Pizza Guy Gets 10 Bucks on $1500 Order… Gets Kicked ‘Night in the Ruts’

Ok fine, he wasn't kicked in the nuts... but he may as well have been! (Also, I like Aerosmith) Anyway, new trend on the internet is sparking daily debates and I feel it's time to share my thoughts on this issue. If you're ever on the popular social networking site known as Reddit, you may know what I'm talking about...

Servers, delivery drivers, and anyone who works primarily for tips are speaking their minds. As a former pizza delivery driver, I can completely level with this story. A customer ordered 85 large pizzas, which totaled to $1,453.93. As you can imagine the internet did what the internet does best, debate. At first, I was torn on this issue, but I think I've finally made up my mind on whose side I'm on.

Here's what we don't know... The distance the driver had to travel, if the driver's tips are divided among the cooks (depending on the pizza place sometimes they are and sometimes their not), if the driver in fact had to cook the food, and what kind of car the driver is using. All these factors play into why the driver should be tipped his fair share.

Now let's look at this in the eyes of the customer. Pizza isn't a cheap party food. Paying almost 1,500 dollars to feed what I assume is a convention hall full of people is a lot to spend. Not to mention, a 20% tip on $1,453.93 is roughly $290. Even if this person was just outside of the usual delivery route, and the delivery guy was driving a Hummer H2, there's no way it cost him more than 7 or 8 dollars in gas. (No math was done to come up with the gas figures, just FYI.) The only extra work the driver probably had to do was perhaps make a few trips between his car and the building.

Now, that's just how the people who ordered the food normally look at it. SO, without knowing how tips are divided, who cooks the food, the distance of the customer and the type of vehicle, there's only one fair answer to this debate. The driver should have gotten more than 10 dollars, but NOT the full 20%. Tipping 20% depends on SO many factors when you're eating out... It's just a guideline, not a legal obligation. I'm a firm believer that if you can't afford to tip, you can't afford to eat out. These people could clearly afford to eat out, but maybe they were on a budget. At least they gave him SOMETHING. I use to jump for joy when I got a 10 dollar tip!

The most I would have given this driver is 50 dollars. That's more than enough to cover gas, and even split it between some of the cooks. BAM, debate over. I have spoken!