I delivered for PJ's Subs when I was in college. Before that I thought tipping a delivery guy was about the stupidest thing ever. It takes doing it to appreciate it. Like others have said, you do know who your good tippers are, and that gets reflected back by your order getting priority. The distance thing is funny, because I would have a few customers who literally were a block, sometimes 2 away, and they would never tip. Seriously, if you're to lazy to walk the block to get your own food, you need to tip the person who does bring it to you. Those people always annoyed me. Delivery driving is a crapshoot of a job. I had some fights with lazy workers in the kitchen if I would come back from a run and orders weren't ready to go back out and it wasn't busy instore. Some of them never seemed to understand that they effected my income by doing that, and that I was the one who would have to hear it from the customer because I was the one in front o them. Conversely, on really big orders, or really busy days, I was pretty much the only driver who would give some of my tips back to the people making the sandwiches. Side note to the other drivers in this thread: have you had any of those stereotypical delivery guy moments, where people play with you? I used to have a lady in Riverwest who would always come to the door in an overshirt, with nothing underneath and she would always bend over and put her food down. Other delivery guys knew exactly who I was talking about back in the day about her. Sometimes that stuff really does happen! There are a few more examples I have, but their bigger stories. Tipping Garbage Men, Postal Workers, etc. : I didn't start doing this until 2 or 3 years ago. I had never really considered it before, but I can say, you notice a service difference if you do it, at least for the garbage guys. I typically just give them a gift card. There are laws for postal workers about what they can accept (no cash, nothing over $20 in value). I just tape it to my mailbox with his name on it. This year I handed it to him. The garbage guys are trickier, I've just put the a Christmas card in a ziploc and put that ontop of the garbage can. Kind of weird, but it works.