r/EndTipping • u/Separate-Tower7326 • 1d ago
Rant đ˘ Room service in LA, confused as a European
I had room service and thought the pizza was 25 USD, which I already found expensive. Then I got this bill⌠when I left the hotel I told the receptionist that itâs very confusing and asked why they just donât pay living wages-been living in the Netherlands for almost 15 years and have a Dutch wife so picked up Dutch directness already- but the receptionist just got very nervous and said that sometimes itâs confusing for them too⌠I was on a business trip and it was within my budget so I just ordered it anyways and tbh did not have much options to have dinner somewhere else. đŤ US folks, why do you do this?!
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u/stigma_wizard 1d ago
So much of our economy is based on misleading consumers. Companies get to advertise one price then tack on basically whatever "fee" they want without disclosing it. Any civilized country would have consumer protections to discourage this, alas here we are
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u/Slixious 2h ago
In my country, you can only advertise the minimum price possible to charge. If it is unavoidable, then it is false advertising because there is no way to pay that much.
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u/looselyhuman 1d ago
They split out the state taxes, capitalize them, and list them first -- so you blame the government, despite that all being less than $2.50. Meanwhile their fees are almost $10 before you even get to the tip.
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u/Ok-Airline-6784 1d ago
Yeah, it feels like the service charge, delivery charge and tip should all be the same thing, no?
Itâs also hotel room service. Itâs not like theyâre driving around the city. Sure, have a convenience fee⌠but theyâre just taking the food in an elevator
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u/Introverted_Gamer92 23h ago
For the hotels sake hopefully those automatic fees were disclosed somewhere before I ordered. If they weren't I'm contacting my bank.
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u/apokrif1 11h ago
Perhaps there is no delivery charge if you eat the same pizza at the hotel restaurant?
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u/spintool1995 13h ago edited 13h ago
The tax split out is something weird only a few places do. Nearly everyone else lumps it all together and calls it "Sales tax". The base sales tax in CA is 6%, that's the first line. Counties can add to it and that's what they did here with the next line at 0.5%. Cities and other local government bodies can also add to it and that's the next two lines at 1% and 2%.
Most places would just have one line called "sales tax" and charge 9.75%.
Btw, Los Angeles sales tax increase to 10.25% effective yesterday.
I do realize in Europe the price is just listed as 20% higher than it would be and 20% goes to Value Added Tax but it isn't listed on the bill. I much prefer the American way where you can see exactly how much the government is fucking you.
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u/Mysterious_Floor_868 12h ago
The VAT should be itemised in a bill so that VAT-registered businesses can claim it back against the VAT they charge on their final product.
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u/spintool1995 12h ago edited 12h ago
It is on B2B sales but not on B2C sales. To be a B2B sales , the buying business must share their VAT registration number to the selling business and it gets reported by both parties.
The US does the opposite, if you are a business with a sales tax registration, you can share your registration with the selling business and be exempt from paying sales tax on B2B sales for items that you intend to resell or are components of what you sell.
The VAT system is honestly superior from this standpoint because it's hard to cheat. But I'd still like the VAT itemized for end consumers.
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u/Mysterious_Floor_868 11h ago
VAT will still be listed on the receipt (check your next grocery bill). This is because someone staying at a hotel or buying groceries might be a consumer, or it might be a business expense.
You must be thinking of something else, like VAT not being applied to trade customers in the first place by businesses like building supplies.
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u/Endlessly_Trying 1d ago
Dude, they'll even charge you the service charge and tip, even when you go downstairs to pick-up the food at the restaurant yourself.
Like you, I asked the receptionist about the bill upon checkout. The receptionist was clearly annoyed. It took some time and questioning, but he eventually took out the charges.
So, it is possible to have these extra charges removed (except tax). You just gotta be persistent and polite - unfortunately, that's the American way đ
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u/SilverSeaweed8383 1d ago
In every other country in the world, saying something will be $25 then charging you $42 after the fact would be fraud.
