The wages for those employees are usually lower because they get tips to boost their wage, some of them get paid a lot for wating on tables. I had worked my way through college working as a cook in resturants.

Common rule of thumb that I use is if your sitting down and someone brings you your food, drink ect.. they get tiped on their performance, anywhere from $0 to 20%. usually when there good 15% if their bad the manger should be told. I tip at Sonics for this reason, they bring me my food to the car.

If you are picking up your food at the register no tip should be given, I would have let the manager know how RUDE that person was, and I would have let him know how much $$$$ I spend there and that might just be the last time I go. Let him know your opinion, she didn't "serve you" she just took your money so why is a tip needed. If you notice most the time the person taking the money at the register is the manager or someone that is not wating on tables.

Anymore the service of these people is getting worse, and they think they deserve a tip, the tip is to rate their service.

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1987 MB 300TD, 245,000 miles running great, converted to WVO.
1996 Ford F350 2WD,PSD,CC,DRW custom conversion, soon to run on WVO.
2003 Toyota Matrix,4WD (wifes)