The motor entrance to The Elysian, a hotel and condominium tower near State Street and Walton. (Chris Walker/ Chicago Tribune)
Dow Jones Newswires-WSJ | The Elysian Hotel in Chicago, which
opened in December, has adopted a no-tipping policy, a move that breaks
with standard practices across the high-end- and luxury-hotel market,
says the head of a trade association.
“I haven’t seen ‘a no-tipping policy’ anyplace else,” says Joe
McInerney, president and chief executive officer of the American Hotel
& Lodging Association. “If you go to a no-tipping policy, certain
positions that have always lived off tips — like doormen, uniformed
services staff — what would they do?”
Elysian employees are paid competitive wages and benefits, says an Elysian spokeswoman.
“I just don’t think it’s luxurious to always have to be thinking about having to tip people for doing the jobs they do every day,” says Elysian’s CEO, David Pisor. “We try to eliminate your need to have to have extra cash on you to get someone to do something.”
Guests are notified of the no-tipping policy after they book a room and are reminded of the policy upon arrival at the hotel. Employees are instructed to politely refuse tips, thanking guests for the gesture but saying that it’s not necessary to tip on the property. If a guest absolutely insists after the refusal, the staff member is allowed to take the tip so as not to offend a guest, says Mr. Pisor.
While tipping practice can vary by location, the general culture of tipping is still in place in almost all luxury hotels, says Mr. McInerney.
Vivian Deuschl, spokeswoman for the Ritz-Carlton, says good rules of thumb are to tip porters $2 a bag, $1 to doormen who hail a cab, $20 to a concierge who is able to track down hard-to-get theater tickets or arrange a dinner reservation at a sought-after restaurant, and $3 to $5 a night for longer stays for the oft-forgotten housekeeping staff.
As for a tipping or no-tipping policy at the Ritz? “We would never have anything like that, nor would we put that down” on paper, says Ms. Deuschl. “There is no set tipping policy and we would never tell our guests it isn’t allowed.”
Rather, employees are taught not to expect gratuity, but to view it as a pleasant surprise, she says.
Similarly, a “gratuity is entirely up to the guest so Four Seasons doesn’t have a policy on something that should be discretionary,” says a Four Seasons spokeswoman.
Fairmont Hotels & Resorts doesn’t have a set policy for all locations regarding tipping, but rather has different practices on “a property by property basis,” says Fairmont spokeswoman Lori Holland. Several of its resort properties, including the Fairmont Banff Springs in Alberta, Canada, and the Fairmont Scottsdale in Arizona encourage a no-tipping policy since “many of our guests are on packages at these resorts and it is a way we can offer a hassle-free experience to these guests,” Ms. Holland says.
– Anna Prior, The Wall Street Journal
Who cares, the hotel can do whatever the hell it wants. Welcome to America, this isn’t the USSA quite just yet.
Furthermore I don’t know how this is “breaking news.”
This has been their policy since they opened. How is this “breaking news?”
I still like to leave tips. It demonstrates my wealth to the lowly hotel employees who wish they were me.
We will see how this policy plays out once they get hotel guests. So far, the place seems to just have hotel employees staying in rooms and throwing their cigarette butts and crap off of the hotel balconies onto the streets below. Classy.
What’s the big deal. This isn’t the first hotel. There’s a no tipping policy at the Sofitel Hotel in Hanoi, Vietnam.
Finally, a policy on tipping that makes sense. In some places I feel like a walking ATM machine. Tips should be reserved for extraordinary service, not doing what someone is paid to do. They are also a large component of expense report abuse by employees. Employers should encourage more establishments to develop similar policies.
The cheapest room at this place mid-week is $345.00 and they are going to tell me what I can and can not do as a paying guest paying an over inflated room rate.
Hopefully this bad policy will show up in the falling hotel
occupancy rates and lower daily rates by people who do not share in this ill-advised policy.
This was their policy two weeks ago when I was there. The service was exceptional. I’ve stayed at the Ritz many times, and this surpassed that by quite a bit. The polite refusal of tips took a bit of getting used to, but it made things quite a bit nicer. I hope this hotel can stay full at their price point. It’s a gem.
I hate tipping, because I don’t understand why service workers aren’t paid reasonable wages in the first place. They work hard, their bosses should pay them well. I hate the fact that it’s my job to make up for their bosses cheapness – especially at high end places. I hope this practice becomes popular.
If it’s anything like Europe where the tip is already included people will tip any way. Those employees will be hard pressed to refuse!
Great policy! I agree with the one comment about feeling like an ATM machine in these places where every move you take necessitates tipping someone. The Elysian workers will accept tips if one absolutely insists upon giving one. I hope other establishments follow the lead of this one.
No tipping is a great idea! Wish more hotels would do it as they do in a lot of cities (outside the US). I’ve been at hotels where the employees try to literally force you into coughing up a bigger tip — and the experience did not make me want to return. Now I can focus on enjoying my stay instead of worrying about carrying dollar bills around like I’m at a strip club.
To cadge for tips is low and unseemly.
It highlights the perverse sense of entitlement service workers have, or Americans generally.
Reportedly people are refused service for not tipping the people that brought them the food they already paid for or taking their bags to a room costing them a weeks pay for a single night.
No, the responsibility to pay properly should fall to the employer, and the responsibility to provide service and service alone should fall to the service worker – not the job of the customer to pay the employee nor the employee to seek payment.
And all the embarrassed, coy, wheezy, coughing hints for a tip are always met with a direct: Go to the boss’ office to do that if you think you’re underpaid before I ask you for a tip myself for providing a reason for your employment.