At the risk of being a curmudgeon, I need to rant about tipping with regard to carry out food orders.
When we carry out from someplace that has sit down dining, where I would tip the server at the end of the meal, I add a tip to the carry out order. If it is a fast food place where I wouldn’t leave a tip even if I ate there, I don’t leave a tip.
So, Panera Bread, no tip. Olive Garden, tip.
The problem with this is the order of events. When you have a sit down meal in the restaurant, you have the entire experience before the bill comes and before you leave a tip. You can adjust the amount however you want. When you carry out the food the bill, and tip, are collected ahead of time. With the advent of curbside pickup at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, paying and tipping, before even getting the bag of food, meant you were tipping for an unknown quality of service.
Tonight, for example, I tipped for an incorrect order. One meal was correct and the other wasn’t. Thanks to summer road construction it is a 40 minute round trip. So I opted for a credit on my card, and had a frozen meal from the freezer.
My solution is to stop using curbside pickup. And I’ll stop paying in advance. I’ll go into the restaurant to collect the order, and inspect it on the spot. Then I’ll pay and tip. If the online order process forces me to pay ahead of time, I simply won’t tip.
It’d be better if American restaurants paid a decent wage and didn’t force wait staff to hustle for tips to offset the miserly hourly wage. That is a cultural change I doubt will happen anytime soon.