Server Scolds Co-Worker For Accepting A Huge Tip From A 'Creepy' Customer
Was she encouraging bad behavior? Or is her co-worker just jealous?
Dusan Petkovic | Shutterstock Perhaps the biggest way waiting tables differs from most other jobs is how unpredictable the pay is. Even at the most upscale places where the big tips are, there are always those shifts that are unexpectedly dead and send you home empty-handed.
So when you rely on the kindness of strangers to pay your bills, you have to take whatever you can get, right? But one server has found herself in a bit of a moral conundrum after accepting a generous amount of money from an unsavory customer.
A server got scolded by a co-worker for accepting a huge tip from a 'creepy' customer.
The 27-year-old waitress's story will be familiar to pretty much any woman who's waited tables or worked in a bar. On a recent shift, she had a table composed of a middle-aged woman and a "very handsome" middle-aged man, the type of guy she would have considered dating but for one thing: He was downright "creepy."
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The man left her a $500 tip because she was 'so pretty.'
The Redditor described how the guy went out of his way to try to come onto her. He made sure to let her know that the woman he was with was his sister, not his wife, and made his interest well known.
Despite his overtures, she wasn't even offended until the end of the dinner. "After the meal, he gave me a $500 tip," she wrote. "The tip was almost twice the price of the meal. He told me the tip was because I was so pretty." The gesture suddenly turned flattery into something that felt "insulting" to her.
"It made me feel like a[n] object," she wrote. "If he wanted to flirt or compliment me, he picked a horrible way." She likened it to making her feel like she was working in some kind of gentleman's club, which she said she has no problem with on its face, but as a server in a restaurant, she never agreed to that kind of dynamic.
Nevertheless, $500 is $500, especially when you're a server, so she wasn't about to sacrifice the tip. And one of her colleagues had quite a lot to say about that.
Her co-worker said she encouraged the creepy man's behavior by accepting his money.
"She told me it was a stupid decision to accept that," she said of her co-worker. "She said I made it seem like behavior like that is acceptable by accepting it." That take made her reconsider her actions, and she decided she "probably would never accept a tip like that under those circumstances again."
But most Redditors felt she had nothing to feel sorry about, and that this most likely arose out of jealousy on the part of her co-worker. After all, she didn't do anything wrong to earn the money. All she did was her job. And frankly, if you're going to be harassed, you might as well come out ahead in the end!
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Redditors also gave her the advice to not ever discuss her tips like this again, as it is very common in the restaurant industry for resentments to fester over unequal tips like this. More importantly, it is also common for restaurant managers to basically confiscate huge tips or demand a share for themselves or other employees. It's a shady business.
Her co-worker is probably right, however, that her acceptance of the tip encouraged his behavior. But why is that her problem? This traffics in the same logic that has blamed women for men's behavior and victimization for ages. Male entitlement isn't her problem to solve, even if she could, and if she's going to be harassed, she might as well come out ahead.
John Sundholm is a writer, editor, and video personality with 20 years of experience in media and entertainment. He covers culture, mental health, and human interest topics.
