How Much Should You Tip At A Restaurant Or Hotel… And Can You Tip In Gold?

Are you wondering how much is a socially acceptable amount to leave as a tip at a nice restaurant? What about how much you should leave a housekeeper/maid at your hotel? And how much should you give the valet when he or she brings your car around?

Tipping has surprisingly seedy roots in the new world, at least, according to Mother Jones 

The origin of the word is unclear—one theory says “tip” is shorthand for “to insure promptness”; another suggests it’s from 17th-century thief slang meaning “to give.” In any case, European aristocrats popularized the habit of slipping gratuities to their hosts’ servants, and by the mid-1800s rich Americans, hoping to flaunt their European sophistication, had brought the practice home.

Restaurants and rail operators, notably Pullman, embraced tipping primarily, Jayaraman says, because it enabled them to save money by hiring newly freed slaves to work for tips alone. Plenty of Americans frowned upon the practice, and a union-led movement begat bans on tipping in several states. The fervor spread to Europe, too, before fizzling in the United States—by 1926, the state tipping bans had been repealed.

Okay, so it sounds like tipping has less than philanthropic origins in the U.S., but that doesn’t mean you can choose not to tip. Tipping for good service nowadays is expected nearly everywhere, in part because service sector jobs pay low wages—and workers do rely on tips to make up the difference.

Consider the following rough guidelines for tipping amounts:

• You should tip 15 to 20 percent at a restaurant where the meal is sit down and service is good (i.e. you’re served by a dedicated waiter or waitress; it’s not “fast food” or “self serve”)
• You should tip $1 to $3, or more if you feel generous, to the valet who pulls your car around—but tipping more than a buck or two is purely optional
• If staying in a hotel room for several days to a week, it is common for guests to leave some change behind for the housekeeper: up to $20 or more per week. Some hotel guests, however, leave nothing. It’s up to you. Ask the hotel concierge or the front desk what is customary at the hotel you’re staying at.

Wondering if you can tip someone in real gold conveniently, too? Well, sure! More than one million users in 150 countries use the Goldmoney platform to save, spend, send, and even earn in real gold. You can send insured gold to another person as a gift or as payment for a service… or as a tip for a job well done! You simply need to know their email address to get started.

Learn more about the platform and:      Open Free GoldMoney Holding Today