A TikToker is offering up some helpful advice to restaurant patrons after recently starting a job as a hostess herself.
Anyone who has worked in a customer-facing industry understands how the job reshapes your own behaviors as a customer, whether you’ve worked at a restaurant, in retail, in rideshare, or any of the numerous other jobs that fit the bill. Certain lessons carry over regardless of the field, such as being polite, patient, and tipping well when applicable, but each specific industry also has its own quirks that we may not understand unless we’ve worked in them ourselves.
User @not_like_other_girls had that experience herself, admitting in a recent video that she didn’t really understand how certain things she previously did as a customer were “annoying and inconvenient or disrespectful.” So she decided to share three of those behaviors for anyone else who may want to be more aware.
To start, she implores patrons to never ask to arbitrarily switch tables after the host directs them to a certain one.
“Even if there’s other tables available, the reason that the host is bringing you to that table is because it’s that server’s section whose turn it is,” she says, explaining that most restaurants have a rotation, and skipping over a server might mean fewer tips for them and more work for someone else.
Her second suggestion was to just be patient when the host says it will be a short wait before you can be seated—even if you see open tables.
“Even though it can be frustrating if you see empty tables but [they’re] telling you that you have to wait for a table, there’s a couple reasons that might be,” she explains. “The first one is that there are other parties ahead of you who those tables are being reserved for, and another reason is that even though there might be a physically open table, there still could not be enough wait staff on right now to comfortably serve every single table in the restaurant at a time.”
@not_like_other_girls I feel like the world would be a better place if restaurant etiquette was more widely known so here is my contribution #serving #servers #restaurant #serviceindustry #fyp #hostess #hosting ♬ original sound – user6649350144406
The final thing @not_like_other_girls suggests avoiding may be a little more familiar: lingering at a table for a long time after the meal has been finished and the bill settled, as the lack of turnover could negatively impact the server’s ability to collect tips.
“So if you do wanna sit and linger with your friends for a little bit, I recommend tipping more to make up for the cash that the server would lose by not having another table,” she says.
Other restaurant workers largely backed the TikToker up in the comments section, adding their own experiences into the mix.
“The most infuriating thing is 1) ppl walking by me or even acknowledging me but then seating themselves 2) ppl asking ‘what about that table?’” wrote one commenter.
“I feel the first one! I used to host and hated this!” another said of customers asking to move tables. “If I want a booth or somewhere specific I tell them before I get walked or sat.”
One viewer simply admitted that they’ve wanted to make a similar video themselves for a long time “but these things make me so angry I could not say it in a nice way.” Several others pointed out how different interacting with customers would be if everyone was required to work a service job at least once in their lives.
“Now only if somehow we can email this to the older people, it would be great,” one user added.
The Daily Dot has reached out to @not_like_other_girls via TikTok comment.
