Paying and Tipping

So you’ve ordered.

You’ve gone through all that stuff you’ve eaten your food.

It’s delicious.

Right it’s been a great meal.

Now you need to pay.

Why do they make you pay at the end.

They should make you pay at the beginning when you’re excited to eat right.

You’ve you’ve eaten it all.

Now you need to pay at the end OK.

You see a waitress over there to get your waiter or waitresses attention.

Watch them moving around the restaurant.

And when you see them looking in your direction can do this.

Just like that whether you want something or if you’re ready to pay to ask for the check.

Do this.

And when they return that when they recognize you when they acknowledge you they look at you.

You go like this can mouth that they will bring over the check or the Bill to you.

They’ll go because they’re far away.

Right.

You don’t want to shout like that across the restaurant.

You want to do it in a quiet way because usually the restaurant will have a nice a nice quiet quiet quiet quiet atmosphere.

Right.

Very important right.

OK.

So check please.

Is the most common I think and this hand gesture goes with it catching the eye of your waiter or waitress.

We also say if they’re right here could we get the check.

Could we get the check.

Could I get the check.

We’ll have the bill.

We’ll have the bill.

I’ll have the bill.

I’m ready for the bill.

Ready for the check.

Excuse me.

Yes I’m ready for the check.

I’m ready for the bill.

I think we’re ready for the bill.

Sometimes we can add that too.

There are lots of different ways to say it but these are these are the basic ones.

OK.

And then she says Sure I’ll be right back with that.

So she brings it now maybe maybe I’ve invited my friend out and I really want to treat my friend.

I really want to treat my friend because I haven’t seen him or her in a while so I’d say I’ll get it I’ll get it or it’s on me in American culture saying it’s on me.

If you don’t say something like that it will be assumed that you will pay for yours and I will pay for mine.

Probably we will split the bill so usually we’ll say Shall we split it shall we split it right.

Don’t assume that I will pay for you and I’m not going to assume that you’re going to pay for me.

In fact in American culture it’s very common for people to split the bill but we usually still will say this shall we split it shall we split it if I want to treat you.

I can say I’ll get it.

It’s on me or sometimes just MY TREAT MY TREAT MY TREAT.

Are you sure.

Are you sure.

That’s very nice of you I’m sure.

I’m sure it’s my treat.

That’s my treat.

Thank you so much.

I’ll get the next one.

I’ll get the next one so you don’t have to treat people.

You can definitely split it.

You might have heard the phrase going Dutch.

Actually it’s not that common.

Now this is an American thing but I said we would come back to tipping.

We have to talk about that for waiters and waitresses and often hosts and hostesses and also bartenders people who work in the bar.

Their salary might be very low and they depend on tips.

It’s a very important part of a lot of services especially in America.

It’s very important for whatever reason.

OK so if you go to a nice restaurant you’ve got a tip.

How do you leave the tip.

You can leave the tip usually in the check.

They’ll give you a receipt after they swipe your card they’ll swipe your card and then they’ll bring you the receipt.

Right.

With the amount on it and a line under it.

So this may be you will say thirty four dollars.

Right.

And then you would maybe tip let’s say you want a tip.

I don’t know.

Seven dollars going to tip seven dollars.

OK.

So now you’re going to pay 41.

So there’s a blank space and the blank space you write seven and then you add it up and write the total and then you sign your name at the bottom and you leave that in the restaurant it’s called the merchant copy the signed one with the tip and the final amount.

It’s called the merchant copy.

You leave that at the restaurant and you take the customer copy the customer copy.

OK.

So there are two copies of the receipt after they swipe your card leave the merchant copy.

Take the customer copy.

You don’t have to fill in the customer copy because it’s yours but you can if you want to.

So how much is polite to tip.

Well I have here between 10 and 20 10 is considered pretty low for most restaurants.

It’s usually 15 to 20 20 is kind of the standard.

If you tip 15 it’s okay.

It’s kind of considered getting a little low but it’s OK.

So if they did an okay job as your waiter or a waitress then 15 10 percent if they really didn’t do very well maybe they weren’t very polite.

OK.

So you can tip 10 percent maybe but that’s not as common.

Only if they did a terrible job and maybe they called you bad bad names or something.

Can you tip nothing.

I’ve only not tipped maybe two times in my entire life because I had a terrible terrible experience.

And you want to talk to the manager after that happens.

Listen I need to talk to you.

The waiter.

She didn’t come to our table for 30 minutes.

Our food came and it was cold and she didn’t mention it.

All right.

So we had a you know it’s a terrible experience.

Then maybe you could tip to zero but that’s pretty rare.