poobears

Why do you care. It really is none of your business; do you tell people what you get paid. What is the obsession with this topic????

 

 

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That's kind of what I'm wondering. Why is their pay anyones business? Do you go up to sales people and ask them what their commission rate is? Do you ask your waitress what her base pay is and make sure you leave a huge tip because you feel bad she is making such a small wage? Do you ask the house keeper at the hotels you go to what they make and how many rooms they have clean before you leave them their tip so you can adjust it accordingly?

The conclusion I've come to is before I was giving them extra tips for twice a day service with all the extras little touches. Now I'll just leave Carnivals standard tips in place and accept their once a day service without the extra touches for the increased price and leave no additional tip. Standard service=standard tip

I'm gonna have to let the kids and DH know we are high ballers now, why didn't anyone tell us year ago? lol

As far as cutting back on portions sizes isn't it about time? There's really no reason for Carnival or any other dining facility to serve massive portion sizes and the majority of people to leave food on the plate while they move onto dessert or something else. It's totally wasteful. Serve a proper size meal and those that want/need another can order another, keeps the waste down. Nothing wrong with that. It's not cutbacks, it's common sense.

Not quite. You missed a big "if". "If" you are upset that Carnival stewards are not getting paid enough for the amount of work they do, you can solve that with one of 2 solutions. Tip more therefore they will get paid more for your cabin. Or quit cruising with Carnival so they won't have to clean your cabin. More money for same amount of work or same money for less work. But if too many people take the second option, it could lead to staff reductions. More people out of work. And the last if is if you want Carnival to pay them more, they will probably raise their fares. It all comes down to a free market mixture of supply and demand.

Awww that makes more sense, see I knew I was missing something. Yes I totally agree with that.

Hires them? I would think Carnival would have to do the hiring. They would have to have interviews, background checks, etc.

What they mean is they are paying employees that are already on the ship to help them out. People that want to pickup extra money. I use to do the same thing as a waitress. If someone wanted to pick up some extra cash and had some time on their hands I would share my tips and have them bus my tables for me or run drinks or something. Room stewards are really not that different than waitresses/waiters. They get a low base wage and then work for tips, the more cabins/tables they serve the better their wages are. You want to make your job easier you slide a little cash to someone wanting some extra money and have them help you out.

Thanks for all the info, his phone does have wifi calling so he was wondering if he'd still be able to do it without being charged. I will let him know that will work. Verizon told him since he has the higher data plan that he qualifies for the cruise plan of $2 a day for MX and his texts and calls there will just come off his domestic data. So he will be able to call and text in port (will make him keep his phone in airplane mode on the ships service while on board). They did not mention a $20 charge to activate it though. It wouldn't be worth paying $20 to activate it, just says he'll have a $2 fee for whatever days he uses it internationally. I'll have him look into it some more.

I need to see if my phone has wifi calling on it, bought a new one the other day so it might. If not I'll keep in touch with DH with FB messenger once or twice a day.

I will not reduce tips due to once a day cleaning as long as I have enough towels and dirty ones are kept cleaned up, I just won't tip extra anymore since we are already paying more. I have always prepaid tips and have never even considered removing them. However after reading a few posts about recent attitudes by stewards I will say that would be the rare exception I would make to tipping.

I may not remove tips for once a day service but dang sure would remove tips for a rude steward. I treat everyone I come in contact with respect but I expect the same in return. Any steward that got an attitude with me would find him/herself with no tips for the week and a complaint filed and I would do my best to ensure it would only effect their specific tips and not others in the cleaning pool, even if meant going down to CS and standing there for an hour while they figured out how much I needed to remove for just that one person.

The stewards are actually working for us as the passengers. We can allow Carnival to charge us more in hopes they will pay the stewards more. Or we can just tip the stewards more and in effect pay them more directly. We have the ability to make it where stewards get paid more. If we don't want to do that on top of what Carnival charges us, we can just not cruise. It's all a choice. The stewards can also choose to work somewhere else if that is an option. It is called a free market system.

I had to have read that wrong, you aren't suggesting if people dont' want to tip above what Carnival is already charging in tips they should just stop cruising are you?

I'm fine with once a day too as long as towels are taken care of. I won't be tipping over anymore though. With the increase in tips and decrease in service I see no reason for additional tips. Before you got twice a day service whether you needed it or not and all the extra touches. Now you get bare bones service once a day, or maybe twice if you are lucky or if you threaten to remove tips (which I would never do).

