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The tip calculator on these is surprisingly broken in obvious ways. For example, if you order a cup of coffee and merchandise or a bag of beans, it calculates 1

The tip calculator on these is surprisingly broken in obvious ways. For example, if you order a cup of coffee and merchandise or a bag of beans, it calculates 15% on the entire order. Wtf!

notyourwork 8y ago
You usually do tip on the full amount right?
- enra 8y ago
  Usually in restaurants where all the of the goods are individually prepare / served. Many cafes sell also beans and other merchandise that are manufactured or made in batches, and can be $20 per item. So tipping on those items would be similar than you tipping in grocery stores or other stores that sell goods. Like you buy a $20k car, do you tip them 20%? Personally, I always just change the default calculation and tip on the service items like $1 for coffee/drink.
- freditup 8y ago
  The parent's point is that you don't normally tip on merchandise you buy. If you buy a beer for $10 and a tshirt for $30 from a bartender, a typical tip would be $2 not $8. That said, it's sort of an arbitrary custom. It's not very much work to fill a glass of beer, find a t-shirt in some cabinet, or hand someone a cup of coffee.
  - brian-armstrong 8y ago
    Not like it makes much of a difference, but in the cases where I've seen it, the merchandise is just on display on the floor. So there is not even an aspect of retrieving it from the cabinet, it is just being rung up.
- brian-armstrong 8y ago
  No, you would tip on the food service amount only. Similary you would not tip at a convenience store or grocery store. At least, this is my US centric viewpoint - other locations might have different customs
tzs 8y ago
I think in many situations tip calculators focus on the wrong thing. They are answering the question "How much do I pay given the tip percent?" Often the actual question I want answered is "What tip will I be giving if I pay various whole dollar amounts?" For example, let's say I order a pizza for delivery, and the mandatory charges come to $20.60, and let's also say I consider 15% a reasonable tip. A normal tip calculator will tell me that I should give the pizza guy $23.69. Screw that, I'm not futzing around with trying to find $0.69 in coins, and I'm certainly not going to give him $24 or $25 and ask for $0.31 or $1.31 in change. Nope. I'm going to pay an integral number of dollars and say "keep the change". What I want a tip calculator to do is give me a table: Pay Effective Tip $21 1.9% $22 6.8% $23 11.7% $24 16.5% $25 21.4% I can then look at that, and see that my best choices are $23, $24, or $25. $23 comes out far enough below 15% that I'll cross that off. $24 is a little over 15%, so is perfect, but if I don't have 4 $1 bills in my wallet, $25 would not be extravagant. Result: $24 or $25, depending on exactly what bills are in my wallet. I made an Apple Dashboard widget to do just that, and it worked out quite well. If I had ever gotten around to learning mobile development, that was going to be my first app for learning.
lotsofpulp 8y ago
You don’t need to tip for coffee anyway, that’s what the charge for the coffee is for.

The tip calculator on these is surprisingly broken in obvious ways. For example, if you order a cup of coffee and merchandise or a bag of beans, it calculates 15% on the entire order. Wtf!

notyourwork 8y ago

You usually do tip on the full amount right?

enra 8y ago
Usually in restaurants where all the of the goods are individually prepare / served. Many cafes sell also beans and other merchandise that are manufactured or made in batches, and can be $20 per item. So tipping on those items would be similar than you tipping in grocery stores or other stores that sell goods. Like you buy a $20k car, do you tip them 20%? Personally, I always just change the default calculation and tip on the service items like $1 for coffee/drink.
freditup 8y ago
The parent's point is that you don't normally tip on merchandise you buy. If you buy a beer for $10 and a tshirt for $30 from a bartender, a typical tip would be $2 not $8. That said, it's sort of an arbitrary custom. It's not very much work to fill a glass of beer, find a t-shirt in some cabinet, or hand someone a cup of coffee.
- brian-armstrong 8y ago
  Not like it makes much of a difference, but in the cases where I've seen it, the merchandise is just on display on the floor. So there is not even an aspect of retrieving it from the cabinet, it is just being rung up.
brian-armstrong 8y ago
No, you would tip on the food service amount only. Similary you would not tip at a convenience store or grocery store. At least, this is my US centric viewpoint - other locations might have different customs

tzs 8y ago

I think in many situations tip calculators focus on the wrong thing. They are answering the question "How much do I pay given the tip percent?" Often the actual question I want answered is "What tip will I be giving if I pay various whole dollar amounts?" For example, let's say I order a pizza for delivery, and the mandatory charges come to $20.60, and let's also say I consider 15% a reasonable tip. A normal tip calculator will tell me that I should give the pizza guy $23.69. Screw that, I'm not futzing around with trying to find $0.69 in coins, and I'm certainly not going to give him $24 or $25 and ask for $0.31 or $1.31 in change. Nope. I'm going to pay an integral number of dollars and say "keep the change". What I want a tip calculator to do is give me a table: Pay Effective Tip $21 1.9% $22 6.8% $23 11.7% $24 16.5% $25 21.4% I can then look at that, and see that my best choices are $23, $24, or $25. $23 comes out far enough below 15% that I'll cross that off. $24 is a little over 15%, so is perfect, but if I don't have 4 $1 bills in my wallet, $25 would not be extravagant. Result: $24 or $25, depending on exactly what bills are in my wallet. I made an Apple Dashboard widget to do just that, and it worked out quite well. If I had ever gotten around to learning mobile development, that was going to be my first app for learning.

lotsofpulp 8y ago

You don’t need to tip for coffee anyway, that’s what the charge for the coffee is for.