I’m going to take a less popular stance here. [Note that I am not condoning what the guests did. But I see their point.]
You’re at a restaurant and you wait an hour for your food. Where is the manager in all this? There comes a time when the manager should have been visiting each table and apologizing and bringing something (free appetizer, drink, whatever) to the tables affected.
The guests are expected to pay the menu price for the food, no matter how long they wait. Restaurants don’t give discounts for slow service. The only variable cost – honestly, the only way to show your displeasure – is to reduce the tip – because the menu price is fixed.
As the guest, NOT leaving a tip was the only recourse they had. Now, you can argue that they should have left 10% or 5% or something in between as opposed to 0% – but that’s just a matter of degree. The fact is that the server always gets screwed – that’s how America operates its restaurants.
So my conclusions are:
- the restaurant’s manager did not do his job – at all.
– the server assumed everything was fine, when it was not
– the guests were rude (the LOL was over the top) but justified in a reduced or non-existent tip
If there were a better way to show displeasure at a restaurant, then I’d be all in favor if it. But until there is such a way, this is what happens.,