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tips?


Redtravel
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Yes you can use your OBC for that. If you like to tip extra for an extraordinary service of a crew member that is up to you. On our last Riviera cruise we tipped our stewardess and her assistant.

John

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The OBC goes on your account

the daily gratuiites will be deducted 1st from any $ on the account then any onboard purchases are deducted

if you have a balance owing it will go to your credit card

you will get a letter on the last full day if you still have OBC to use up

 

no need to tip in advance

you will get service

 

yes we tip extra in cash to room service person at the time of delivery

we tip the housekeeping staff extra in cash with note of thanks

also mention the names of special staff in the cruise survey ..that goes a long way for them for promotions etc...

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And most important: if you are lucky enough to have refundable OBC from your travel agent or whomever, you can cash that out and take it with you when you leave the ship. Refundable obc doesn't need to be spent on-board! It's nice to have a generous travel agent. :D:D

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Even to your butler (for room service)?

 

I dont tip for room service because our butler brings it in and at the end of the trip I always leave a generous additional cash tip for him..

Jancruz1

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I echo the advice of naming a person(s) who has been of great service to you on the survey. On our last cruise several crew thanked us for naming them because they had been told by management of our appreciation.

 

All of those surveys are seen by corporate so that mentioning the crew, officers and the Master will be seen by the bosses.

 

BTW....we also tipped the laundry crew at the end of the cruise. We were on ATW and some of our clothes should have been taken to the creek and beaten on rocks before ever being loaded into the machines!!! They performed miracles!

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Hi RT,

 

>tips are an extra $16 pp which is charged to your cabin

 

This is not a "tip". It is a service fee.

 

A tip is a gift you give the staff for "great service".

 

Enjoy your cruise.

Ira

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Hi RT,

 

>tips are an extra $16 pp which is charged to your cabin

 

This is not a "tip". It is a service fee.

 

A tip is a gift you give the staff for "great service".

 

Enjoy your cruise.

Ira

Kind of a grey area about the service fee. It can be deducted or reduced at the end of the cruise, so I always think of it as a tip. I think only once in all the years did we reduce the tipping and that was a long time ago. The cruise from hell. NOT OCEANIA. Also we tip our butler extra at the end of the cruise for all he does for us besides the room service.

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Hi RT,

 

>tips are an extra $16 pp which is charged to your cabin

 

This is not a "tip". It is a service fee.

 

A tip is a gift you give the staff for "great service".

 

Enjoy your cruise.

Ira

Not sure what you mean "This is not a tip"!

 

Definition of gratuity: "a gift of money, over and above payment due for service, as to a waiter or bellhop; tip."

 

 

Yes, the $16 a day is a gratuity! see above.

Anything extra that you give to a waiter, etc is at your discretion. Every time you buy a drink, 18% is added.

Lots of discussion on this topic in other threads.

Each to their own discretion.

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No never the Butler for room service that they handle....,For the Butler at the end of the cruise----

 

We tip the regular butler at the end of the cruise, but when we order Room Service after hours, a different butler will be filling in and we will tip him "on the night".

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Stan and/or Jim,

 

Do you know (not think or guess, but really know) who participates in the distribution of the pot collected as "gratuities" from the basic cabin gratuity charge ($16 per person per day, $32 per room), the butler charge ($7 per person per day, $14 per room) and the 18% charge added to each alcoholic beverage?

 

 

Here's why I'm wondering:

 

 

On an 'O' ship (Riviera or Marina), if it were at full capacity, the 625 rooms (double occupancy) would yield $20,000 per day, and the 147 rooms that have butler service ($14 per day) yield $2,058. Total = $22,058 per day.

Each Room Steward(ess) and assistant handles more than 1 room, but I don't know how many more. Is it 10 rooms -- 15 rooms? Let's say it's 10 for ease of math. $32 per day, times 10 rooms is $320 a day. On a 10 day cruise (again, for ease of math), that's $3,200. I doubt that amount goes solely to those 2 cabin cleaning staff.

 

 

How many rooms does a butler handle? Probably more PH per butler than the upper suites OS, VS, and OC. So if a butler handles 10 penthouses, that's $140 a day, or $1,400 for a $10 day cruise. Again, I doubt that total amount goes to that 1 butler.

 

 

And, how about the beverage 18% add-on? How does that get distributed? For people without a drink package, I understand the 18% attached to each drink. But for the House Select package, if someone has 2 glasses of $11 a glass wine at lunch and another two $11 a glass drinks at dinner, their total is $44 for the wine and $7.92 for gratuity. That's $51.92 against a daily package charge of $40. Where does the overage come from to go into the gratuity pot? And it can get much worse for someone with the Premium package at $60 per day -- it's very easy to get over $100 a day in beverage cost and $18 to $20 a day in gratuities.

Where does that extra come from? And how do the various bar-tending staff benefit from the gratuities?

 

OK, so, once all that gratuity money somehow gets dumped into a pot, how does it get distributed, and to whom?

 

No, this stuff doesn't keep me awake at night trying to figure it out, but when I read these tipping threads, I start to wonder.

 

So, Stan and/or Jim, can you help?

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Not Jim

but I will take a wild guess

The daily Gratuity will be put in the "pool" & divided up among all the housekeeping staff & food service waiters in all dining venues .. depending on how many hours worked that cruise ...

