Tipping in the service industry

[emjay]

Im from.the UK, the only time I've tipped is telling the taxi driver he can keep the change.

Yeah, I forgot about that... I say 'keep the change' a lot too. But outside of that, and outside of individual tips given to individuals, the only places I've seen with any customary expectation of tips has been restaurants... but I don't go to restaurants enough to know whether that's a general thing across the board. Ie I generally only go to restaurants if I'm invited as part of some event, but don't 'eat out' of my own accord very often... seeing it as expensive enough without tips let alone with tips. So I really don't know how widespread that sort of tipping culture is in the UK. I know they did it in a Frankie and Benny's I went to once, but since I think that's an American franchise, that doesn't necessarily help in determining the UK culture for it, since it could just be, in that case, an imported/borrowed American tradition. I know there have been other places as well though, but as I said, haven't had enough exposure to them to know how and where it applies in general.