My sister is painting her new addition and it has high ceilings. One of the guys building the addition has scaffold and offered to paint the ceilings for her. He is being paid by the contractor, but sis wants to tip him as well. Any ideas for what is an appropriate tip that won’t insult the guy? She figured he will spend about eight hours. She was wondering if $80 to $100 would be too little (she says, “It’s only $10/hr”), but I said it was on top of what the guy is already making, so….
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Replies
Ive never been tipped.
You figgure he wants to work round her and thats the reason?
Tim
Never seen a C-Note put a Frown on anybodys face!
Nice bottle of MD20/20.
I've never a guy who would be disappointed by a $80-100 tip.
A crisp $100 bill would be great. A year from now he'll still be remembering it with fondness.
As a general contractor with my own carpentry crew, I tend to frown upon my guys doing "side work" for my customers. I believe you should be careful with this situation and make sure the painter's boss knows what is going on. It's not worth $ 100.00 if you lose your job or tick off the boss!
StevieG
Good point about notifying boss--he is aware of it.
Thanks for replying. It sounded to me like sister was proposing a pretty decent tip, but although i do painting, I wouldn't consider myself a pro (see my other thread about my fun with enamel). I am cheap and probably would have given him half that, but then I'd done the painting myself (despite my apparent lack of ability to paint!).
If she wants to give him the $80-100 so be it, but I'm with you. I think $50 is fine. What's she going to give everybody else?
He's the only one who's doing extra work. She already does stuff like bake cookies for the crew and so on. It was funny: she said the GC and some others were on the roof one day and her kid was flying a wind-up flapping bird I gave him for Christmas and all the guys on the roof were fascinated watching this plastic bird fly. She asked where I bought it so she could get Eric (the GC) one!
All:
On my previous job doing solid surface countertop repairs for a large fabricator, I was tipped over ten times in a three year period. Eight to fifty bucks and I never comlained, in fact I even bragged to the boss about how I was getting tipped and no one else was.
Joe
Since we're on the subject of tipping...
Built a sleeper-on-slab/subfloor/carpet last Friday and Saturday, 12 hour days. The customer was only in town for a few days, bringing her father down from up north, getting him set up, etc. and she would be leaving Tuesday morning. The original plan was to do it Friday and Monday, but I offered my Saturday (and an hour Sunday was required to tie up some loose ends) just to get it done and get out of her hair...she appreciated it some much I got a few bonuses...first was a $220 tip...second was a few plywood golfing figures to cut and paint (homework!!), the house is on a golf course, they stick the figures in the back yard for novelty...third is a handful of jobs in the near future.
Well worth the extra effort. It's good when consideration comes from both sides- makes doing this for a living so much more of a pleasure.
1. she'll never get him to leave.
2. maybe she should wait and see what color he paints it?
My opinion is that $50 is plenty, and only if he does a decent job and cleans up after himself pretty well.
If a guy does something exceptional (eg, do an emergency rush job ahead of a party) then a somewhat more exceptional tip is appropriate.