> > I'm going to Germany for a few weeks (we leave Thursday) with my German class, and my teacher says that in Germany you don't pay the tip in the sense that you leave a percentage of money on the table when you go, but rather that it's included in the bill. Which, in my opinion, is stupid.
>
> How is this different from the restaurant simply paying them a proper salary in the first place? Those costs would still come through to the customer in the form of higher prices for food.

When we were in France, the service charges were included, and we usually still left extra money, mostly because my mother and I have both waited tables for a living. When we left the hotel, we left the equivalent of about $30 for a week's stay for the housekeeping staff -- we could hear the woman who went in to clean our room shrieking with delight from the lobby. The funny thing was, we felt we were getting off easy, because even though we were leaving some money, we weren't leaving what would be considered GOOD tips in the States. And because the people we were leaving tips for weren't accustomed to it, they were very appreciative and we were treated very, very well at any place we went to more than once.

Mou"worth it, to us"sie