Let me conclude then:
Belgian Pie, Uncle Bob, the chibber and others include it in their prices which is fine, we follow the other 99% and add it. Think the end result counts and we are in Taiwan. No, it has nothing to do with the taxes. We do pay our staff well above average as it is which they deserve. Still not made it to the Lexus or Benz, still relying on that 282 bus in the morning. Remember that during my last visit to the bush land, got the bill, paid, left some bills as tips, waiter just stood there and when I asked what the matter was the puff said that it should be at least 15%. Different countries different customs.
Simple enough - I do not patronize houses that decide they are entitled to add a “service charge” to their bill of fare.
It is their right to do so, and my right to not patronize those houses who feel entitled to add this extra charge to their tab.
Caveat emptor.
Warning, this is a rambling diatribe of inconsistent wisdom. 
I’m mixed on this issue.
For one, I hate to pay a service charge.
Ironically, if there is no service charge put against my bill, I’ll typically end up giving a tip of much more than 10%. In the States now, 20% is considered normal for good service.
On the other hand, for some staff (such as Johnny at the Tavern - one of the best bar staff member in Taiwan) I’ll pay the 10% plus I give them a tip. ??? And also to Sylvia at Carnegies with no 10% service but still offers great, expedient, and friendly service. They are both exceptional.
Anyway, I’m not going to complain too much. I know it is a pain to add “service” to the bill, but if you don’t want to pay an extra tip, just don’t. Consider yourself lucky to get off with a 10% “tip”. It is still less than you would pay “back home”.
Don’t get me wrong, I wish there was no service charge and no tipping and the owners made the staff happy with their money. But I don’t see that happening. I feel tipping should be for exceptional service. Unfortunately, in many countries tipping is expected. At least in Taiwan, a tip is considered “above and beyond” what is expected from a patron.
However, I’m leaning to the side where the price due is the price shown. I don’t care so much about the price. Just put it out there. If I want it. I will pay it. If I don’t, I won’t.
Interestingly, I’ve had friends in the States that made substantially more in tips than they made with their salary.
Be that as it may, 10% is still less than you are going to pay in most countries at a restaurant you will return to.
As a customer, I think you just have to think of the total cost of your dining experience. Is it worth it or not? 10% may seem like a lot but overall may not be an issue depending on your satisfaction.
If I get home smiling and happy, an extra NT$100 (or $500 
) is worth it. Isn’t it?
Be careful with that remark TC.
[color=red][b]I do not believe in service charges; never have. Our selling prices are based on the cost of the food, a fixed ‘percentage cost of sales’ calculation and what we regard as a workable and reasonable margin. To imply that I would follow that and then add 10% and therefore somehow, cynically, hide a service charge in the selling price and then present this establishment as a place that has ‘no service charge’ is very, very false and more than a little insulting. DO NOT assert that I do something that I don’t.
I have never considered a service charge and the whole 10% thing never has and does not factor into any of our cost calculations at all. Ever![/b][/color]
I am not going to get into an online pissing match here but I do take exception to the implication that somehow we bury a service charge into our selling price. That is pure bollocks and if anyone has any doubts about my feelings on the matter, let there be none now. If other establishments want to do it then that is their business. It is not how I do things here and a trawl through other posts of mine on the subject will confirm my strongly held convictions on the subject. I stand by my principles and will defend them to the hilt.
More than a little annoyed TC; I had latterly held you to a highter standard than that which your statement demonstrates and certainly not one which would attach my name to a practice which I firmly don’t believe in. You are entitled to believe what you wish but do not present your belief in such a way so it reads as fact to the browser.
If you were to withdraw your assertion that I somehow factor into the selling price of food and drink, a hidden service charge and thereby insinuate some degree of dishonesty on my part, then I will edit this post accordingly.
Bob
Late/early one my friend! Come on, I really do not give a flying f… (as you would put it), how other establishments calculate their prices, wether they factor any sort of charges in or out of their prices. Certainly not intending to accuse anybody of any wrong doings and do not think I have, reading my posts on the subject.
Exactly. And I, as a customer, should be able to choose for myself if a tip is warranted.
When I go to Vegas I like giving the waitress a large initial tip at the beginning and tell her, “Keep those drinks flowing and there will be another tip to match this one at the end of the night”. Helps insure getting good and greased while I flush my money down the toilet. 
