How does one calculate the gratuity?

Answer 1

This is very important to post since there are a lot of people who go out to eat and don't tip their server properly.

The standard tip is 15% of the bill.

20-30 % if they impressed you.

If you tip more then you're a generous person and there should be more of you in the world, since most servers make below minimum wage.

Anyhow, here's the easy way to calculate the tip without a calculator.

Let's say the bill is $35.76

One way to think of 15% is that it's 10% + 5%

Most of us can do 10% in our head by just moving the decimal over...

$3.57

For the 5% we take 1/2 of our 10% value

I typically round up to make the math easy

For this example lets round the 10% to $3.60

Thus 5% is

3.60 / 2 = 1.80

Now you just add the two together

$3.60

+$1.80

======

$5.40

See, that was simple and it didn't even need a calculator.

If we did 20% we would just take the 10% and double it...

$3.60 x 2 = 7.20

Most people should be able to do this basic math without the need of a calculator.

To recap

Take 10%

Take 1/2 of that which is 5%

Then add 10% to 5% to get 15%