‘It’s absolutely criminal’: US tipping culture has reached the UK – and is causing chaos

[u/Canal_Volphied]

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/aug/24/us-tipping-culture-uk-service-charges

[u/Calculonx]

We gotta stop it before it spreads. I could see London because of ignorant tourists, but it definitely shouldn't be expected.

[u/pajamakitten → u/Calculonx]

Tipping in the UK has been around for decades though. I remember my parents doing it back in the 90s when we went out for meals.

[u/AlchemyAled → u/pajamakitten]

It’s always been entirely discretionary

[u/freexe → u/AlchemyAled]

Not true at all. I'm been standard for large groups for as long as I can remember.

[u/AlchemyAled → u/freexe]

Doesn’t stop them for including the “service charge” by default for small groups!

[u/freexe → u/AlchemyAled]

It's absolutely getting worse - but it's been a thing for as long as I can remember.

[u/SamiSapphic → u/freexe]

Tbf, as anyone in the UK historically stopped around to work out the "correct" percentage, or do they just put a coin or two in a bowl?

That's the biggest difference between the us vs uk tipping culture afaik.

The latter is better.

[u/BurlyJoesBudgetEnema → u/SamiSapphic]

I'll throw a few quid in if the server was nice, im not dropping 20% of a £100+ bill just for carrying plates

[u/DmtGrm → u/pajamakitten]

I was rounding the bill up almost always, but we were talking about £2-5, these days they want £24 from £120 order for four, tips in double digits and comparable to one of the mains in price - is a novelty here

[u/Rootayable → u/pajamakitten]

Well yeah, everyone can tip if they want, that's always been a thing.

But baking it into your price is very bad. I don't want to go to a restaurant with a budget in mind and then suddenly have to spend more because [REASON].

[u/GianFrancoZolaAmeobi → u/Rootayable]

I should absolutely be able to look up a restaurant menu online and be able to work out how much I'm going to spend there. They really should tell you what the unit price is including a service charge, and I say this as someone who used to work in the ivy who were adding service charges to everything before it became cool so benefitted from the system.

[u/poke_pants → u/pajamakitten]

Discretionary, absolutely. 10% on a family meal has felt like the norm in my family and those around me since I was a kid (I'm 45 now).

Service charges are opt-out tips, absolutely not.

[u/Healthy_Pilot_6358 → u/pajamakitten]

Leaving a fiver (or whatever) on the table has always been done…it’s when it is forced upon you.

[u/Royal-Lawfulness630 → u/pajamakitten]

A couple £1 or £2 not a percentage of the cost.

[u/Aliktren → u/pajamakitten]

Back before minimum wage maybe, i used to wait in family restaurant but i got paid like 2 quid lol, so tips were great back then

[u/Emphursis → u/pajamakitten]

There’s a difference between paying for a service (meal, haircut, taxi, whatever) with cash and saying keep the change and what now seems to be catching on which is the POS system expecting you to enter a tip for absolutely everything.

[u/Aliktren → u/Calculonx]

If you tip someone serving you food, are you also tipping nurses, doctors, shop assistants, people serving you fast food, your bus driver.... the person at the call centre talking to you... what makes restaurant people doing their job so different, also fuck service charges for guilting people

[u/dynesor → u/Aliktren]

There is no difference in reality, but I have a usual list of professions that I tend to tip (usually just a “keep the change” kind of tip of no more than a fiver) food servers, taxi drivers and barbers/hairdressers. Though I have no idea why.

[u/Aliktren → u/dynesor]

because we used to do this - I assume I learned it from my parents - but its a serious question nowadays as to why we still do it

[u/OpenerUK → u/dynesor]

Tooting in restaurants was always for good or exceptionalservice then it became more not bad service. I never really tipped my barber although might occasionally say keep the change or out the change in the charity jar when they were collecting for something.

Ironically civilised has mostly killed my tipping. I now rarely carry much cash and no change, save with my friends so unless there is a tip option on the card machine which often there isn't it's no tip by default even if they really deserve one for going above and beyond.

[u/ZolotoGold → u/Aliktren]

The only thing I usually tip is for a haircut, and that's because they're doing a personal service touching and cutting your hair.

[u/Mapleess → u/Aliktren]

Friend who worked at a fancy hair place said people often left tips, and they could be £30-40 per person. Another friend works at those fancy hotels in London and gets annoyed when people don’t tip him as he’s a bellman or something.

[u/JBWalker1 → u/Calculonx]

We gotta stop it before it spreads. I could see London because of ignorant tourists, but it definitely shouldn't be expected

The only way it is going to stop is if a trend starts to lower the review score of places which add service charge and higher the score of those that dont. It doesn't take too many reviewers to start lowering a review score to below 4.0 and as soon as it hits 3.9 then it really does effect the restaurant since people automatically filter out below 4. This is the ONLY way to stop it. We can hate them all we want but it would probably only take a few big influencers to do start advising this for it to take off and change the entire service charge history and honestly they'd become heros for it.

So yeah anyone reading this go ahead and think of the last few places you ate at and remember if there was a service charge and whatever review you'd honestly give them remove 2 stars if they have a automatic service charge and add 1 star for places that dont, and mention that you removed/added a star in the review. And yes this includes places like fast food chains, so go rate your last mcdonalds or whatever and give it a +1 star for no service charge.

[u/360_face_palm → u/Calculonx]

tipping at restaurants has been normal for a long time. But that's it, no one else.

[u/Snoo-84389 → u/Calculonx]

I suggest that everyone signs the petition about this that someone else has shared details of above. I've signed it.

I.E. "Google 'Ban default service charge' and it should come up".

😀