Absolutely nothing to do with drink. I was perfectly lucid at the time of posting having just finished working. A look at the structure of the post and the better than average grammar should indicate that I was in no way inebriated. I was however, annoyed.
TC, if you wish to reach ‘conclusions’ by all means do so but have the decency not to attach my name to them. Speak generically and speak of other establishments by all means but you have no basis on reaching the conclusion you did; you made an emphatic assertion that I take exception to.
Earlier in the day, I had had an offline discussion with a mod when he too worded his post in such a way as to be misleading and at least I had the circumspection and respect to refrain from chiming in with my view when the subject of service charges was conjoined with a thread about one of your establishments. That mod’s subsequent clarification of his earlier statement can be read above. Indeed, to further emphasise my point, I would ask that mod to post my PM to him in full in this thread. In it my views are clear and unequivocal.
If I had a ‘conclusion’ to reach about how you structure your pricing, then I would keep it to myself for, as you accurately state, I don’t generally give a “flying f**k” how other establishments do it or even particularly what they do beyond deriving, on occasion, mild amusement from my own privately-held conclusions on how others choose to operate.
All that I ask is that you refrain from inaccurately using my name when forming a conclusion or at the very least refer to a fellow F & B establishment in a generic form. That is all.
Anyway, fancy a beer? I haven’t had a drink in days.
Bob
You should run for office my friend! Do not be so bloody sensitive, you know I respect you for how you run your business. Yes could do, will ring you after office hours.
Please note: My involvement in this thread is as a poster, not a mod. Here is the PM in it’s entirety:
[quote=“In a PM to Truant, Bob”]Truant,
Have to mildly take you to task on the implication that if the service charge were deducted, then that 10% would find its way back into the price of a meal. By extension, that would also imply that when we settled on selling prices and not charging 10% we somehow factored that in. This is not the case and your post, if read backwards would seem to imply that that is how it works. Not the case; we simply work out the cost of the meal, work within a ‘percentage cost of sales’ framework and fix a price based on the cost and a reasonable margin. The 10 % service charge is never considered at any point nor is it tacked on to the end of the above. I don’t believe in at all and I wouldn’t be so cynical as to sneakily bury it somewhere. Ergo, the supposition that we don’t charge a service charge because it is somehow buried in the price of the meal is incorrect and unfortunately, that is how your post reads.
I didn’t want to put this in the thread as the thread is Capone’s domain so to speak and my posting there could have been misinterpreted. Additionally it opens the door for those who may wish to demand that we reduce our prices because we added 10% in to the price of the meal and that is why we don’t charge it.
The reason I don’t do it is to simply iincentivize staff into providing genuinely good service and allow the consumer to determine what level of reward if any is to be given based on their own level if satisfaction.
Seems to work well in Carnegie’s and certainly does away with complacency on the part of staff thinking that no matter what they will get a tip.
Feel free to post this PM if you wish but please acknowledge that this was a PM.
Cheers mate and all the best for Christmas!
Bob[/quote]
Truant,
Duly noted and my apologies for the misrepresentation. Unintentional, I can assure you and not designed to seek a ‘political’ advantage over the direction of the thread. Sorry.
Best Regards,
Bob
P.S. In my PM. I meant to say “of” satisfaction, not “if”: a typo.
Uncle Bob for President!
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again; I personally HATE service charges. Not because I mind paying more, but because I do not like thinking something is one price and then finding out it is another (even if it is only slightly more).
It also leads to a lot of confusion. Here are two examples in which I was personally involved recently:
[forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.ph … rge#434218](Guinness draught from ireland available from wed. oct. 5th
forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.ph … rge#436619
In the first one, the price was quoted as 450NT$ (not even a mention of a service charge). However, when I came to pay, there was an additional 10%. In the second one, the price was ALSO 450NT$, and there was no mention of a service charge. I had to ask several times to make sure it was ACTUALLY 450NT$. That’s what I mean by confusion.
Incidentally, whether 450NT$ or 495NT$ they were both exceptional value for money, but I hope it’s clear that that’s not the issue here.
