tipping is an unfortunate element of economic activity that nobody likes but aside from Japan where it’s explicitly discouraged, it’s not going away any time soon.

 

[explanade]

On some Trip Advisor forums, there are locals who yell at Americans not to tip in their countries, because they don't want their service industry to become habituated to expecting tips.

 

[samcat]

Because they don't clean during our stay, I try to leave $5 when we check out. Though sometimes I forget!

 

[rodi]

I've traditionally tipped $5/night. That was pre-Covid. But since room cleaning has changed since Covid - I tip at the end of the stay... If I'm making my own bed and going to the front desk for towels, I'm not tipping. The final day I always tip, because that is when the service is happening.

As far as nice hotels still doing daily service - the default is no service during the stay including at pricier hotels in the US.

As for where to leave the tip - our guide on our recent trip to Ecuador suggested leaving the tip on the pillow, because the room keeper will get it if it's on the pillow, otherwise the supervisor would get it - and likely not leave it for the room keeper.