Like I said I'm fine with once a day but will not reward less service by paying more than required for it. I'll save my extra tips for those that add more to my vacation, I'm already paying extra with the increased tips and that more than covers the services I am getting with once a day cleaning.

It's in no way a punishment to the stewards they are getting their full pay since I prepay tips, they just aren't getting the extra tip, but they are doing half the work or less on my room and getting paid by many more rooms so not a bad deal on their part.

Actually you owe whatever the deposit it at the time you make the price adjustment. Right now isn't there a sale going on again for $50 deposits? If so you wouldn't owe anything more for deposits because once again there is a $50 deposit sale going on.

I booked under a $50 deposit sale, the later I changed rooms during a 1/2 price deposit sale. I had to pay the difference between the $50 deposits I paid and the 1/2 price deposits I would have to pay under the new sale, I did not have to pay the full deposits.

Of course he's making more money, he gets paid by the cabin. The more cabins they service, the more money they make. Sorry but I do think he was playing the poor me card if he told you he was making the same tending to 38 cabins as he was 20 or whatever he was before.

Why is everyone so hung up on the LATE time of this check in. They are all comparing it to the typical 10-10:30 check in. That is not what this cruise is. This is a late boarding cruise. No one is getting on this ship in the morning. The OP booked a LATE boarding cruise. That is what she picked from the start. Even with FTTF she wouldn't get on in the morning because it's not a morning boarding cruise. It's a afternoon/evening boarding.

Her 6-6:30 check in is the same as an afternoon check in on a day cruise, you get on after most are already eating or have eaten lunch. If she didn't want night time check in, she should have booked a cruise that ported out in the morning instead of the evening. No one including carnival can change that.

I personally wouldn't want to board late afternoon so I wouldn't book a cruise that boards in the afternoon even with FTTF. Simple

That's the itinerary several of the shorter ones are getting stuck with. Unfortunately other ports are probably full. That's one port I sure wouldn't want to be in overnight. Who wants to be in a port with safety warnings after dark all night? From what I've heard the shops are open and the casino does open around 8pm. I would just plan on staying on board in the evening and treating it as a sea day/evening.

For 3 or 4 hours I'd leave the day of but early enough to account for any major delays. Our closest port is about 14 hours, GPS says 11 to NO but actual driving is about 14. That is where next weeks cruise is and I can get there in a day as long as there are no road delays, we had plans to go down on Thursday for a Sat. cruise so we had a day to chill but DS switched shifts at work so he'll have an extra day off, now we'll take 2 days driving down. Get down earlier and have 1.5 days to roam around the town. I've been there before but it's still nice to arrive early and relax.

That's how I figured it would work. I will let him know to keep it on airplane mode while on the ship and buy the social package from Carnival while on the ship. Make sure he only uses his phone in the port. Thanks

Asking for my DS he has Verizon as his carrier and they have a travel pass for using on a cruises, you put in your ship and it tells you if it's compatible or not. We are going on Triumph next week and for $2 supposedly it uses your domestic data while you are on the cruise. But how would that work, you aren't connected to Verizon towers out in the ocean, you have to connect to Carnivals satellite, he'd still have to pay for a data plan with Carnival right?

I'm assuming this travel pass if for use in ports not on the ship. I don't have Verizon. I have straighttalk and mine doesn't work in ports so I'll be using a ship package for sure and it will be a camera in port, wont' be good for anything else lol

The problem is someone has to be in the late slots, some prefer to be in them and some get stuck in them because they book last minute or they simply don't pay attention as in OPs case and don't select a spot in time to get a lower one.

All anyone is saying is follow the rules and don't expect to be the exception. You don't have to like the rules, you just have to abide by them. You know them (or you should, if you don't read them, that's on you) going in so either accept them or take your business else where. Seems like OP has decided since she can't be the exception to the rules she will take her business to another line which is definitely her choice.

Seems silly to me since she is Platinum after this cruise and will have priority boarding but if something this minor is all it takes for her to change lines I would say she was ready to change anyways. Nothing wrong with expanding your horizons and cruising other lines. No one should feel like they are trapped sailing one line anyways. Get out there and sail other lines, you may find one that love more or you find yourself right back where you started with a new appreciation for it. Just don't expect other lines to make exceptions for you either because they won't.

For me the length of cruise doesn't matter I go for a balcony. I don't really spend money on anything else while on board since I don't drink and they made the casino smoking so I can't spend much time in there if any. I will do a game of bingo now and then but can take it or leave it. I am definitely not Carnivals target cruiser, they don't make a bunch of money off me while on board and I usually book excursions separate from the ship.

