Customers Feel ‘Emotionally Blackmailed’ over Tipping Prompt at Self Checkouts

Customers are feeling “emotionally blackmailed” when being prompted to tip at self checkouts in restaurants and retail establishments, especially amid record-high inflation and less friendly customer service.

Business owners say prompts to leave a tip at self-checkout can significantly increase gratuities for staff, but more and more customers are asking what exactly these tips are for, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal.

“They’re cutting labor costs by doing self-checkout. So what’s the point of asking for a tip? And where is it going?” an American University student asked.

Companies “are taking advantage of an opportunity,” professor William Michael Lynn, who studies consumer behavior and tip culture at Cornell University’s Nolan School of Hotel Administration, told WSJ. “Who wouldn’t want to get extra money at very little cost if you could?”

Tipping researchers reportedly say that this type of tipping prompt is a way for employers to put the burden on their customers, rather than increase their staff’s wages themselves.

Saru Jayaraman, director of the Food Labor Research Center at the University of California, Berkeley, concurred, telling WSJ that “some employers are trying to use increasing tipping as a way to not have to pay people more.”

Square, which is used to power many iPad point-of-sale machines, revealed that the tip prompts really do work, noting that tipped transactions were up 17 percent year-over-year at full-service restaurants, and 16 percent at quick-service restaurants in the fourth quarter of 2022.

But shoppers are not pleased, and feel emotionally blackmailed into leaving a tip when at a self-checkout, which many times now forces a customer to either click a tip option or select “no tip.”

One man told WSJ that he kept his AirPods in his ears and avoided eye contact while buying a bottle of water at a gift shop at New Jersey’s Newark Liberty International Airport recently. Then he skipped leaving a tip. “Just the prompt in general is a bit of emotional blackmail,” he said.

 

Meanwhile, a sign attached to the bottom of a self-checkout machine at the Metairie, Louisiana, location of cookie chain Crumbl states, “Consider leaving a tip if we made you smile.”

One 20-year-old college student, who works as a server at a restaurant to help pay for college, and understands the importance of tipping, told WSJ that she felt guilty not leaving a tip, so she accepted the tip prompt, which made her cookies end up costing about $5 each.

She also noted that her only interactions with Crumbl employees was when she was told to step to the side to wait before receiving her order.

“When no one even helps us, I feel like there shouldn’t even be the option to tip,” she said.

You can follow Alana Mastrangelo on Facebook and Twitter at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.