When Your Wingman Is A Cheapskate
Diego Cervo/Shutterstock
The barkeep rang a bell, points in our direction, and, over the crowd of 40 or so patrons, yelled, ‘Ooh, look out ladies – biiig tippers over here!’
Everyone laughed. The ladies waiting for us were embarrassed to be seen with us. They promptly excused themselves to blend in with the crowd after politely pretending to listen to my friend claiming to have left the barkeep a $20 tip, which I knew to be bull.
I’m a very generous tipper so it was extremely embarrassing for me. The bartender was a total jerk for doing that, though.”
A Server Never Forgets… Except, Maybe, A Food Order
Sorbis/Shutterstock
“I was once almost kicked out of a local wing place one time because a waitress told the manager we had made obscene statements to her. This couldn’t be further from the truth.
It turned out that she remembered us from the week before. We had tipped poorly because she took 20 minutes to get our drink order, 40 minutes to bring those drinks, and another 30-40 minutes to come back and take our food orders. On top of that, she didn’t put our orders in and lost them, having to start the process over, but she was a little quicker that time.
It was pretty awful but our group is easy-going and really liked the wings (it was a weekly event for six or so of us to go), so instead of complaining to a manager, we just left the appropriate low tip. She basically had decided to lie to the manager to try and clear the table up for someone else.”
Don’t Ask This Bartender For Friendly Advice
bogdanhoda/Shutterstock
“My friend and I were at a club/bar just hanging out. I hadn’t seen him in a while, so we sat most of the night catching up. We closed the place, so I walked to the bar to close tab. The bartender, a guy probably around the same age as me at the time, was in a timid mood for some reason.
He looked at me and said, ‘What do you want?’ I made the universal motion for ‘tab-out,’ which is acting like you are signing something in the air. He got my receipts and card together, put it on a plastic tray, and flung it at me.
I did what he should have expected: I left no tip. I took my card and put the signed receipt back in the tray. I looked at him and said, ‘Here,’ in a snarky tone, and left the tray on the bar. He came over, saw the bill, and flipped out. He walked around the bar to come to my side and got in my face.
Completely unexpectedly, he reached up and grabbed me by the throat. My friend who, like me, is a Marine, started beating the crap out of the bartender. Anyone with bar experience should know what came next: a crapload of bouncers. I managed to get a kick in on the bartender before the bouncers got to me.
They threw both of us out, obviously, and stood at the door. We decided to call the cops. Both of us had a couple of insignificant injuries and could have easily called it a night, but we decided we wanted the bartender to pay for his actions.
The cops showed up. My friend and I filed the complaint. My friend told the cop about how bad his neck and back hurt and showed her his elbow scrape. She did her report, asked us to be on our way, and said she would be in contact.
The bartender was arrested. My friend and I filed suit against the bar. My friend got paid and the bar closed down a month later.”
The Cost Of Pride
Luis Molinero/Shutterstock
“A girl I was working with was waiting on a table of gentlemen who racked up a pretty hefty bill. As most waiters do, she assumed the tip would be fat and was gloating about it the whole meal, bragging to other waiters about her up-sells as she printed out the ticket.
The men paid out, got up, and left. She walked over, grabbed the book off the table, looked at it, and immediately slammed it back on the table. She walked up to the bar at which I was working and began ranting about how these ‘stupid imbeciles just stiffed me on $250.’ She started insulting their Southern drawls, called them rednecks, and accused them of being poor.
The whole time, she was completely oblivious to the fact that the head of the party was at the bar asking me for change on a $100 bill. I give him his change (not knowing it was her guest). He walked down to the end of the bar where she was still ranting about him, threw $80 in front of her, and said, ‘I used to be a waiter and I hated having to break $100 bills for customers. I was trying to save you a step on a busy night.’
He then turned around and walked out, leaving this stupid little girl to cry and moan when she finally realized what a jerk she had been for using preconceived notions to judge this guy who was one of the rare people whom every waiter loves to wait on.
The best part about getting out of the industry was not the fact that I didn’t have to deal with customers anymore. It was that I didn’t have to listen to waiters rant every shift because they take everything so personally all the time.”
Mischievous Server Thought His Con Was So Smooth
FGC/Shutterstock
“I went to Applebee’s recently with my friend. Her boyfriend had just broken up with her and she wanted to cope. The service was slow but it was around 11:30 on a Monday night, so we didn’t really mind. I left a seven dollar tip on roughly a twenty dollar meal, I thought it was pretty fair.
One week later I made a shocking discovery that forever changed my perspective on things.