
Millennial Fired For Tweet - shakes
http://www.theawl.com/2013/07/millennial-fired-for-tweet
======
jbail
Is it expected of you to tip when you aren't getting waiter/waitress service?
When I get a burrito at Chipotle, I don't tip. I stand while ordering. I pay
at a counter. When I'm finished eating, I bus my own table. These are the
things I always assumed you were paying a server for when you tipped them.

When I order delivery, I always tip generously because somebody actually got
in their car or bike and came to my house with food. That's extra effort in my
book. Same goes for when I eat in and have a waiter or waitress waiting on me,
refilling my water, etc.

Certainly $170 is a large grilled cheese order, but more generally, I'm asking
if it's expected to tip when you are not getting service beyond having your
food handed to you.

~~~
rdouble
I think that is part of the issue. Nobody really knows if you're supposed to
tip at an artisanal grilled cheese food truck. If it was Chipotle you wouldn't
tip. If it was a hot dog cart you wouldn't tip, but you also wouldn't ever
order $170 worth of hot dogs. Do people tip for big orders at Shake Shack? If
not, I'd say you don't tip at fancy food trucks, either.

It gets trickier here in the future because if the business is using Square
and you pay with a card there's always a tip solicitation screen before the
signature screen. This has caused the unintended effect of me always paying
for my third wave coffee in cash.

~~~
jmduke
On a semi-related note: I'd love to see studies about the effects Square has
on tipping. My intuition says that it increases tipping but reduces overall
CLV.

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Zikes
If the author is looking for sympathy, I have none for them.

The fact that this is on Twitter has nothing to do with it (nor does their
being a "millenial", but that's another matter), they could just as well have
shamed their customer on any number of platforms online or offline and the
result would have and should have been exactly the same.

~~~
keypusher
Agreed. If he wanted to talk about the problems associated with jobs based on
tipping, or why the minimum wage isn't high enough, or any number of other
issues related to the US service economy I would definitely be sympathetic,
but when you earn tips at work, you don't get to complain that the tips your
received were inadequate (except perhaps to your coworkers). You do not
publicly question customers about their tip generosity in any public forum if
you intend to stay employed, let alone Twitter. I worked in food service jobs
for years, yes I know the money is bad and the work sucks, but the solution to
that is getting a better job not shaming your customers and embarrassing your
boss.

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jmduke
I think it's a useful exercise to remove the Internet from the equation here.
This is equivalent to grabbing a megaphone and letting all of your customers
know "Hey, look at Glass Lewis & Co! They didn't tip us for a big order!"

If I'm a customer and I hear this, this is what I could be thinking:

1\. Jeez, that's not very nice.

2\. Wait, I don't tip when I order from any food trucks. Am I gonna get called
out tomorrow for it?

3\. I'm going to start bringing my lunch.

Especially since this is an industry where the cost of replacing a PTE is
especially low, it doesn't seem like the owner did anything wrong besides
protect his revenue. He didn't even try and coax an apology out of the guy.

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bradleyjg
Tip at a food truck? I've always understood tips to be customary in the
restaurant industry for sit-in or delivery, not pick up.

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neltnerb
This quote makes me giggle.

"If social media is going to be used in one way to monitor worker
productivity, why can it not also be used to advocate for a more civil
exchange between worker and consumer?"

... right, because putting things up in public on the internet encourages
"civil exchange".

Not saying that it's unreasonable to advocate whatever position you like, but
that is an incredibly silly justification.

~~~
anigbrowl
Not leaving a tip on a $170 order is pretty uncivil as well. His boss ought to
have told Lewis and Glass to go fly a kite, they're not entitled to immunity
from criticism.

~~~
Falling3
I would really have loved to see that as well.

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ianterrell
Regarding gcb0's pointing out of the Streisand Effect:

[https://twitter.com/search?q=%40glasslewis&src=typd](https://twitter.com/search?q=%40glasslewis&src=typd)

~~~
Zikes
Kid's going to have a tough time getting hired now.

Not only did he make the mistake of shaming a customer online, a poor customer
service practice in and of itself, but he went on to repeat that same mistake
by writing an entirely unapologetic article about it.

Why would I want to hire someone that doesn't know how to bite his tongue? He
seemingly lacks any of the necessary social mores for interacting with even
moderately challenging customers, a skill I've seen better mastered in your
average drive-through window.

~~~
jlgreco
I was wondering about that, but (thankfully for him) he seems to share his
name with a Irish comedian. All he probably has to do is leave that job off
his resume and it won't be particularly google-able.

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eblume
This is a pretty good example of the sort of social interaction that makes me
want to stay away from social media platforms.

It's not a fear of saying the wrong thing and getting fired... it's the fear
of saying just about anything at all with such a huge megaphone attached to
your mouth (and the fact that your shouting will be recorded forever.)

HN comments are about the closest I'm generally willing to go to that sort of
ultra-public commenting, and even then I'm generally pretty careful. Some
people seem very cavalier about it.

~~~
dredmorbius
Tell me about it.

I limit my social networking to other planets entirely.

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thret
I'd have fired him too, trying to shame one of his biggest customers.

Not sure why he thinks he is entitled to a tip, a tip is voluntary. It is a
gift.

