Tipping vs Listening to sales pitches.

[gremcint]

I'm not quite sure how to word this.

I'm in favour of tipping and usually tip over 15%.


There is this cultural feeling towards tipping and a lot of people feel get rather upset about nontippers. Part of it comes from the type of job and part of it comes from what they get paid.

Yet I see a lot of these people complain about sales people, I'm not talking about the really pushy ones or ones who don't listen and won't take no for an answer I'm talking about the ones just doing their job and offering the options.

I sell computers, it's my job to help you find the right computer and also to get you to buy the extras, I probably shouldn't say that but that won't surprise anyone here. Yet there is this attitude that I'm wasting your time or just after your money. Well most salesmen are on commission or get hourly but how well you sell affects how many hours you get (like me).

So how is this different than tipping, when you tip you are basically just giving the person money for a service you would receive either way (remember I'm in support of tipping) but with buying what's called attachments you are getting an actual tangible object or a service that you would not have got otherwise.

I understand that pushy salesmen have given the others a bad reputation and that is part of it but it just seems a little odd to me.

[HYHYBT]

Well, I see at least two ways to look at it: first, if you are paid by how much you sell, then the quicker you stop trying to sell me something I have no desire or funds to buy, the quicker you can go on to the next potential sale. Alternately, if you look at buying the add-ons as an equivalent to a tip, it's a horribly inefficient one. When I tip a waitress, she gets all of the tip (minus taxes, of course, allowing for various forms of sharing.) Whereas if I'm buying Random Inexpensive Item, most of the money from the warranty I'll *never* use (as I'd only use the item a few times within the covered year anyway, one at least of which would be within the normal return period, etc; for example, my current blender is about 30 years old, and has been used all of twice in the last five years. If it needed replacing, what kind of fool would I have to be to buy a one-year warranty? Anyway...) most of the money would go to the store, not to the salesperson. If you want to draw a comparison to restaurant work, it's not equivalent to tipping, but rather to buying the suggested desserts and drinks when you're not even going to consume them and all you wanted was the dinner you originally ordered.

(and on that note, they can get too pushy too. A while back I did something I never do: eating at a real restaurant by myself. I was asked at least five or six separate times if I wanted an (alcoholic) drink, the last time including "why not?" followed by an explanation of why I'd really like this one. Never mind that I don't enjoy drinking; that I never do it, and so have no way of judging how much is too much; that I was by myself and had an hour's drive home; or that I'd already said "no" several times.)

[crashhelmet]

You can't compare the two.

In a sense, tipping is a way of saying "thank you" for the service that was provided. Some view it as an extra incentive to ensure that everything in their dining or drinking experience is what it should be. It's not the same as buying overpriced accessories or extended warranties that go with something else they just bought because you helped me find the item I was looking for. You're already making the commission off of what you sold me, so your time hasn't been wasted.

Now if I ordered a custom built computer system from you, with certain specifications and requirements, I probably would tip you if you took the initiative to ensure it was exactly what I asked for, when I asked for it. But if I can go online or to another store and get the same accessories for significantly cheaper than what you charge, don't expect me to buy them from you.

[gremcint]

actually unless you are buying that computer as soon as it comes out and not on sale the store is probably losing money, or breaking even at best, and selling just a laptop does diddly for my numbers and drags them down verses selling the attachments which improve my numbers and help me get hours.

Also depending on the item the cost of the warranty ranges from 10 to 20% a lot of the time which is what most people tip.

I
Average tip for a $50 meal, 7.50
Extended service plan where I work on an item $49.99 or less, 6.99 (14%). or between 50 and 99.99 is 9.99 (between 10% and 20%).
That gives you free shipping to the manufacturer for whatever the original warranty period is and in the additional year you get store credit of the original value of the item.
and seeing as how some printers come with a 5 year warranty you just bought 5 years of free shipping. How is that bad service.

computers and items over 250 are a bit different.

'm not saying that they are the same thing, I just think it's a little odd, as one gives the person money directly and the other will help me get hours, you buying that mouse when you got the computer just put me one attachment higher and may get me scheduled for more hours than I might have other wise either by beating other associates or earning my store more hours from corporate.

so let's say you buy that 6.99 warranty and because of that I get scheduled one more hour the next week than I would have otherwise then I just got another hour's wage (~$10) and you basically just put money in my pocket.

it doesn't scale as well to the larger items I realize but on an item like a laptop even if you buy it from someone else I really do recommend the extended, I see so many come in for repair day after day, and the repairs 70% of the time cost as much or more than the extended.

[gremcint]

I should clarify that I'm not saying that you should buy the extended as a tip or buy the attachments as a tip I'm just commenting on the attitude that I see on various sites towards sales people in regards to this. If you honestly do not need the item then don't buy it, but at least consider it because the deal isn't as one sided as it seems a lot of the time.

[Rageaholic]

I think it comes down to what the customer chooses to do voluntarly. Tipping is ingrained in us, so we don't mind or give it second thoughts. I mean, don't they rely on tips? It would be sucky not to. In that instance, the waiter or waitress isn't asking for the tip, it's just done. That's not the same with salespeople. With salespeople, they are the ones who initiate it. If I know what I want or am just looking, it's annoying to feel pressured into buying something I may not want. Same thing with extended warrenties.

Of course, I wouldn't say I get mad at them for asking. I just say no. But if they continue to bug me, yes, I get poed.

[crashhelmet]

The problem with your argument here is that you're not asking for a tip, you're asking for the buyer to help you keep your job. It's apples and orangutans.

I understand your plight. Commissioned sales sucks. Most employers don't care about anything except for the bottom line and will quickly replace you with someone that they think will improve it. When I worked for Circuit City, I had a store manager that didn't care how much in sales you were producing if you weren't selling enough extended service plans. You could be leading the department, or even the store, in commission and spiffs but if you didn't meet a certain percentage in ESPs, you wouldn't be there much longer.

Adding to this, most consumers already know what they want when they walk in. They do their research on the Internet, find out where it's being sold, and they go down to buy it. All you have to do is ring/write it up. During the holidays you may have to provide more assistance as they may only have an idea of what they want to buy for someone. The only thing extra you need to do from there is offer the necessary accessories and extended warranties.

Whether or not they buy them comes down to how much they know and how well you sell. It's not a tip, shouldn't be treated as one, and shouldn't be expected.

[HYHYBT]

I for one would be more amenable to listening, at least, when offered a warranty if they weren't offered for stupid things. Who, for example, needs one for an iPod-to-USB cable? Yes, I was offered one, week before last. I may well lose it somewhere eventually, but the idea that it would break (outside of major abuse) is laughable. If I want a mouse, I have several already. The thing is, the more often stores (I won't say salespeople, as you do as you're told and/or forced into) offer things I don't want, the less I listen the next time. If they'd just offer add-ons when it would, for most people, make sense to take them, I suspect they'd have more success.

And yes, laptops definitely need the extended warranty... as long as it will be gladly and generously honored. I've never had trouble with that (and, partly as a consequence, have owned... what, ten of them over the years? Certainly wouldn't if they found excuses not to repair them!), but I've heard of others who had, especially when the warranty is with the store and not the manufacturer.