Speaking as an American, this crap is new. It started because of the proliferation of those iPad-based POS systems (like from Square, et al). They're ostensibly a good thing (low barrier to entry, easy to deploy) but most of them come with an inbuilt tip request.
For my part, I never tip for counter service, unless I'm paying cash, then the change goes in the tip jar because I don't like jingling when I walk. Nor does anyone I know, really. Same for carryout food. I'm not tipping you to hand me a bag.
Didn’t it really start to take over during Covid over here? All the ‘essential workers’ needed to be tipped because Uber and all the other delivery services didn’t want to pay their employees a living wage. Also all the restaurants turned to tipping for takeout as well since there was no dine in and here we are. Post lockdown and still doing this ‘goodwill’ tipping to line pockets.
Yeah, I think that's exactly what happened.
I used to always tip 20% when sitting down at a restaurant or bar, still do unless something is really off, but I would tip nothing or a lot less when picking up, unless I had a really good relationship and they'd hook me up. But then Covid hit and I tipped 20% everywhere for picking up because I was just glad they were open but also because I knew they were taking a risk and no one was allowed to dine-in so they wouldn't get their normal 20%, so I thought it was fair. Now they took a nice gesture and exploited it too much. I don't tip when picking up anymore.
That's part of it too, and I think the driver behind the overall "tip creep" trend, but I'd been seeing this particular brand of crap since long before lockdown
Here's how you can understand it:
American company orders are greedy and they will do whatever they can to not pay workers, including trying to con customers into paying them
As a customer I have a rule for tipping that is easy to follow
You come to me, I tip. I come to you, I don't
Only exception is if I ever do take out and the servers have to prepare it. I'll tip them
It's strange to me as an American that when I visit some countries there's no where to tip. I get physically anxious when I can't tip a waiter or bartender.
