These days, customers who visit a restaurant to pick up a carryout order, or even a fast-food drive-thru, may be greeted by a prompt on the screen asking how much they’d like to tip.
In some cases, it’s just a kiosk making the request, but other times the cashier might be waiting for the customer’s response.
“It usually catches me off-guard,” Chris Nordstrom, a commercial real estate executive in Kansas City, Missouri, told Fox News Digital.
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“It’s not that I mind tipping in the right context,” he said. “It’s just that fast food, by nature, has traditionally been a non-tipping experience.”
Just 12% of U.S. adults tip when eating at a “fast casual restaurant,” according to a Pew Research Center survey.
About 77% said the quality of the service they receive is a “major factor” in deciding whether to tip and how much.
“I don’t tip if I pay before I eat,” wrote one person on Reddit.
Another user wrote that if there’s a tip option at a fast-food restaurant, “it should be an instant zero … unless they make less than minimum wage, no need to tip.”
Most fast-food restaurants are required to pay the federal minimum wage, and some states have an even higher minimum wage.
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Tipped restaurant employees also earn at least their state’s minimum wage, according to the National Restaurant Association.
“More often than not, I don’t tip at fast-food places unless the staff has gone above and beyond – or if it’s a locally-owned spot that I want to support,” Nordstrom said. “Tipping is tied to service – not just the act of handing over an order that was pre-prepared.”
But people who work in the service or retail industry may have a different perspective.
“If the option comes up, I’m always happy to tip,” Blair Dubinsky, a client advisor at a luxury-brand retail store in New York City, told Fox News Digital. “Working with the public isn’t easy, and if that’s the way I can thank them, I don’t mind doing it.”
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The custom of tipping is strictly American, according to Sarah Aynesworth, a Texas-based etiquette consultant who trained at the Protocol School of Washington.
“‘TIP’ is an acronym for ‘to insure promptness,’ which began during Prohibition,” she told Fox News Digital. “People would get their alcohol delivered faster if they gave a little bit of extra money.”
Aynesworth said she does not always tip the customary 20% when dining at a casual or fast-food restaurant.
“That’s really for more of a seated, served meal, where someone is refilling your water and giving you an experience,” she said. “At a fast-food restaurant, you’re paying for fast food.”
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For those who do decide to tip, pay attention to the numbers on the screen before tapping, said Aynesworth.
“Sometimes they are prompting you to pay even more than a normal percentage,” she said.
Nordstrom said he has noticed auto-tip options creeping higher, sometimes starting at 25%.
“When I’m being prompted to tip for things like grabbing a water, it seems a bit excessive, especially when the cashier is staring at you,” he said. “It feels as if the social guilt aspect has overtaken the spirit of tipping.”
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Dubinsky said she often tips fast-food workers – not out of obligation, but simply as a courtesy.
“I don’t think people should necessarily feel like they need to tip at a fast-food restaurant … however, people put in the effort to take the order and make the food, so I think it’s very polite to tip.”
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If picking up takeout food and there’s an option to tip, she said she will usually leave one, but not if picking up food from a window, “because I’m not interacting with anyone.”
Nordstrom said he believes it should not always be expected.
“If tipping becomes an expectation everywhere, regardless of the level of service, then its meaning as a reward for above-and-beyond hospitality is lost — and it becomes more of an additional tax.”