General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Completely f'd up business practice I just found out about [View all]mnhtnbb
(31,372 posts)and decided to take euros with us to pay for everything--hotel bills, restaurants, etc--
because we were concerned about the dollar declining if the Repubs didn't
give up on their shutdown/fiscal cliff crap last October (we were leaving the end of Oct).
Not only did we not have to pay the standard 3% credit card company charge on all international
transactions, but we also got a good deal on the euros we bought ahead of time.
BUT...to the point of the OP...we saw many, many people paying with cash in restaurants.
However, we also had understood that many European places indicated service was included
on the menu. One pricey--very pricey--lunch we had with our son in Berlin, the maitre'd came running out after us,
asking whether we had been displeased, because we didn't leave a tip. I went back in and put
a 20 euro tip down (almost a $30. tip which is 20% on a $150. lunch!) But my point is, that
we never seemed to know if tip was included or not. It was very frustrating. We think
that many times it was, but we were identified as Americans so expected to add a tip.
Maybe that's paranoid, but it really began to bother me that we were being taken advantage of.
I wish it would become universal practice to pay waitstaff a living wage and stop the whole tipping
business.