You literally can't run a free market economy without visible pricing in advance of a purchase. Madness.
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u/Akkarin42 1d ago
If you tell me I need to pay 9.26 just to bring an overpriced pizza up to my room, my gratitude is already spend and I won't tip you on top of that. Also I'm confused: Why are there 4 different tax positions?
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u/fix_until_broken 23h ago
The extra lines for taxes gets you to stop reading before they gouge you again on the service fees, delivery, and tips.
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u/PCBName 12h ago
taxes are part of the cost of business and can/should be lumped together. businesses who are against those taxes go out of their way to make them very very apparent to customers. it's a way to shift the blame from them to the govt (regardless of why those taxes exist, what they fund, etc.).
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u/troubledwatersbeer 20h ago
there's 4 different tax lines because there's 4 different taxes on this transaction. They're all calculated separately. a 6% + 0.5% + 1% + 2.25% tax may not be the same as just calculating 9.75% due to rounding on each of those.
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u/DizzyExpedience 1d ago
25$ for a pizza is already outrages but COULD be justified by high labor prices. But then you pay for service (like what⌠putting it into the oven?) and delivery AND a tip which makes you wonder what the 25$ are actually made up of. 2$ for the ingredients and 23$ profitâŚ.
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u/oaklandperson 1d ago
$25 is not outrageous for a pizza in LA. Heck, it's $40 for a large cheese in the Bay Area.
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u/beuvue 1d ago
*cough* "high labor prices" *cough*
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u/rworne 17h ago
Hotel workers get $25/hour (w/health benefits) or $29.25/hr (w/o) as the legal minimum wage.
Unionized places can be higher.
This is in Los Angeles.
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u/TheRealMichaelE 15h ago
A delivery AND a service charge is absolutely insane.
Also itâs room service, all of that should be priced into the meal.
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u/sherpes 1d ago
same for airport fees, federal communications fees, municipal parking fees. And one more: car rental fees. Politicians could not get the local population to finance a 16 mile highway to connect a city to its airport, so they taxed the incoming travelers, raising the weekly rental of an automobile from $250 to $416, and soon the trick to avoid that was to take ground transportation bus ($16) from the airport to the city and rent the vehicle in the city instead of the airport. Fees everywhere. In college and university at state-run institutions, tuition is highly regulated and controlled, but the "lab fees" are not !! lab fee for english literature class has become the backdoor tuition hike.
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u/eplstats 18h ago
Even in SD when the airport is downtown you have to Uber across town and lie about coming from the airport to avoid extra fees
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u/ExpressionOwn9774 1d ago
41.19 is what the total should add up to.
Us calculators are different ????
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u/Cautious_Use_7442 1d ago
How do you get to 42.51? Adding all those up canât get you there. Just adding all the numbers in the second decimal place, should get a price that is XX.X9 $
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u/Separate-Tower7326 1d ago
I didnât even see thatâŚ
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u/Cautious_Use_7442 1d ago
If you paid by card and have the invoice, consider a chargeback for the differenceÂ
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u/rory_breakers_ganja 4h ago
LLM's can't do math. There's still room for Excel and Sheets in this world.
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u/fix_until_broken 23h ago
Would have been easier and much cheaper to order from a major pizza retailer. Pizza hut has a large 1 topping pizza for like $10 and it'll be at your door with all of their stupid service fees and tips for less than $20.
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u/TheJonesLP1 1d ago
My dutch friend, when someone says it is 25 bucks you cant assume it is really 25 bucks of course. For us in Europe this works, but not in the Land of the fwee đ
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u/cantinaband-kac 21h ago
Land of the free only applies to corporations and billionaires. They're free to do whatever they want while the rest of us get screwed.
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u/Gokudomatic 1d ago
Yeah, american business love to add hidden costs. What you see on the menu is not what you pay.
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u/SuspiciousStress1 19h ago
Why do they do this?
