The tales I`ve heard from people who work in the service industry are different.

Pouring coffee may be one thing if decent wages are mandated, but being a maid in a lot of large hotels is back-breaking work that is underpaid and involves effort completely out of proportion, to, say, being a bellhop who gets a buck per bag.  

Let`s put it another way: if one can afford a $250 hotel room (low average rate in downtown Toronto these days), and $25 per night for valet parking, then one can afford a buck a night for the maid to make up the room and a few dollars at the end of the stay to `change the room`.  If you leave a dollar each day on the bedside table with a small note saying `Thank you`in a hotel, the maid will often write out a reply that shows real appreciation.   Sometimes they will even stop you in the hall to briefly thank you personally because a lot of people don`t understand how much this small tip means to them both financially and as a gesture of respect.