Occasionally when i’m extremely bored I like to go to The Coast website and read the “Restaurant Reviews” section. Certainly not to read any current reviews of establishments in Halifax that I may take seriously, but moreso to see if anyone has written about me.

I just want to see if anyone writes something along the lines of, “Tonight we were at _____ and our waiter was an old, bitter Jack Ass.” Then I try to figure out which table it was I pissed off.

This evening I checked out the site and had the grave misfortune of reading the following tale,

“We as a large group of about 40-45 people decided to go to the Canadiana restaurant for supper last night. What a mistake that was. We had reserved for about 30, but we had some more come with us, which the staff seemed to have no problem with. The wait staff was very kind and courteous. The manager, however was the rudest person I have ever dealt with in my entire life. He told us our children were acting like animals, and that the restaurant was not a playground. Apparently talking to each other and eating your meal is animal in nature? We were also told by this incredibly ridiculous man that our children were disturbing the other patrons in the restaurant. We made up the majority of the restaurant, so I am not sure who we were disturbing. I assume the fact that we would have made up the majority of the sales for the night made no difference to this man whatsoever. We left (most of us did, anyway) without leaving a tip, but not because the wait staff was bad, because they were not, but because we hoped it would send a message to the manager. Those waitresses lost out on tips from about 45 people because their boss was such a peach. I really hope people read this and NEVER patronize this restaurant. Great business sense Mr Manager!!!”

Any lengthy complaint from a patron is usually riddled with exaggeration and hyperbole.

I’m sure most of the people in their party decided to leave a gratuity for the servers. I’m sure there was a majority of honourable souls who said to themselves, “You know what, our kids were running around like animals, that manager is a jerk, but it’s not the fault of our server, so let’s give her at least 10 percent.”

But this is a situation that plagues servers on a routine basis, and is one that causes a lot of frustration.

Consider the age old expression, “If the cat shits on the rug, why kick the dog?”

Serving large table of families with plenty of kids running around is arguably the most challenging and least rewarding part of the job. The experience can range from flat out awful to leaving the server exasperated and disgusted with their current existence.

Furthemore, there are alot of servers who would not have hung in there so willingly as these gentle and noble servers apparently did. Many a server would half ass their way through such an experience.

So the fact these dilligent young men and women hung in there and provided the best possible experience they could, despite overwhelming odds, demands respect and a generous gratuity.

If you are pissed off about a dickhead Manager, then ask for his/her name and call the owner at a time of your convenience to complain. Or post your ramblings on The Coast detailing his lack of courtesy and be done with it.

But by not tipping the servers, who you admit were on task and delightful, doesn’t prove a god damn thing, and certainly doesn’t teach anyone a lesson.

All it proves is that you are a cheap ass, who goes to restaurants looking for any reason possible to justify why they would not leave a gratuity. Even if the server was not to blame.

Follow Halifax Server on twitter @hfxserver and check out his page on Facebook.

Source: http://halifaxserver.blogspot.com/2011/05/dont-kick-dog.html