To Tip or Not to Tip?

Everyone from your barista to the car mechanic is asking for tips, and new technology adds to the pressure.

- LAURA PETRECCA

TIPPING has long been a tricky topic, but in rethe practice cent years, has taken on a whole new level of complexity.

Service providers are not only increasingly soliciting tips, but they're also spinning around touch-screen card readers with suggested percentages that can run as high as 30%. Adding to the struggle are bills with a "service charge" and a line for gratuity. And then there's the awkwardness of making a tipping decision while standing two feet from the person who just handed you your take-out pizza.

"It's a very complicated space," says Lizzie Post, co-author of Emily Post's Etiquette, The Centennial Edition, and the great-great-granddaughter of manners maven Emily Post.

So, how did the gracious act of adding a gratuity become so confounding? The global pandemic was a major impetus, as many consumers, while holed up in their homes, wanted to support small businesses and show appreciation for service workers.

"Covid increased people's willingness to tip even in circumstances where you weren't used to it," says Michael Lynn, a Cornell University professor of consumer behavior and marketing who has published more than 50 academic papers on service gratuities. "It also increased their willingness to tip larger amounts."

In addition, credit card readers that give suggestions such as 18%, 20% and 25% are more prevalent than ever-and unlike tip jars, they can cause extra gratitude angst because you must opt out. "With a tip jar, failure to tip is passive. It's a sin of omission," says Lynn. "Whereas failure to tip with the digital screen is more active. You have to say, 'No tip.' And we generally think sins of commission are worse than sins of omission."

Across the country, tip jars are proliferating, and digital prompts show no sign of abating. Still, you can take steps to feel good about the amount you tipif you tip at all.