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Just to clarify a few things that have been mentioned in a few of your replies:
As mentioned, the guy waiting on us had one of those little hand held devices into which he was placing our orders. It was equipped with a credit card reader, as is every one of those I have ever seen.
It's been my experience, when presented with one of those, that there is apparently no extra work whatsoever for the waiter to split the check. Also in my experience, when the waiter is using one of those, the new "default", at least when dealing with groups who are obviously not family or something, is to assume we will want separate checks. As a result, I think we have gotten a bit lazy or inattentive about asking for them up front. It's just assumed, since it is so easy, that that will be the case. Maybe we shouldn't make that assumption. It certainly wasn't a valid assumption in this case.
Our guy was not rude in the least. Maybe a little louder than necessary, but he was very polite. And assertive... But certainly not rude.
The waiter was by no means swamped, or really even all that busy. The place was maybe 20% full, and he was not the only one waiting tables. And, well, at the end of the day, that hand held device would be doing all of the work for him. It's not like the days before we had such things, where he would have had to sit down and break it all out manually.
I would have handled it completely differently. No tip, for sure, but it would have been a private conversation. I would not simply leave no tip with no explanation, and I would not write comments on the receipt or something. I would feel as if I owned him an explanation, face to face, but privately. Help him improve.
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