All Bar staff including the bar waiters get a share of the 18% tax/tip

 

So take your $20000 (for ease of math) divide by 200 crew (probably more than that) Housekeeping a dining waitstaff

Then divide by the number of hours worked pd

some can work up to 10 -14 hrs a day

 

This is all speculation on my part I have no insider info

 

I just leave it up to the cruise line to figure it all out

YMMD

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Then divide by the number of hours worked pd

some can work up to 10 -14 hrs a day

Crew work 70 hours/week. I know this because I've asked senior officers and staff on three different lines: Oceania, HAL & Cunard. In my book, and I've worked in the hospitality industry for a few years, they earn every penny.

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Stan and/or Jim,

 

Do you know (not think or guess, but really know) who participates in the distribution of the pot collected as "gratuities" from the basic cabin gratuity charge ($16 per person per day, $32 per room), the butler charge ($7 per person per day, $14 per room) and the 18% charge added to each alcoholic beverage?

 

 

Here's why I'm wondering:

 

 

On an 'O' ship (Riviera or Marina), if it were at full capacity, the 625 rooms (double occupancy) would yield $20,000 per day, and the 147 rooms that have butler service ($14 per day) yield $2,058. Total = $22,058 per day.

Each Room Steward(ess) and assistant handles more than 1 room, but I don't know how many more. Is it 10 rooms -- 15 rooms? Let's say it's 10 for ease of math. $32 per day, times 10 rooms is $320 a day. On a 10 day cruise (again, for ease of math), that's $3,200. I doubt that amount goes solely to those 2 cabin cleaning staff.

 

 

How many rooms does a butler handle? Probably more PH per butler than the upper suites OS, VS, and OC. So if a butler handles 10 penthouses, that's $140 a day, or $1,400 for a $10 day cruise. Again, I doubt that total amount goes to that 1 butler.

 

 

And, how about the beverage 18% add-on? How does that get distributed? For people without a drink package, I understand the 18% attached to each drink. But for the House Select package, if someone has 2 glasses of $11 a glass wine at lunch and another two $11 a glass drinks at dinner, their total is $44 for the wine and $7.92 for gratuity. That's $51.92 against a daily package charge of $40. Where does the overage come from to go into the gratuity pot? And it can get much worse for someone with the Premium package at $60 per day -- it's very easy to get over $100 a day in beverage cost and $18 to $20 a day in gratuities.

Where does that extra come from? And how do the various bar-tending staff benefit from the gratuities?

 

OK, so, once all that gratuity money somehow gets dumped into a pot, how does it get distributed, and to whom?

 

No, this stuff doesn't keep me awake at night trying to figure it out, but when I read these tipping threads, I start to wonder.

 

So, Stan and/or Jim, can you help?

 

Here's how I look at it. I let Oceania's management and workers worry about how these things work. If the workers aren't happy then they'll find another career. Most seem to be happy working on Oceania. I've never really thought about it being any of my business.

 

I just worry about having a good time.

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don't forget the guys who are at the tenders, the guys in the engine room, the laundry guys, the maintenance people (plumbers, electricians, etc). as well as all the kitchen staff and the cleaners of the larger public rooms

 

There are a bunch of people that share in the pot.

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Crew work 70 hours/week. I know this because I've asked senior officers and staff on three different lines: Oceania, HAL & Cunard. In my book, and I've worked in the hospitality industry for a few years, they earn every penny.

So that falls in my guesstimate

 

I have worked 10-12 hr days in retail & some of the public are not always kind :(

 

Yes the crew earn every penny IMO

 

I agree with ORV ..if the crew were not happy on the ship we would not see them resigning contracts year after year

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don't forget the guys who are at the tenders, the guys in the engine room, the laundry guys, the maintenance people (plumbers, electricians, etc). as well as all the kitchen staff and the cleaners of the larger public rooms

 

There are a bunch of people that share in the pot.

Most of those positions are salaried

Those cleaners that check the washrooms & vacuum I believe they fall under Housekeeping staff

Edited by LHT28
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cbb,

 

This is one of the things I wondered. Are you saying that the members of the crew, which I view as the people that make the ship go and maintain the ship (as opposed to the hotel side which is servers, room stewards, bartenders, kitchen staff, and so on), also participate in the gratuity pot? I would have thought the ship's crew members would be on straight salary. I would think the hotel side would have at least a base salary supplemented by gratuities.

 

Since people can opt out of paying gratuities at checkout, there could be a cruise that ended up with every passenger deciding to withhold gratuities (I know, pretty far-fetched, but....). And that same cruise could have been the annual International Temperance League Convention, so no booze being poured. (I know, again pretty far-fetched). But that could leave 'O' with no money to distribute.

 

It seems to me that the "gratuities" are actually factored as part of the hotel staff's basic salary, otherwise, why would they be a fixed amount for each person/cabin? And why is it the same amount for a 175 sq. ft inside stateroom and the 2,000 sq. ft Owner's Suite?

 

Before you call the SPCA and accuse me of beating a dead horse, I'll stop.

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And why is it the same amount for a 175 sq. ft inside stateroom and the 2,000 sq. ft Owner's Suite?

 

The short answer is that the Gratuities are not the same for an Inside versus the Owners Suite....

 

There are more attendants in a Suite, so those Passengers tip substantially more.

 

Still worth every penny IMHO

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