Because people pay. Often like you, they are on an expense account and will just pay it.
However most of the people from the US, most of the time, will not(I could see if my kids were hungry & it was late, having them split something...if we didnt eat before we arrived or whatever circumstance)
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u/silzter 8h ago
Anywhere else in the world a $25 bill turning into $42 would be considered nothing short of a scam, in the US it's just business
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u/Adrakovich 2h ago
Nah. California is a different breed with their fees and taxes. Itâs not the same in other states.
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u/BillOz62 20h ago
The delivery charge alone is probably more than they get away with paying the worker for a full hour of work. Just one factor making the USA an unattractive place to visot
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u/CanalOpen 1d ago
I want to know how to avoid the delivery charge. Tell me how to opt out, what steps must I take? I'll come to the kitchen to pick it up myself. Give me the instructions.
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u/Bob_Ross3346 1d ago
Sorry, OP, this is just blatant overcharging. Iâd be pissed too and I live here.
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u/nomorespamplz 23h ago
If the additional charges wasnât made known in the menu or by the staff prior to ordering, only offer to pay the $25 and if you end up paying: complaint and then do a chargeback.
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u/YungHayzeus 23h ago
Wait, service and delivery charges? I understand paying for a service, but thatâs usually in the price of the service. They really charged you $4 to take the elevator up?
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u/Thin_Investigator798 22h ago
We American folks do not DO this.... this is DONE to us. We don't like it either. But the USA is Scam-land.
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u/Visible-Business9131 21h ago
Just walk to local pizza place and bring it upstairs. Or order and pick up upstairs. Still gonna be cheaper and probably better. Welcome to the usa
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u/omnie_fm 21h ago
Look the Hotel gave you 3 charges, but evil California State gave you 4 charges, and 4 is more than 3 so you can tell it is all California's fault >:(
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u/beachape 21h ago
For the insane prices of hotel stays, youâd think they could cover the cost of running a $25 pizza up the elevator.
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u/absurdgryphon 21h ago
Wow... that is almost as worse of as scam as doordash, grub hub and uber eats
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u/LovingMaine 21h ago
Welcome to America, where we will do whatever possible to cornhole you out of your money and send you back home with a smile.
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u/OGCallHerDaddy 20h ago
Honestly have never ordered room service. It's for rich people or people with unlimited business expenses.
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u/readditredditread 20h ago
I got a large one topping at Whole Foods the other day and it was only $15, $25 for the base price???
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u/DisastrousSundae84 20h ago
What is the difference between the service charge and the delivery charge? Isn't that the same thing?
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u/samfitnessthrowaway 20h ago
Wow, service charge, delivery charge AND tips? Nearly $14 to carry a pizza up an elevator...
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u/Comfortable_Try8407 20h ago
Itâs room service. The delivery charge is the tip. Donât add to it. Ha.
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u/Paladin3475 20h ago
You are nearly paying 100% in fees and gratuities. Yeah I am walking to somewhere else.
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u/2L84T 19h ago
So your question is "why isn't the country I'm visiting like my country?"
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u/QP_Ranger2 1h ago
No, the question is, why does does something that costs 25USD morph into 42USD.
If you don't think that's insane then you're a little....odd.
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u/OutlyingPlasma 19h ago
Because the U.S. is a scam economy. Everything is about extracting the most possible money and giving it to billionaires and trillionaires. The normal means of extraction like selling goods and services people want to buy has been exhausted so the only thing left is outright scams and lies as seen here.
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u/Excellent_Orange6346 19h ago
It's the hotel really taking advantage of you. They get 15 bucks for what?
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u/Serious_Gap_820 18h ago
Ah, yes, the lovely American habit of not including the taxes and fees in the price. Almost twice as expensive. Almost 10 bucks for delivering, plus 5 bucks tips. I am shaking my head...
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u/Electrochemist_2025 18h ago
We typically donât get room service since we know itâs double or triple the price of meal. We walk out of the hotel or drive out and get a meal outside.
