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BGonline.org Forums
Tipping etiquette...
Posted By: Jake Jacobs In Response To: Tipping etiquette... (Timothy Chow)
Date: Friday, 9 December 2011, at 5:38 a.m.
"Every other passenger" meant non-seniors. Mr. 665 Thacker was justifying his non-tipping because he was a commuter, and what I told him was that the folks getting off the 6:07 train, or the ones arriving at O'Hare were also commuting to and from jobs, but they (not quite) "all" tipped. Seniors were on average terrible tippers. There were other stereotypes that tended to run true - on average. Keeping in mind that this was forty years ago, as a group women tipped less than men, unless they were waitresses or bartenders (or cab drivers), and then they were great. Black's tipped very poorly, but we had one regular (brush with fame, his girlfriend's brother, a friend of mine back then, is Madonna's keyboard player) who managed a bar on Rush Street, and he tipped well. Mexicans, when they first arrived didn't tip at all, but since most IIs back then worked as bus boys and dishwashers, once they started working in a restaurant they were really good tippers. The Filipina nurses never tipped, nor did the Kuwaitis attending Northwestern to get degrees in Law Enforcement.
As a pizza driver I averaged about 10% of the cost of the order; the average order was five bucks, and I'd make the fifty cent delivery charge, and a fifty cent tip. On week nights I averaged slightly more than thirty deliveries for seven hours on Wednesday. (I didn't count arriving half an hour early to be sure I got the oven I preferred, not the time after midnight finishing the last run and checking out.) After buying three bucks worth of gas that was about $4.25 an hour. Sundays I averaged closer to 35 deliveries. We were open until 1 a.m. on Saturday, and I averaged just over forty deliveries. It varied a bit by season, but I almost never had to rely on the guaranteed $2.00 (plus tips) an hour. My best night I ran 53 deliveries, 24 of them between 7-9:30. Considering the sprawling territory we covered, some of the furthest deliveries were more than four miles from the kitchen, and taking into account the three different freight lines crisscrossing the town, that was flying! The best tip I ever got was about five dollars, but that was for over fifty bucks worth of pizzas - I had to take two ovens for that run.
As a cab driver we made 40% of the meter, later raised to 45% by seniority. The company paid all expenses including gas. Flag drop was $.60, plus $.10 each 1/6 mile, plus $.10 a minute waiting time (but that accumulated, so that if its gear was moving faster than the mileage gear, for instance in heavy traffic, it would up the fare). Extra passengers were twenty cents piece, and we were allowed to pocket the extras. Tips for me averaged 20% of the fare. They varied widely by fare, but at the end of the night it was fairly consistent. In the summer, if it wasn't raining, I would struggle to make four bucks an hour. In bad weather six or seven was the average for a night. During a good rush hour I could book as much as $15-$20 an hour, which translates to $9-$12 for me. Given the traffic in rush hour, especially if it was snowing, that was flying!
My best fare was $130 plus a $25 dollar tip. It took me eight hours, and among other things I had to register the passenger in college (and, as it turned out, loan him the cash for the registration), and find him an apartment, one that had to be within walking distance of the campus. It was a very interesting day.
My best tip was $41.25 on an $11.75 fare. That was also an interesting story.
Very soon after starting work there, I learned how to dispatch, and within two months was driving three nights, driving part-time Friday and Saturday, and then dispatching the rest of those nights. After a year and a half I became the night manager and spent most of my time in the office. I negotiated a salary, $6.00 an hour, that I believed to be the highest for any dispatcher in Chicago at that time, at least for a non-owner. I had a couple of offers for quite a bit more, but for various reasons turned them down.
If I had to guess, I would say that the highest earning driver we had made between fifteen and twenty thousand a year in the early seventies. He drove days, started at five and drove until six, Monday through Saturday. However in the late seventies the drivers working in Vegas were making fifty grand a year, and if they worked for the largest company, Whittlesea Bell, they belonged to the Teamsters, and got full union benefits.
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