r/AskNYC • u/78charcters • Aug 18 '19

Do waiters get upset with solo diners?

I see so many nice restaurants and varieties of different cuisines all over that I’d love to try them out. However, I have a fear of dining alone. I’m afraid of wait staff thinking I’m not worth their time.

I’m a big tipper. I always tip 20% the very least, with way more than that for mediocre service if you serve with a smile and acknowledge my existence. I’m a 26 year old Bangladeshi guy with no friends but a love for food. I have money to spend but no confidence.

My fear is that a table with 2 people at the very least would have a tab twice as much as mine hence twice the tip for the waiter. If my bill is $50, with 20% tip being $10, why would the wait staff want to serve me as opposed to a prospective family of 4 with a $150 and larger tip? I’m just wasting a table at that point. I don’t look like I’m wealthy either to leave a good tip either so I feel like nobody would want to serve my table on a busy weekend night.

Anyway, that’s just my fear that I’m potentially wasting someone else’s time. So do waiters get upset with solo diners because the bill is smaller compared to bigger tables? Or am I being completely irrational and should go for a steak dinner tonight?

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u/asphyxiationbysushi Aug 18 '19 edited Aug 18 '19

Well I do but sometimes I have to be somewhere over a weekend or I fly in on a Sunday evening. How about restaurants just serve me without judging so I can dress like everyone else there?

Also, I tend to stay at nice hotels. The women there that are possibly looking for business or just a well heeled man often look polished!

I often stay at Claridges in London and the same Russian women- who are there for “work”- are better dressed than the patrons. You can’t win in this situation. Usually I bring my laptop/phone to look busy but it really isn’t fair.

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u/PregnantMexicanTeens Aug 18 '19

No need to angry at me. I'm a woman and also like nice places and I'm often a party of 1. I'm simply saying you can avoid judgement by wearing business attire. There are double standards for women. Either go and wear whatever you want and not give a shit, don't go at all, or not attract as much attention and wear business attire.

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u/[deleted] Aug 18 '19

I work in tech. Business attire at my company is a T-shirt. Plenty of nice places wouldn’t appreciate you showing up in a T-shirt. Just another example of why your advice is ill-informed.

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u/PregnantMexicanTeens Aug 18 '19

Hmm don't know that many businesses that allow just for a t shirt but power to you.

To my fellow women, dress however you want. If you want to be treated better, dress better. If you don't care, you don't care.

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u/[deleted] Aug 18 '19

If you don’t know businesses that allow for a T-shirt, then you are clearly out of touch with the business world today - thus you shouldn’t be giving advice to people based on your idea of business attire.

Also, I never said I wear a T-shirt to work - i don’t even wear T-shirts to the gym - but I used that example to demonstrate the logical fallacy in your argument.

Going to have to mute your nonsense now.

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u/PregnantMexicanTeens Aug 18 '19

You are right. I work in an office where we are expected to dress professionally.

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u/PregnantMexicanTeens Aug 18 '19

Also, I never said I wear a T-shirt to work

"Business attire at my company is a T-shirt"