Holiday Tipping in an Economic Downturn

Give until it hurts. No matter what, you never know when you will need the goodwill you are banking in the next year.

When I give holiday tips, I think about the conveniences afforded me by those who receive my tips and their needs.
As a commercial tenant in a Manhattan building, I appreciate the guards, the handymen, the engineers. They direct my clients to my office, keep my building safe, clean my office, fix problems that arise.

I also appreciate my mail carrier, who often saves me trips to the post office to sign for packages and registered letters by leaving items with neighbors.

The number of hours of effort these people save me, and the fact that they are working hard for less money than I earn, is reason enough to give the same amount–or more–than last year.

If I had lost my job or experienced a significant loss in income this year, I might feel justified in offering a smaller tip, along with a card thanking the individual for their effort and a wish that next year be better for both of us.

Of course this isn’t tipping, but one area people tend to cut back on is tithing at their churches. Churches survive based on people’s generosity and discipline in giving each year. I agree with statement number 1 — give as if you have money to spare. The Lord will provide for your needs, He is simply asking you to help provide for others.

People who work in offices for various companies generally work 8 hours a day five days a week, often providing the same range of services to the same person/boss or group of people/bosses. Yet, many will not receive any year end bonus or gift in their workplace this year. Many non-executive office jobs don’t include year end bonuses period – it’s just not part of the compensation package. Still, these people are expected to give a year end bonus to service people in their personal life? I’m not talking about executive types with large salaries – I’m talking about the everyman type: secretaries, assistants, bookkeepers, etc… – people who are struggling just to keep the status quo on their fixed incomes in an economy where prices continue to rise for everything despite the recession.

While people in service industries may put in the same hours per week as their clients – the low level office workers – no individual service provider works 8 hours a day five days a week for any one client, the way that office workers put in days in the same group every day and will go home at the end of December this year with nothing extra. In this economy we should all be grateful that we have jobs at all and regular salaries.

So for the secretary or bookkeeper who is facing the same boss all day long 5 days a week, and getting no bonus, why should she/he have to dip into grocery/ConEd bill/metrocard money and tip someone who provides a service once a week? I’m talking about the person at the laundry, the do-nothing super of a rent stabilized building who ignores the one call per year you might make to him, the person who takes your order at the take-out place you use once a week… that type of thing, the occasional quick service situation that is within the definition of that person’s regular job, not an extra. People who serve you daily at length like nannies or housekeepers, or anyone who really spends a lot of time with you and has a relationship with you – of course you should tip. But most likely, low level office workers and retail store employees don’t have that kind of “staff” anyway.

It’s this group of low to mid earners who really get hit the worst at year end. We tend not to have bonus eligible jobs and in this economy any tips that may come from our bosses themselves personally will be lowered or non-existent, since even the executive bonuses are being trimmed or cut this year. It all trickles down.

Having said the above I will add that I am actually a generous tipper to a fault in terms of point of service transactions like tipping waiters and waitresses, cabdrivers, etc.. at the time of service in the course of regular business. But gift giving at the end of the year when it means dipping into basic needs funds, without a bonus of my own to take from – it’s not only a hardship but it just feels unfair.

Help!

This is my first holiday season as an office tenant in a Manhattan commercial building.

I just received the happy holiday note that conveniently names all the building workers — though it doesn’t say so directly, I assume the purpose of this is to tell you who to tip. I absolutely want to give them tips; the workers are great.
BUT – I have absolutely no idea what the protocol is. How much to give? (Obviously it varies, but I don’t even know how many zeros we’re talking about.) Do you give to each person listed, or just a lump sum to the doorman for him to divide? Any advise would be greatly appreciated.

I think that tipping has become absurd. The idea of tipping people who are getting paid to do a job is ridiculous to me. I understand a waiter who works for an artifically low wage–and that you simply dont go to most restaurants and help yourself. But to tip a doorman, who cant be fired , has a pension and is paid a salary with benefits–I really dont quite understand it. I pay an absurd about for monthly parking–and I dont drive an expensive car. I have to tip the people who are employed there expressly to park cars?

Holiday tipping is nothing but blackmail. and yes, I pay it–to people who make more money (a LOT more money–than I do. Otherwise the consequences can be very unpleasant. But I do draw a line–there is no way I’ll ever tip an employee of the US government.

Am I the only one who thought it was illegal for Post Office employees to receive cash gratuities?

Here’s the deal with the postman. Leave him a nice tip and he will come to the house and drop off the box and leave it on the covered porch. If I don’t tip the postman I will find the box in a puddle out on the road across the street. It’s as simple as that. This is fact.

In response to #11, — D Frankfurter, most doormen are paid $10 an hour, and expected to supplement their income with tips. Brush up on your facts before you stop tipping in industries that it is customary.

I’m surprised that neither the article nor the comments so far (save the one by the waiter) have really tackled the issue of the economics of the service industry and he role that year-end tips play in overall compensation.

This will be my 2nd holiday season living in a high-end “branded” full-service building (it’s part of a hotel complex). I was surprised — and not a little put off — at the large holiday fund box in the lobby of our building, the multiple email reminders (at least one a week for ~ 6 weeks starting in the middle of November) and the several notes slipped under the door reminding us that there was an opportunity to demonstrate our appreciation. I was equally surprised to be told when I inquired that the “traditional” contribution to the tip pool is one month’s condo fee (in our building that is no less than $1000 for any unit, and up to $3000 for the larger ones).

When I thought about it and did the math (let’s say labor cost is 50% of the total budget; that means that the tips are expected to equal fully 1/6th of each employee’s ordinary wages), it became obvious to me that far from being anything that could be reasonably described as “a little extra for good service”, those dollars are actually a significant part of the building staff’s total compensation for the year. Or, to put it another way, the management company that runs our building keeps their budget artificially low by leaning on the residents (some of whom are renters, by the way) to subsidize salaries with “tips.” It’s a smoke & mirrors approach to “efficiency & cost control.”

The thing that really bugs me about this is that because there are inevitably some percentage of my neighbors who contribute much less than their pro-rata (probably the same people who use to help themselves to our laundry soap before we stopped using the cubbyholes provided for storage), us nice guys end up subsidizing freeloaders. So, in addition to being an underhanded shell game w/the budget, it’s also guaranteed to be inequitable.

And, of course, we’re stuck. My wife and I are appreciative of the doormen & concierges, and are also cognizant of the fact that they’re at a lower wage scale than we are and therefore the dollars count much more for them than they do for us. But the whole thing ends feeling like a con job on the part of the management, and it’s hard to give cheerfully under those circumstances.

This is probably orthogonal to the conversation, but I guess the moral is that people need to know that in many situations (as with waitstaff), it’s not so much a “tip” as a baked-in piece of the economics of someone’s livelihood. Maybe it’s just my Obama-fever talking, but I feel as though if you’re fortunate enough to be in a position in which another human being is performing a valuable service, you have an obligation to understand how they survive, and to play ball.

Just my $.02

I am fortunate enough to still have my job (as does my husband) but do feel a bit nervous about the year ahead. However, I have always felt that the tip I give (to the security people in our office building, the people who help me succeed like marketing, assistants et, my hairdresser and super) is to say thank you for the past year.
I totally understand not giving as much if you have no job but a card with something homemade or even a bottle of wine is thoughtful.

so what do we think is an appropriate tip for apartment building staff? (i.e. doormen, maintenance, super). also, is it preferable to give a stack of cards, one for each employee with a crisp $xx bill in it, or a single tip for everyone?