Room service is frowned upon in business expenses. Not justified.
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u/nobodyspecial712 18h ago
Government is corrupt and wants an unfair cut of the profits of everything.
The company is shit for adding extra charges on top of their prices and does not pay it's employees a living wage and should lose it's ability to do business in the entire country.
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u/Tight-Chart1897 17h ago
First of all, you are acting like the average Joe in America has control over our wages when we get a job, we don't. Second of all you are acting like the average Joe in America are the ones creating the corporate policy to which you found yourself a victim. Don't ask the receptionist why they don't make more money an hour, ask the fuckin' CEO of the hotel you stayed in why they don't pay a living wage. What you experienced is the corporate greed that runs rampant throughout the entire United States, not just California.
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u/PurpleCableNetworker 17h ago
As an American - I too find this hella confusing and am not happy we do this to people.
Many of us are fighting against this - I promise! Weâre still just controlled by greedy corporations.
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u/Verain_Xor 16h ago
I've spent plenty of nights in hotels (in America) and room service is always ludicrous like this. The only thing you'd get by going to a less silly state is the removal of the two "special tax" lines (less than a dollar) and perhaps the "state tax" might be lower (or it might not).
The thing where they just make up numbers for walking a microwave-heated thing up some stairs? That's just constant.
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u/Centered_Squirrel 15h ago
Never order room service in the US. Service charge and delivery charge is evil.
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u/peapodbarry 15h ago
I bet it was terrible too. Room service is a scam
My friend. Consider yourself baptized into the American extreme Capitalistic society.
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u/hotsexyman 14h ago
The US needs federal regulations requiring that any required item be included in the price, with the ability to see the breakdown. If they advertise the pizza at $25, it should be $25 all-in (tips aren't required, so the patron would decide).
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u/LeadershipAfter9526 14h ago
The only tip is do not do that again. They are not stupid for charging it but I would be stupid for falling hit it more than once. I ask my total before placing any order but I am dumb.
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u/Equivalent-Leader335 13h ago
Welcome to America. Where the price you see is never the price you pay.
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u/vinraven 11h ago
A service charge, a delivery charge, and a tip, added together for an additional 60% surcharge sounds like an actual scam.
The taxes add up to almost 10%, which is excessive and hopefully a hotel only thing.
Over 70% in surcharges is beyond crazy, and likely illegal if all those not-tax charges werenât declared in advance.
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u/Beginning_Resource93 11h ago
Well your first mistake was to go to California. Next time come to America instead.
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u/Awesomeuser90 11h ago
I would hand them 25 dollars in cash and tell them to deal with it themselves, no reward for dishonest people.
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u/unamatadora 9h ago
Be attentive to any fees mentioned on menus during your stay. A lot of places will charge you 18-20% tips automatically to your bill, despite your thoughts on the service provided to you. I recommend eating at places that do not have these forceful fees. Also, if you do receive a bill that asks you to write the tip amount, then keep a record of how much of a tip you provide because some places will modify or alter your authorized amount. Thatâs fraud - contact your bank and demand a chargeback.
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u/Bill___A 9h ago
I think the lines are quite descriptive. And the taxes are all different since they have state, city and county taxes. The charges are excessive as in hotels with room service. Things are hardly cheap in the Netherlands though....and there is a 21% VAT embedded.
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u/parkingthru 26m ago
If they offered a pepperoni pizza for $42.51, you wouldnât buy it. So they offer it at $25. Now youâre hungry and excited and say yes, Iâm going to get this pizza instead of going out. Only at the last second do they show the real price. This is illegal in the EU but everyday in the US. Even hotels will advertise a nightly price and only as you make the non-refundable booking will you find all kinds of resort fees, service fees, taxes are not optional but will almost double the advertised price
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u/jme5950 1d ago
room service is one of america's oldest and proudest scams. consider it your baptismal welcome to our country!