Tip the Van drivers, especially if they get your bags for you or offer to drive you to dinner or the stores. It’s just called being nice. They don’t get paid a lot and they do a service for you. The more we take care of them the more they’ll take care of our Crews.

Putting on my barracks lawyer hat: tipping for services such as baggage handling and food service while on a business trip is in the very definition of "meals and incidental expenses" (M&IE). Which is why you get non-taxable per diem under IRS rules as a transportation worker while on trips which overnight away from base. (Source: IRS and ALPA)

Hate to break it to you, but the guy driving the La Quinta van isn't getting retainer from your employer. Whether you tip the van driver or not is up to you, I guess, but the intent of your $1.95/hr, or $46.80/24 hr period, is to cover expenses on the road. It ain't difficult to carve out part of that per diem and be a professional.

You may want to revisit your ALPA source it specifically mentions what’s not in M&IE

Sure, because professionalism is determined by how fat of a tip we leave for the van drivers.

I bet you are one of those guys that wears your hat and expect people to look at you in awe. You are a real piece of work.

You're probably referring to ALPA's guidance that items such as "transportation between places of lodging or business and places where meals are taken, telephone calls, laundry, cleaning and pressing, the mailing costs of filing travel vouchers, and payments for employer-sponsored credit card billings" are not considered incidental expenses. You are misinterpreting the transport line item because you are not paying the fare/fee for the transportation itself, which is a item separately reimbursed had you paid.

The tip portion is addressed separately, and specifically, under the definition of an incidental expense. Examples:

From IRS Publication 463: "The term "incidental expenses" means fees and tips given to porters, baggage carriers, hotel staff, and staff on ships."

GSA on per diem:
"What is considered an incidental expense? The Federal Travel Regulation Chapter 300, Part 300-3, under Per Diem Allowance, describes incidental expenses as: [F}ees and tips given to porters, baggage carriers, hotel staff, and staff on ships."

Oh my god, this horrible topic has migrated.

Ha. The eternal debate over van tips is at least a change from our normal programming. Don't worry, we'll be back to the usual soon enough.

One of the proudest moments of my life has been that I derailed this thread with one post.