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Aug 09, 2023

Josh Freed: I'm giving up on tipping and tapping with credit cards

Tip-hustling machines keep spreading so fast I half-expect to get asked to tip my dentist, along with the bus driver. I’ve been thinking a lot about tipping and tapping. I was at a bakery recently and

Tip-hustling machines keep spreading so fast I half-expect to get asked to tip my dentist, along with the bus driver.

I’ve been thinking a lot about tipping and tapping.

I was at a bakery recently and when the Visa machine was brought out, the server pressed several buttons before handing it over, kindly sparing me the usual tip choices facing us everywhere.

I felt a strange surge of relief at not having to think about whether the server deserved a tip, just because she’d recommended which bread was freshest.

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And if so, how much: 10, 15 or 25 per cent of my $12 order?

A year ago in a column, I questioned whether we’d reached a tipping point since the pandemic spread tips to the butcher, baker and candlestick maker — and more than 10,000 of you responded, largely saying you felt tipped out.

That’s an unusually high response, unless I mention my thoughts about anything in gun-friendly Florida.

Since then, many have questioned this new “tip creep” at everywhere from dépanneurs to make-your-own-yogurt-cup shops.

But tip-hustling machines keep spreading so fast I half expect to get asked to tip my dentist, along with the bus driver.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, tipping was a way to show appreciation to sales staff forced to share our germs. But lately it has become a way for businesses to have customers subsidize their poor worker wages.

We’re not just shoppers anymore, we’re investors, only if the business eventually makes a killing we won’t share profits.

I’m a great believer in good restaurant tips. I automatically press 20 per cent unless a waiter spills soup on me and doesn’t bother to say “sorry.”

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Restaurant staff work hard, giving often complex personal service. But that’s less true for most store cashiers, whose job is to punch the cash after I wander about serving myself, then hand them a carton of milk or beer.

Yet most of their card machines ask for hearty tips. Many of us have learned to press the green “enter” button, then “other tip,” then “0,” but it’s never a relaxed psychological task for me.

I often find myself asking if the salesperson helped me in some way and how much? Should I or shouldn’t I leave something?

But reflexively pressing 15 per cent on a beer carton can cost you $8, and there’s a lot of key-punching to leave 50 cents — which is never onscreen.

It has gotten so tiring to think about that one friend has gone back to paying entirely in cash, just to avoid card-machine tip options.

I wish stores would simply boost employee salaries, then raise prices to whatever’s needed — and we’d each decide what items we can afford.

Until then, I appreciate servers skipping past the tip options before handing me the terminal. It’s almost enough to make me tip them.

There’s a second new element of the post-pandemic, no-cash revolution that’s causing me trouble. It’s not tipping: It’s tapping … my credit card.

I don’t usually check my credit card bills carefully. I glance at the total and if it looks about right I tap my card.

But there’s a possible cost in that convenience.

Recently I was at a Verdun restaurant with my nephew Jonathan, where we ordered a blowout table d’hôte special for $60, plus wine.

When the bill came, we tapped our cards at the onscreen total, but didn’t get a full receipt until we’d already paid and the waitress was wandering away.

But in retrospect we both thought the total seemed high, so my nephew checked the bill carefully. He discovered they’d double charged us: once for the table d’hôte and once for each item on it.

Consequently, our 20-per-cent tip wound up being doubled, too. We complained and the waitress corrected it but didn’t bother to say “sorry,” so my tip fell.

It seemed like a fluke, but two evenings later I stopped at a highway supermarket and picked up two takeout sushi, along with our week’s groceries.

I tapped at the total flashing on the screen, then the bill was printed and stuffed in my grocery bag, so I’d move on quickly for the next customer.

But driving home I recalled the amount on the machine seemed somewhat high, again. Back home, given my restaurant experience, I studied the receipt’s 23 items and found I’d been billed for four sushi, not two — for an extra $26.

I phoned the store where, surprisingly, a supervisor said they had cameras on every counter. He promised to check my items on the video at the hour I’d been there.

Three days later, he called back to say I’d been sushi-swindled and my money was refunded.

Both bill errors were largely because of my recent tapping habit. The casual bump of your card is convenient, a magic wand-style wave of the hand.

But it means you often don’t see the bill until you’re out on the street. Pretty soon we’ll probably have computer chips in our wrists that bill us automatically as we exit a store.

Both my tipping and tapping problems have me thinking I’d better follow my friend who has abandoned his credit cards.

So I’m off to the bank to get a wheelbarrow of toonies.

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