Should you tip for fast food or takeout?

These days, customers who visit a restaurant to pick up a carryout order, or even a fast-food drive-thru, may be greeted by a prompt on the screen asking how much they’d like to tip.In some cases, it’s just a kiosk making the request, but other times the cashier might be waiting for the customer’s response.“It usually catches me off-guard,” Chris Nordstrom, a commercial real estate executive in Kansas City, Missouri, told Fox News Digital.“It’s not that I mind tipping in the right context,” he said.“It’s just that fast food, by nature, has traditionally been a non-tipping experience.”Just 12% of U.S.

adults tip when eating at a “fast casual restaurant,” according to a Pew Research Center survey.About 77% said the quality of the service they receive is a “major factor” in deciding whether to tip and how much.“I don’t tip if I pay before I eat,” wrote one person on Reddit.Another user wrote that if there’s a tip option at a fast-food restaurant, “it should be an instant zero … unless they make less than minimum wage, no need to tip.”Most fast-food restaurants are required to pay the federal minimum wage, and some states have an even higher minimum wage.Tipped restaurant employees also earn at least their state’s minimum wage, according to the National Restaurant Association.“More often than not, I don’t tip at fast-food places unless the staff has gone above and beyond – or if it’s a locally-owned spot that I want to support,” Nordstrom said.“Tipping is tied to service – not just the act of handing over an order that was pre-prepared.”But people who work in the service or retail industry may have a different perspective.“If the option comes up, I’m always happy to tip,” Blair Dubinsky, a client advisor at a luxury-brand retail store in New York City, told Fox News Digital.

“Working with the public isn’t easy, and if that’s the way I can thank them, I don’t mind doing it.”The custom of t...