Also, I agree with bob that service staff should not be led to believe that they are going to get 10% no matter how crap they are. There’s the reason why tips came to be. They were (and should still be) a reward for work well done. Otherwise, a compulsory 10% (in my opinion) is not a tip, but us paying the staff’s WAGES, which in my opinion should just be factored into the cost.
Hats off to tpebob for his stand on this.
I always assume the 10% goes into the owner’s pocket and I am always right and it is always just a way to make things seem cheaper than they are and only hotels, airlines, and restaurants are allowed to do it.
You can’t have the thing without the “service”. Therefore it should be acceptable to print:
Steak and Chips
NT$1.00 + 120% sales, goods, and administration fee charge, +90% amortization of goodwill relating to initial purchase of restaurant charge, +60% allocation of fixed asset depreciation expense charge, +230% raw material direct cost charge, +120% allocation of specific staff overhead charge, +30% it’s Christmas charge, +12.9% that new car’s not bloody paid for yet charge
and so on
Do I really need to get into how any restaurant or bar allocates its revenues? Do I give a shit? No. How much is the fucking meal? There you are. Done.
I don’t see anyone quoting “NT$1,300 plus 160% mark-up charge” or “NT$1,300 plus 80% putting-it-on-a-plate charge” but a “service charge” is just as much a nonsense as that
“I’ll have mine without the service please.”
“OK, Sir. Here’s a rifle, the field’s over there. Aberdeen Angus was it, sir? It’s the big hairy thing with the horns. No, sir, that’s the manager. Left a bit. Got it.”
You see? This is what we’re up against? “Back home”. For Newbies, “back home” means “how they do it in the USA”.
Aargh! :taz:
:soapbox: The day anyone is the US or Europe or anywhere else is asked for US$8.00 for a beer and then asked for an extra 80 cents on top of that :fume: for No Reason Whatsoever Other Than The Proprietor is Too Chicken to Write US$8.80 Because Everyone Else Writes US$8, 
is the day I join al Kai-EEEDA :raspberry: and make the extermination of Western Civilisation and all it stands for my life’s work. :grrr:
[I’m going to hanging upside down from a light bulb in Aboo Gra-EEEEEB for that comment, even though it’s just a joke please mister CIA agent, don’t renditionalise me! 
] 
What Miranda says. I want to see the total price, the price that I pay, not some intermediate price.
I don’t care how you calculate the price you charge, you have to take into account wages, decorations, taxes, mercedes contributions and whatnot, and you come up with a total price that people are prepared to pay and makes you lots of dosh. Just tell me the final price.
What if 7-11 put one price on all their stuff, then added 10% service charge when you paid ? You could find it a bit dishonest. Same in restaurants when the menu says $500NT then charges you $550NT. if it costs $550, then say $550. If it’s traditional, then it’s a tradition then needs to be changed. Expecting tips is extremely rude too, even more dishonest than “service charges”
Uncle Bob, you are a General Manager and therefore I assume and this without any pre justice, you were not the target and therefore it is not a requirement to post that it could be that you were falsly being put in the fireing line for no wrong doing from your side.
An interesting thread on service charges. I love Miranda’s take on it. I wish the proprietors would simply include the 10% in the price. I used to believe the service staff were getting this money, until one night at Ruth’s Chris a server stuck his neck out and told me otherwise.
That’s what I posted before … many of the establishments in Taiwan add a service charge … this goes in the bosses’ pockets to buy the big new lexus … that’s why service in Taiwan sucks basically … there is no incentive to give good service if you get paid a lousy wage … and tipping is not done mostly, only by foreigners … depending on which country they come from tho …
That’s what I posted before … many of the establishments in Taiwan add a service charge … this goes in the bosses’ pockets to buy the big new lexus … that’s why service in Taiwan sucks basically … there is no incentive to give good service if you get paid a lousy wage … and tipping is not done mostly, only by foreigners … depending on which country they come from tho …[/quote]
Agreed. The staff are getting stiffed. I was fooled into thinking it was a charge in lieu of tipping–at least that is what such a charge would be where I come from.
I have a question for Tpe Bobby. If I want to tip one of your girls for great service, is there any difference if I write the tip on the credit card form versus leaving it at the table. In other words if I tip off the credit card, do you have a system in place so that my server gets her due and knows who gave it to her? I usually leave it on the table but dont always have small bills on me.
Ah, but there’s a service charge.
HG