I was tended to by the best wait staff I have ever encountered last night at the Greenwood Hotel. Not only friendly, but knowledgeable, and seemingly eager to please. After the meal, I was faced with a dilemma.
Should I leave a tip?
The wait staff definitely provided excellent service, but personally, I am against the practise of tipping. Where would I draw the line? The meal itself was excellent, so should I fire a couple of bucks in the direction of the kitchen and let them divide it amongst themselves based on their contribution to our meals? In the end, I rationalised it this way; As the hotel itself would be the main beneficiary of having such commendable staff, IMHO, it is their duty to compensate them commensurately. My primary transaction was with the hotel, and the staff there are all part of the infrastructure required to run the business smoothly. The better the staff the more smoothly the business runs, and vice versa. I have never been compensated directly by a client of any of my employers for developing a useful computer application, but have made myself valuable to employers for doing so. So it should be with hospitality and service staff. I would hate to see Australia go the way of many American service industries, with the employers paying minimum wages and the service providers relying on the often fickle public for payment.
Tipping, from my point of view, is primarily to ensure good service, not to reward it. It makes more sense to provide an incentive before hand.
So, as you may have guessed, we didn't leave a tip (sorry Diane and Alexia), but made sure the hotel management were aware of the excellent job done by their employees.
