Had a discussion with the guys at work about tipping your barber. Place up the road from work that I go to in lunchtimes charges £9 to cut my hair, one guy at work thinks I should be rounding this up to a tenner. In fact he thought I was being rude by not tipping him anything.

My view is that if they want me to pay a tenner they should charge a tenner. I’d still pay the tenner but that’s not what they charge at the moment.

Am I being the most rude person by not rounding up or am I normal by not doing this? Do you to your hairdresser/barber?

My old man always said, if they are round the back of your head with something really sharp; tip them.

Mines usually £8 rounded up to a tenner. Not sure what I will do when they put the prices up?

I tend to tip mine a Quid or two, but it’s only £7.50 at the Head Office in Leeds. 🙂

Yep, I get my hair cut 3 times/year in a mates salon and usually tip £5 for the girls who wash it before my mate cuts it

£9 but I just hand them a tenner.

Other barber nearby is £11 which is a PITA and my thinking is that as long as people keep giving the £9 barber £10 he won’t put his prices up to £10 as some kind of gentleman’s agreement. He gets what he really wants and I get to say “keep the change”*.

*I don’t really say that phrase

I used to round up to a tender when it was 9 quid, now it’s 9:50 it felt mean to only tip 50p so I no longer tip.

Very British problems

Anyone you trust enough to have steel at your throat is worth tipping. End of.

I’m a structural engineer but no one tips me so their house/industrial shed/Dr surgery doesn’t fall down!

Some of you guys are paying c.125% of the advertised fee, do you over pay for everything you buy or service you receive?

Yup round it up to £10 but it would cost £7. The barber gets the £3 not the owner, I don’t tip the owner when she cuts it, if it was £10 that would be for other costs not just for cutting my hair.

I tip my hairdresser at Christmas – same for the other people who do things regularly for me (window cleaner, gardener, postie and the bin-men … oh and the estate managers office.)

Sure, 33% tip, every time, about once a month.

I buzz my own hair. Window cleaner charges £9 and I give him 10. On the day he announces it’s now 11 quid we may have to work out a Christmas tip arrangement!

Thinking about it, 9 quid is ridiculously cheap for my mock-Tudor gin palace.

I tip the girls who wash it beforehand because my mate will always fit me in at very short notice for a cut whenever I want despite their being a 4week wait for an appointment with him, I can get a decent espresso or beer or glass (or two/three) of champagne whilst I get my hair cut which takes an hr so I often leave slightly the worse for wear but with the sort of haircut that even I have to admit is a damn fine looking cut that is only let down by the person modelling it

I don’t tip for a few reasons
1. It’s the guys own business rather than some minimum wage employee
2. I pay with a card which never feels right if you add a tip. Where does it go?
3. I am loyal to them, I think repeat business is worth more.

I live in the UK

I tip when I feel it (whatever if is) deserves a tip

I was in New York in November , ate in TGI Fridays on 5th Ave. food was slow and when it finally did arrive, cold, I thought it didn’t deserve a tip but that was not an option.
I won’t eat in TGI Fridays again anywhere in the world

#hair washing, book an appointment 4 weeks in advance? Champagne?

Is this you?

Nope. I get a 3 all over, takes about 10 mins & costs £6.50. In fact she tips me by sticking a tit in my ear once in a while.

I’ve had the same bloke cut my hair every month for the past 22 years (I know it’s this long because he started working at the barbers next to the sport shop I worked in when I was at school). He’s a mate though, we used to go out drinking and more recently we go out riding together. Seems weird that I’d tip a mate, so I don’t.

😀 , nah, I have much better hair than that ^. And I don’t book weeks in advance, I usually phone up in the morning and say to him I need a haircut today

Yes

she tips me by sticking a tit in my ear

Sounds good? Can you hear the milk?

Barbers, Waiters, Bell Hops, yes.
Pilot, Check Out Staff, Dentist, no.
It’s a minefield!

I’ve tried tipping Mrs Dingo when she cuts my hair,but she says we do “quite enough of that sort of thing anyway!”

My best mate cuts mine and still charges me so he can whistle for a tip 😆

I don’t tip for a few reasons
1. It’s the guys own business rather than some minimum wage employee

Where I go the guys who aren’t the owners aren’t employees, they are self employed and rent the chair for a fixed fee so all haircut fees are a profit for them. The owner is the one who pays the bills for the building/shop so from my point of view, all the barbers have to pay out money, just the owner does it in a different way to the others.

Last time I gave a barber a tip the horse came in last …

Yep, £8 for the cut, £10 paid. He does a good job, seems a nice guy and I know full well he’s not exactly rich either. £10 to be made to look semi-respectable for 6 weeks or so seems like a bargain to me.

Always a tenner.

I’m a structural engineer but no one tips me so their house/industrial shed/Dr surgery doesn’t fall down!

Some of you guys are paying c.125% of the advertised fee, do you over pay for everything you buy or service you receive?

explains everything, you needn’t have bothered with all the rest.

I let myself know what a great job I’ve done…

No. I’m paying for a service and they supply it at an agreed price. Same for restaurants. I’m already paying extra for the service and they should do it well. Really don’t get bellboy tipping either. Their job is to carry your bag, do you tip if they do that particularly well?

I’m a structural engineer so have littl capacity for abstract thought

Mine charges £4. Cheapest in town by miles. I round it up to a fiver.

Used to use one that was £9. It wasn’t twice as good. They seemed surprised I took the change.

Normally tip, 11/12 or something and I round it up to 15.

Which is a decent tip, but if they do a good cut and are happy to cut in silence if I feel like sitting in silence, it’s worth it. Also it genuinely seems to slightly surprise them, as I’m tipping slightly more than most I think. In generally it costs little to be a “good” tipper and makes someone’s day a little brighter – so why not?

Of course, only wish each visit cost me a tenner.

I dont normally tip anyone but barbers seem to structure their pricing to be £8 or in my case £13 including a shave so waiting for the £2 back seems churlish. Car wash places also do this IME.

£13 but I give them £15

£8 – no tip. Just never even occurred to me TBH. I’m not a bad tipper in restaurants usually either. In general I think tipping should be phased out and people should be paid properly in the first place.

For better or worse I judge people mostly on how they they treat people with less power than themselves.

No. I’m paying for a service and they supply it at an agreed price. Same for restaurants. I’m already paying extra for the service and they should do it well.

the people actually doing the job often/mostly have no control at all over the “agreed price”. If I use a restaurant and it’s food is good, and the service is quick and the server happy, I’ll mostly tip pretty well, as I’m likely to go back. They’ll remember me as a good customer, and I’ll get good service, so I’ll tip well…and so it goes.

For better or worse I judge people mostly on how they they treat people with less power than themselves.

The owner/barber who cuts my hair doesn’t really have less power than me though does he?

Just gone up from £7 to £8 and I always give him £1 and make the same old joke: “This can go towards the coffee machine for your regulars!”

One of the regular barbers has just moved to Preston – HMP Kirkham actually, ten months for biting his partner’s cheek in a fight as they emerged from a club. I always thought him a bit odd.