While eating at a Thai restaurant and amassing a bill of $197.55, one Reddit user opted to be that low tipper, leaving a total of $13 as a tip following the meal.
This means the customer left merely a 6% tip on their bill before leaving the restaurant.
However, because of this low tip percentage, the Thai restaurant in question took matters into its own hands.
Tipping 6% at a dine-in restaurant is generally considered to be poor etiquette. (Getty Stock Photo)
In a now-deleted Reddit post, the user explained how he automatically got charged an additional $20 gratitude charge by the restaurant. This means the total of the user’s tip was upped to $33, a much more socially acceptable 16.7% tip for the meal he paid for.
The Redditor also revealed that, because of this unexpected upcharge, he contacted the restaurant and demanded that he be reimbursed the entire amount that he tipped, a condition that the Thai restaurant did eventually agree to, according to the customer.
However, that doesn’t mean the internet was quite as willing to let the low-tipping customer off the hook.
In fact, while many people agreed that the restaurant was wrong to adjust the tip, the Reddit post also received quite a lot of backlash due to the initial amount that the man had decided to tip the restaurant.
As was alluded to earlier, tipping around 15-20% of your dinner bill is generally perceived as the correct etiquette while dining at a restaurant, with 10% only being valid in the event of poor service at the restaurant.
Many people believe tipping culture in the United States is predatory and unnecessary. (Getty Stock Photo)
So, while few people outwardly defended the restaurant’s actions, it should come as no surprise that Redditors tore into the man for leaving a low 6% tip in the first place.
One commenter, for example, wrote: “$13 tip? … they probably had a hard time reading your scribbles and assumed it was actually an appropriate tip and not an insult … you should be ashamed of yourself, even more so airing this in public.”
Another shared a similar sentiment: “You’re a lousy tipper, but the restaurant shouldn’t have done that. What they should have done is given you s****y service the next time you come in.”
Ultimately, however, one Reddit user wrote a comment that stood out as the most catch-all response to the situation.
“Everyone sucks here,” the user explained, “The restaurant for trying to steal $20 from you, US tipping standards that subsidize low wages, and you for leaving a garbage tip and trying to f**k over a server who is not responsible for the US tipping standard.”
