Barmaids and waitresses

Taken from Charles Booth et al, Life and Labour of the Poor in London Second series: Industry Vol 4 (Macmillan, 1902), pp236-239

 In her report to the Labour Commission, Miss Eliza Orme deals fully with the conditions of employment of barmaids and waitresses, and  although some additional and corroborative evidence has been obtained, we are mainly indebted to her inquiry ?or the facts which follow. The hours of barmaids employed in public-house or railway refreshment bars are nearly always long, sometimes amounting to one hundred per week, but more commonly averaging seventy to eighty.  The following may be taken as a fairly typical example of a barmaid's working life:- She goes into the bar at 7 A.M., principally to dust and tidy up, has breakfast at 7.30, and then half an hour for dressing, returning to the bar before 8.30. Lunch at 10.30; an interval for dinner at 2 or 3 o'clock (the time varying according to the number of the staff employed), followed by about two hours' rest; tea at 5, supper at 8.30 and finish a few minutes after closing time (12.30). On Sunday she is in the bar from 12.45 till 3, and from 6 to 11 P.M. She has one Sunday and one week day off each month and a. week's holiday in summer.

In theatre and music-hall bars the hours are only from thirty to forty per week, work beginning at 6 or 7 P.M. and finishing between 11.30 and 12.30.

Sometimes in large establishments it is found practicable to work two sets. Thus in one of the principle railway bars one party of girls commences at 7am and works till 9.30pm, having intervals for meals and about 2.5 hours for rest, whilst a second party begins at 11.30am and finishing at 11pm.1 inclusive of meal times and one hours rest in the afternoon. Arranged to suit the peculiarities of their business this system may prevail in other branches of the trade.

There is on the whole a noticeable tendency towards a ten hours day for barmaids and waitresses.

In the matter of payment for services every variety of custom prevails, from wages with full board, lodging, washing etc, to wages without extras of any sort.

Hotel proprietors and large refreshment contractors mostly pay 10s to 12s with board and lodging, to ordinary barmaids, rising to 15s for first barmaids, and from 18s to 38s for manageresses. Gratuities form a considerable addition to the earnings of barmaids and waitresses in hotels and railway bars, often in the later case exceeding the wages.

Girls in the business usually commence at fifteen or sixteen years of age, and do not receive any payment for the first month. They most generally live at home with parents or near relations, but where they this is not the case and they have nothing but their own earnings to depend, it must be a hard matter for them to support themselves decently and keep up the respectable appearance which is necessary.

A barmaid at work today

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