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pdog
What a weird title. Why call out that he's a "Millenial"?

~~~
jlgreco
What is a "millenial" anyway, someone who is currently 13 years old or
younger?

I can't help but feel that he should have just taken this as a learning
experience and shut up. At least he shares his name with a comedian so
potential employers may not discover that he likes to publicly shame
customers...

~~~
bradleyjg
It took a while to settle down, but I think the general consensus on
generations is now:

Greatest Generation -> Baby Boomers -> Gen X -> millennial (f.k.a. Gen Y)

If you set generation length at 20 years, and the anchor point of 1946 as the
beginning of the baby boomers, you get a definition of millennial of
1986-2006. That is about right IMO for people who grew up with pervasive
internet.

No one knows what the 2006-2026 generation will be called, the oldest of them
are barely out of elementary school.

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callmeed
I'm going to take an opposing view to most comments here:

1\. Yes, you should tip at a coffee shop/food truck/counter restaurant if the
staff are slammed–especially so if you're the reason they are slammed. These
employees are likely underpaid and the people at Glass, Lewis & Co probably
make 5-10x what this dude makes. I don't think a 15-20% tip is necessary, but
some type of tip is appropriate IMO.

2\. While the tweet was a mistake (he admitted so in a round-about way), I
don't think he should have been fired and Glass Lewis & Co's overreaction just
backs up my opinion (established by them not tipping) that they're jerks.

3\. This guy used the same Internet to "shame" a customer that people use to
give 1-star Yelp reviews for the most ridiculous reasons. The door swings both
ways. For all we know, GLC's $170 caused bad reviews by other customers who
had to wait.

I hate it when customers belittle my customer service employees in help
tickets and I will jump in and tell them to back off at times. Granted, none
of my employees have tweeted about a jerk customer–but even if they did, I
wouldn't fire them (I would definitely apologize and try to make it right).

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georgebonnr
First of all, yes, I think most people would be unsure of whether or not they
are expected to tip in that situation.

Second of all, "standing up for yourself" would be verbally nudging the
customers as to whether they wanted to tip or not, as he did. Publicly tweet-
shaming them is, in my opinion, something else entirely, and not worthy of
receiving any kind of support from the owner.

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gkoberger
One thing worth noting is a lot of companies don't allow you to expense tips
-- meaning that someone would have had to pay $170's worth of tips out of
their own pocket. Since it's not table service, there's a good amount of
debate on if a tip is even customary.

~~~
jlgreco
Would this apply to "standard gratuity" or whatever for "parties over 8"?
Seems a little off if that is the case.

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resu
What's the difference between making a large order at a food truck vs doing
the same at McDonalds?

~~~
keypusher
After the food truck, some guy will get on Twitter and complain loudly about
you after work.

After McDonalds, you will get on Twitter and complain loudly about the food
after work.

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epoxyhockey
Tip etiquette is always a funny thing. As a customer, you always want to show
appreciation for the lowest level workers. Also, as a customer, you know that
spending $170 at a small business is almost a gift in of itself (admittedly,
more for the business owner than the employee).

But, was the employee expecting to make 20% tip on a $170 order? Does one
normally tip more than $1 at a food truck, if at all?

Was the business owner expecting to post big profits for the day and not
compensate the worker a bit more for that day?

At the end of the day, the worker may have a right to be upset watching
everyone greatly profit but himself.

~~~
crisnoble
"Was the business owner expecting to post big profits for the day and not
compensate the worker a bit more for that day?"

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that no, the owner was not going to
share his extra revenue with his minimum wage employees.

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ewest
I think firing the guy for this is pretty extreme - it does not allow for:

* the owner to constructively handle issues like this (maybe like educating the 'offender') * the 'offender' to learn from his mistake and understand it in a broader context

All we have here is action: twitter-shame non-tipper; result: fired. Very
short-sighted.

As far as the story itself goes - tipping is optional (even for large/huge
orders), so the guy was in the wrong to begin with.

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gcb0
#streisandeffect

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WestCoastJustin
Flagged -- what possible good commentary is going to come out of this?
Everyone in this story (and we are only seeing one side) needs to grow up.
Stop being passive aggressive online, when you can actually speak up _in the
moment_ and express yourself. I'm having flash backs about _dongle_ jokes.

~~~
gkoberger
To be fair, he also did that. And I personally think he should have been fired
for that, too -- many people customarily only tip for table service, and
asking someone if they meant to not tip is rude.

Unfortunately, it's a tip -- and there's no obligation for someone to tip
unless they feel it's deserved, especially if there's no waiter or delivery
involved.

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moron4hire
We tip because servers have a separate, lower minimum wage to the rest of food
service. I don't tip at places that don't have servers.

~~~
sejje
I think you've confused the cause and effect, but I agree with your
conclusion.

I do tip non-servers sometimes, but I do it for exceptional service in an
attempt to reward it. Plus, it makes me feel good.

~~~
moron4hire
but rewarding past service doesn't actually result in better future service.

~~~
sejje
I don't know that you're right, but I'm not sure it matters. That's not why I
tip.

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rhizome
This guy wasn't "advocating for himself," he was talking about a customer of
the company he works for. He would have had nothing to say if he didn't work
there, and moreso if he wasn't aware of the order at all. You simply don't
shame or insult your customers. It may feel like a hard lesson now, but I
guarantee he won't be creating a VC-backed startup geared toward making this
kind of thing easier.

