What kind of holiday tip do you give to the hairdresser, mailman and other service people who help you in your life?

My hairdresser gets a 20% tip every time I see her. If I have an appointment around Christmas, I will take cookies or brownies for her to share with her husband and sons. We’re friends as well as having a service person/customer relationship, so this works for us.

There isn’t anyone else that I would tip. No mail carrier as we have a post office box. No newspaper delivery. Can’t think of anyone else off hand. If we were “regulars” at a bar or restaurant, those people would simply get bigger tips during the holidays.

I don’t give a special tip to those I tip all year.

And nothing for the mailman.

Occasionally, I will give $20 or $25 as a holiday tip to the paper guy or other regular service person.

There is a counter service restaurant down stairs from my office where I get breakfast every day. I don’t tip because it goes in a tip jar. This year I have been thinking about tipping the morning crew $50 each, but I only deal with maybe five of them on a regular basis. I need to ask one of them how many are there each day, and give it in envelopes rather than one big drop in the tip jar.

I don’t tip my hairdresser much during the year so I give him a generous tip at Christmas. I give one to my housecleaner as well and no one else.

I don’t have any service people I use on a regular basis the last few years but, for years prior I always gave my gardener buddy a nice little cash tip and bought gifts for his 2 little kids. I also tipped my house cleaners nicely as well. I used to be a rural mail route carrier up here in the Sierra Foothills and loved all the gifts that were left in the mailboxes for me on my route at Xmas. Home made baked goods, bottles of wine ( it is a wine trail area ) and all summer I was left bags of fresh garden veggies.

I loved opening those mail boxes and seeing what was there.

$50 to the newspaper delivery guy and mailman. No, I don’t think that $1 per week is excessive for someone who provides excellent service, day after day, for any entire year.

$100 to the woman who walks and feeds Sadie, whenever I’m out-of-town. She doesn’t come every day or even every week, but she’s special. I’ve had a relationship with her for over 20 years.

$50 each to my hairdresser, manicurist, and Botox Lady. These service providers get 20 – 25% tips year-round, but I like to do something extra for the holidays.

By the way, USPS employees are prohibited from taking cash gifts. I get around this by handing my mailman a nice card in a sealed envelope. He has no idea whether the card contains anything, so he isn’t accepting or declining a gift. He leaves a card for me every Christmas; to the best of his knowledge, I’m simply doing the same in return.

I’ve played this game for many years, and the mailman’s never had a problem with it. To the contrary, the next time I see him, he give me a warm smile and knowing look.

I cut my own hair and I didn’t think actual paper papers were still a thing.

As for the mailman I live in a apartment complex and the mailbox is on the other side so I never see them. But I would totally tip them if I knew how. This isn’t a joke. I am a total USPS fanboy. It is pretty magical that they can get a letter to the middle of nowhere for 50 cents and they can also read my shit handwriting.

Last week newegg sent me a stick of RAM via Fedex. I had to send it out to Texas right away. Fedex wanted 11 dollars to ship it. I thought I would save some walking and check the price. Fuck that.. 11 bucks to ship a envelope. So I walked the 10 blocks to the post office and got it shipped for 2.50. Mailed on Saturday, delivered on Tuesday. Tracking number included.

Much love USPS

USPS employees are really allowed to accept tips. I don’t know if FedEx or UPS employees are not, but I wouldn’t tip them anyway. Maybe I would, if they ever actually delivered my packages to my door. But they don’t and invariably I have to check around with my neighbors to see which one got the package. The USPS, on the other hand, gets the package to my door every time. Every. Single. Time.

I have two different newspapers delivered, one is daily except Sunday and the other is Sunday (they also deliver on holidays). They each get a check from me for 40 to 50 dollars.

USPS guy is Will. He gets a twenty sometimes twice a year “for postage due” like when my sister-in-law sends ten pages from a magazine to my wife (short postage), he also makes sure any large parcels are put on the porch out of sight.

I always tip my hairdresser really well (between 20–25%) but she’ll be getting a 50–100% tip from me next time I’m in. I was just there a few days ago and when she remarked on how long it’d been since she’d seen me / how much weight I’d lost, I explained my illness. She proceeded to cook me dinner. She gets the big tip next time.

But yeah, ordinarily I don’t do anything special for the holidays, just because I try to be generous year-round anyway.

@Darth_Algar They can receive gifts, but not cash or cash equivalents: https://about.usps.com/postal-bulletin/2012/pb22349/html/cover_025.htm. Thus, a $20 box of cookies is fine, but a $20 bill isn’t.

@Love_my_doggie

Correct, but I was referring specifically to tips, rather than gifts in general. To me “tips” implies cash.

^^^ Call it a “tip,” or call it a “gift,” the policy’s the same. I note that the USPS standard is titled, “Employee Tipping and Gift-Receiving Policy.”

Do I care about this rule? Nope.

We don’t really tip in Australia. If someone gives you fabulous service you might give them a tip, but it’s not standard practice.

I have a wonderful hairdresser, I buy her a present. She’s become a friend and my kids call her my favourite daughter. They’ve even nominated her as the person I’ll live with when I get very old. So she’s very special.

Other than that, I don’t give service people anything. When the bin men used to have to run down the road, hefting the bins and emptying them into the truck, they would get a six-pack of beers at Christmas. Same for the postie. Those jobs have changed now and nobody does that anymore.

I bring in treats for my workmates. I give a nice gift to my son’s ‘environment councillor.’ (Sort like a support person/ child minder that helps teach my son to improve his social kills due to his aspergers/ adhd.) Otherwise there is no one to ‘tip’.

I tip lawn guy and newspaper girl.