The product is the easy part. Getting tipped well is a skill, and the people who are good at it do specific things. Here is what the babes actually report back.
1. Tell them where to hold the phone
This is the single biggest one. Most phones read NFC near the top of the back of the handset, and most people instinctively wave the middle of the phone at it. One sentence — “hold the top of your phone here” — fixes almost every failed tap.
Failed taps are not a tech problem. They are an instruction problem.
2. Make the ask physical, not verbal
Shouting a handle over music loses people. Gesturing at something they can tap does not. You are replacing a memory task with a physical one, and physical wins every time in a loud room.
3. Set a default amount if your app allows it
PayPal.Me lets you suggest an amount. A suggestion removes the most awkward decision in tipping — how much is normal here — and people generally round up rather than down.
4. Use a link tree if your crowd is mixed
Point your pair at a Linktree with Cash App, Venmo and PayPal on it. Then nobody has to install anything, because they will already have one of the three. Several of our highest-earning babes do it this way.
Every extra step between wanting to tip you and tipping you costs you money. Your whole job is removing steps.
5. Check your privacy settings before a shift
Venmo in particular: if your account is private, people who do not follow you may not be able to pay you. Test it on a friend’s phone before you rely on it for a night.
6. Apply them properly or nothing else matters
Clean, dry skin. No lotion, no oil, no shimmer. Press from the centre out for ten seconds and leave them alone for five minutes before getting dressed — body heat is what sets the adhesive. Oil is the only thing that reliably beats it.
7. Wear the loud design
Pasties that get noticed get tapped. The subtle ones are beautiful and the loud ones make money, because somebody has to ask about it before they can tap it. If a design starts conversations, it is doing its job.
8. Say something when they tap
The tap is a moment. Acknowledge it — eye contact, a thank you, anything. People who feel seen tip again later in the night, and they tell their friends to try it.
9. Keep a spare pair
Adhesive has a lifespan; the chip does not. The worst version of this night is the one where a pastie gives up at 11pm and your income goes with it. This is the whole reason we built the monthly restock club.
None of this requires you to be anyone other than who you already are at work. It just removes the friction between somebody wanting to pay you and actually doing it.