The art of tipping: Listen to 6 Minute English - YouTube
Catherine: Hello. This is 6 Minute English
and I'm Catherine.
Sam: And I'm Sam.
Catherine: Sam, how do you feel about
tipping?
Sam: Tipping? You mean giving extra
money to people
in certain jobs for doing their jobs?
Catherine: Well, I wouldn't put it quite like that.
But yes, it's giving money to waiters and
waitresses, hairdressers, taxi drivers -
money that is more than the actual bill.
Sam: It's a nightmare! I never know who
to tip, how to tip, by cash or by card, how
much to tip – is it 10, 12.5, 20 per cent or
even if I should tip at all because in some
places a service charge is automatically
added to the bill.
Catherine: Yes, tipping is a really
complicated issue
which we will be looking at in this
programme.
But to start with, a question. What is the
biggest tip that we know somebody gave?
Is it… A: $10,000, is it… B: $250,000,
or is it… C: $3,000,000?
What do you think, Sam?
Sam: I'm going to go for $250,000.
Catherine: OK, we'll find out if you're right
at the end of the programme. Now, back
to the topic of tipping and in particular,
tipping people who work in restaurants.
William Beckett runs a number of
restaurants and he recently
appeared on the BBC Food Programme.
He was asked about his view of tipping.
Now as we hear him, listen out for this
information. In how many cities does he
say he currently has restaurants?
William Beckett: It is cultural, i.e. it differs
from place to place. We have restaurants
in London, we have a restaurant in
Manchester, we're also opening a
restaurant in New York and those
three cities have quite different attitudes
to tipping. In London, the norm is, it's
there, it's on your bill. That's not the
norm, for example, in Manchester and it's
not the norm in New York where we're
going to open a restaurant later this year.
Catherine: So, first, how many cities does
he currently have restaurants in?
Sam: That would be two. London and
Manchester.
He's going to open one in New York later
in the year, but it's not open yet.
Catherine: And what does he say about
tipping?
Sam: Well, he says that it is very cultural.
What is the norm in one city is not
necessarily the norm in another. 'The
norm' is an expression
that means, as you might guess, 'what is
normal, what is usual'.
Catherine: So in London, for example, a
service charge is usually added to the bill,
but in Manchester it isn't. So the policy in
London and Manchester differs which
means, again as you might guess,
it's different.
Sam: There's another short expression
that he used that I'd like to highlight.
Before he talks about how the policies
differ, he says 'i.e'. These two letters stand
for the Latin phrase 'id est'. Now we never
say ‘id est' but we do write and say 'i.e'. We
use it to show that what comes next is using
different words to say what we have just
said or written. So he says, about tipping,
'it's cultural' i.e. it differs from place to
place. ‘It's cultural' is a more general
statement and ‘it differs from place to
place' is a more specific definition of what
he means.
Catherine: So, one difference is that in
some places people prefer an automatic
service charge so that they don't have to
think about or try to calculate a tip. But in
other places, people hate that - they want
to decide who and how much to tip
themselves. But do people
actually make use of that freedom not to
tip? Here's William Becket again and this
he's time talking about New York.
William Beckett: New York exactly the
same. There's a tacit pressure to tip. But
theoretically you just stand up and walk
out. You don't, everybody tips 20% or,
there is a theory of an option.
But people like that.
Catherine: So he says there is 'a tacit
pressure to tip'.
What does he mean by that?
Sam: Something that is 'tacit' is not
spoken, not said, yet it is still understood.
So in New York no one tells you that you
have to tip, but everyone knows that you
have to.
Catherine: And because there is no
service charge on the bill and no one tells
you what to tip, you could just walk out
after paying. He says that's 'theoretically
possible'. That means although it may be
possible, it's actually very unlikely because
of the tacit pressure and the way we
behave.
Sam: But he does say people like that
freedom not to tip, even if they don't
actually use that freedom.
Catherine: Right, nearly vocabulary time,
but first, let's have the answer to our
question. Now Sam what is the biggest
tip we know someone gave?
Sam: I thought $250,000.
Catherine: Well it was actually, believe it
or not, a whopping $3,000,000. Yes!
Now, on with today's vocabulary review.
Sam: So we've been talking about tipping,
the practice of giving extra money to, for
example waitresses and waiters.
Catherine: 'To differ from' is a verb which
means 'to be different from'.
Sam: 'The norm' is what is usual or
normal.
Catherine: 'i.e.' is a short form of a Latin
expression and it means ‘in other words'.
Sam: Something that is 'tacit' is not said
but is nevertheless understood.
Catherine: And if something is
'theoretically possible' it can be done but
for different reasons it probably won't be.
And that is where we must leave it today.
Goodbye!
Sam: Bye everyone!
