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Travel tipping tips
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March 11, 1998: 4:18 p.m. ET
Hospitality experts and travel veterans share their gratuity guidelines
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NEW YORK (BizTravel.com) - For many business travelers, the subject of tipping is one which elicits a tinge of insecurity, if not a flood of sheer dread. Is 15 percent enough for a dinner party of 10? Will $20 for the concierge get me tickets to a show?
No matter how seasoned a road warrior you are, there are some situations in which the proper amount of gratuity just can't be pre-determined. How much should you give the bellman who carried your three suitcases up five flights of stairs because the elevators were broken? Or how little should you leave the snooty waiter who brought your client his dinner 10 minutes after everyone else got theirs?
The rules
"Nobody knows the rules about tipping," says Laura Powell, a freelance travel journalist for CNN and the Washington Post. "And even when you think you know the rules, they change when you go to a different country. In Japan and Australia, people are insulted if you give them a tip, and if you give a New York City cabbie a 5 percent tip, he gets insulted."
Nevertheless, tipping guides do exist. The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority makes these recommendations:
- for bartenders and cocktail waitresses, $1 per round
- for parking valets and bellhops, $2
- for chambermaids, $1 per night
The guidelines help "relieve the stress and confusion about tipping prices," said Rob Powers, the group's director of public relations.
Meanwhile, the School of Hotel Administration at Cornell University devised this set of supplementary tipping guidelines:
- for a bellman carrying luggage, $1 a bag
- for a doorman hailing a taxi, $1
- for restaurant waiters, 15-20 percent of the check
- for a bartender, 10-15 percent of the tab
- for a room service waiter, 10-15 percent of the check (if not included in service)
- for a concierge who makes your dinner or show reservations, $5 to $50
- for a parking valet when the car is retrieved, $1 to $2
- for a hotel housekeeper, $1 to $2 a day.
But despite these guidelines, most travelers consider tipping discretionary, says Powell. "There's no such thing as a birthright to a 15 percent tip on a meal. Service people would be the first to say that if you reward lousy service, you'll continue to get lousy service."
Above and beyond the call
Lynn Thomas, a Waltham, Mass.-based management consultant who travels half the year on business, tips hotel employees to perform tasks which help increase her productivity.
For example, she has asked bellmen to carry several boxes for her, and has had valets start her car on winter mornings to ensure that she would make her appointments on time. When a bellhop recently transported 10 heavy cartons for her around the hotel, she tipped him $15.
On extended assignments at a hotel, Powell tips the concierge upon arrival, noting that "Concierges can cut through red tape. If you show you're willing to pay for service, they will go that extra mile to get you a reservation in a busy restaurant."
But tipping varies depending on the city and quality of a hotel. Staff at hotels in New York and Chicago, where prices are higher than in most markets, expect more than the norm. As Powell warns, "When you're staying at the Plaza vs. the Quality Inn, you should expect to give a larger tip to the bellman."
No-gratuity zones
To alleviate tipping concerns, the Inn at Union Square in San Francisco and the Alexis Hotel in Seattle established no-tipping policies.
Before launching the policy in June 1995, management at the Inn at Union Square raised employees' salaries to compensate for the loss of tips, but maintained its $140 to $195 room rates. After nearly two years, feedback from guests to the no-tipping policy has been 98 percent positive, according to assistant manager Holly McGlothlin. Employees now go the extra step to deliver improved service without having to worry about the size of their tip.
Still, some gray areas remain.
As Kathryn Potter, manager of media relations at the American Hotel and Motel Association, notes, "The more you travel, the more you become familiar with the norm. But staying at the Plaza, where many guests are millionaires who throw around $100 bills, I still wonder if my $5 tip is sufficient." 
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