Hacker News Reader

Comment by boring_twenties | Hacker News Reader

Just anecdotes, but I've lived in the US pretty much my entire life, and I don't think I've ever had truly bad service here. Maybe five times ever it's been subpar enough to tip 15% instead of my usual 20%, but certainly never worse than that.

Meanwhile, in the few months I've cumulatively spent in Europe, outside of Italy, almost all service was dramatically worse than this, and on quite a few occasions so bad I could probably make pretty good comedy sketches out of them. The only real exceptions have been family-run places and very expensive ones.

In Italy on the other hand service has been as good as or even better than back home.

View on HN

European* idea of good service: take my order, serve me good food, accept my payment, otherwise leave me alone to talk with my friends. (*: can vary highly from one country to another.)

American idea of good service: promptly bring me water, promptly ask what I'd like to drink, serve drink quickly, promptly take my order, promptly serve my food, continuously check in to see if everything is ok, expect a tip.

Cultures are just a natural insult to each other. There is no real way to say, please check in on me more often to a European (their pay doesn't depend on it, they might humor you, but probably not). There is really no way to say, please leave me alone, without being insulting or not taken seriously.

Any idea of good service is heavily biased by norms of what service means in the first place. Some people will grow up with one sense of norm and immediately take to the other when experiencing it. Generally though, people growing up with one set of norms finds the other set obnoxious.

I mean, I had to literally get up and find our waitress in Slovenia because we’d been sitting there ready to go for 20 minutes. She was sitting inside. I’ll take being bugged occasionally anytime.

Not to mention in Europe you need to conserve you drink like it’s the last water in the world.

In the Netherlands we had to find the hostess chatting in the back just to be seated.

Then after waiting like 10 minutes we had to find her chatting in the back again to ask for menus.

Sounds like you are comparing the experiences of an American eating out in America with the experiences of an American dining in foreign countries.

Some of your experiences were negative, and others positive. But none of your foreign data used a native diner, so, it’s difficult to correlate the results with the topic of this discussion, which is about the effect of tipping on service.

When I visited Taiwan service was universally excellent, far beyond what I am accustomed to in the US. Tipping is also not a thing. A friend of mine tried to leave a tip and the barista chased us two blocks down the road to return his “lost” cash.

Same here in Japan: generally phenomenal service, no tipping. Even the convenience store staff and McDonald's drive-thru staff are exceptional.

I've lived in Asia long enough that I hate eating out in the States when I return, with the silly expectation of tacking an extra 15% onto my bill just for the staff to do their job.

Different places have different definitions of good service. For me good service is a server that is there quickly to take my order, brings food at when it's ready (bringing all dishes at the same time unless requested otherwise), realizes when I'm looking to pay the bill, and otherwise is nowhere near the table. Being able to answer questions about items in the menu is also good, though I don't often need this. In my (very limited) experience in the US, I found that servers talk too much (making suggestions or even small talk), they keep showing up asking if I need anything, refilling my glass unprompted, and felt generally phony in their demeanor. I found it very awkward and would not define it as "good".

That said, I have occasionally had bad service in Europe, usually in the form of it being very difficult to flag a waiter when I need something.

> they keep showing up asking if I need anything, refilling my glass unprompted

Generally in the US these kinds of things are “mandated” by management or corporate offices, especially in retail stores and chain restaurants.

When I worked in retail I HATED bothering people who seemed like they were fine browsing without any help. But of course one time someone complained because they weren’t greeted within 3 seconds and didn’t receive white glove service, so at the door greetings and constant check ins became the standard practice even when most people don’t care.

Expectations/norms are different across the world, even across Europe, so poor service to you might be seen as excellent service to a local. Everyone warned me before I went to Paris about rude and inattentive waiters. All the service mostly seemed normal to me though.

More than a country vs country thing, though, I've noticed poorer service in super touristy areas that vacationers might tend to gravitate towards (even in my home city). The worst experience I had in Paris was near the Eiffel Tower. I can venture a few guesses as to why, entitled vacationers making demands that suck up more than their fair share of the waiter's time, unfamiliarity with the local cuisine leading to misunderstandings, pressure from managers to turn tables over too frequently, etc.

But again, this is all anecdotal. :)

As a British person I can't even get a glass of water from US waiters!

But what do you want from service? It's probably vastly different from what Europeans want from service. European service isn't 'bad' it's just not what you're used to. US service seems 'bad' to Europeans - it's intrusive, nosey, and rude to us.

> As a British person I can't even get a glass of water from US waiters!

Really? I'm curious what the breakdown is there. In most US restaurants you'll be asked almost immediately what you'd like to drink and then they typically keep it filled.

It’s a joke - they never understand the pronunciation ‘water’ it baffles them - you have to put on an American accent and say ‘warder’ and then they understand.

There’s a very substantial cultural difference between the US and Europe when it comes to service expectations. Trying to rate European service against US expectations is always going to result in disappointment.

Personally I hate it when servers loiter around, or intrude during a meal. Outside of ordering my food, and having it arrive on the table, I don’t even want to know the wait staff are there. Some conversation and pointers on the menu are always nice, if I’ve asked, and having empty dishes vanish without any fuss is also good. But beyond that, I’ll indicate if I want wait staff attendance, hate it when they try to preempt me.

I actually dislike a lot of service in the US, not because it is slow or anything, but because it often makes me feel really uncomfortable.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com