If I had to choose inside or no cruise at all I would try an inside but I spend a lot of time in my room on the balcony so can't imagine having as good as experience sitting in a closet lol

FTTF is quite limited. Not everyone can just purchase FTTF and use it, it does sell out pretty much every cruise. I would bet on a cruise with check-in's this late, it would go very fast. I would bet if they got stuck with this late a check-in time that the FTTF's are long gone as an option, unless they lucky and one comes up from someone dropping.

My point was OP stated even if was available they wouldn't have given Carnival more money to get it. Of course later they came and said well it's not available anyways. But originally they wouldn't have taken the option even if they could just because they didn't think they should have to because they should be an exception due to having kids. Tons of cruisers have kids, that doesn't make them unique and neither does being almost platinum.

It's kind of like finding a hotel in New Orleans for a Halloween cruise. My favorite hotel could have been booked earlier in the year for $79 on Hotwire for next weekend according to some others that will be cruising then, by the time I checked hotels that same one was running around $200-250 a night. I didn't really want to pay that much knowing we never paid that much before. Then the price went to $400-500 per night :eek: Obviously I wasn't paying that but all other hotels in the area that were safe and decent were high or sold out too. My fault for not paying attention when I should have early on. I had no idea Halloween was such a big weekend in NO, plus they have a big football game going on that weekend.

Calling hotels and pleading my case sure wouldn't have gotten me anywhere. Nor should it have, it was on me for not doing my part, not on them. I guess I could say I'm never cruising out of NO again or never staying at that hotel again but why? I'm the one that didn't look when I should have.

Didn't Carnival pushed this whole once a day service thing as "for the customers". Supposedly we wanted more time to spend with the stewards to chat (does anyone really want this?) so they were going to once a day service with no turndown to give the stewards time to get to know you more. Or did I imagine that?

Yet from what the stewards tell us they went to once a day and almost doubled their room count. Either the stewards are playing the poor me card and just trying to get out of twice a cleaning knowing they have that option now or Carnival fed everyone a load of bull. The truth probably lies some where in the middle. Stewards are playing it up a bit and Carnival knew they were increasing their rooms and hoping people would go for the once a day so they could cut back on workers.

A friend left from Port Canaval last week (dont remember the ship) but he had to select once a day service

 

I don't see a problem as long as they keep the towels fresh or ice bucket do we really need the room cleaned 2x a day? Do you clean your house or bedroom 2x a day? And remember when you remove tips you hurt the worker not the billion dollar company if you wanna hurt the company don't book with any carnivals owned company

You aren't paying anyone at home, I assume you don't keep ice in your bedroom at home to chill drinks either do you?

Personally I don't see filling an ice bucket as a room stewards job. Their job is cleaning the room, that includes extra towels or blankets if you need it. Ice is an extra job that is nice if they include it but I don't necessarily see it as one of their job duties just because Carnival use to have them do it automatically. I'm sure they waste a lot of time filling up peoples ice buckets and to me guests that want ice can carry that bucket up to the Lido and get their own or Carnival could put public ice machines on each floor like hotels do, but I doubt they do that because kids and some adults would be scattering ice around from them and making a mess.

There are tons of things to do in Charleston with kids - why not make it a tourist vacation day? (Make lemonade from that lemon!)

 

 

The Aquarium - very near the port - is wonderful! Plenty of free parking and you'd be minutes from the cruise ship parking area, with no need to wrestle with downtown Charleston (though of course downtown Charleston is one of the loveliest cities in the World).

 

Also, though you'll need reservations, take the trip to Fort Sumter - it leaves from the same place as the Aquarium. Great boat ride (we had dolphins swimming along side), and all ages can enjoy Fort Sumter (great place for kids to run around, explore, and get a piece of American history).

 

Between the Aquarium and the Fort Sumter excursion, you'd easily use up all the time after check out and before boarding.

 

Again, look at this as a wonderful opportunity to add a second vacation to your holiday!

This is exactly what I'm talking about. Make it a fun day for the kids. Why sit and pout in a parking lot for hours when you don't have to? There are tons of things to do around town, make it part of your vacation, that's what we would do if we had a late to take a late check in. In fact we'd probably check out of the hotel earlier in the day instead of a late check out so we could get in lots of activities prior to boarding.

Guess it's all in the attitude, if someone wants to start your cruise off with a bad one, nobody can stop them. I sure don't.

Everyone thinks they should be the exception. You have the option of FTTF but you don't want to take it so you accept the alternative of being patient and boarding later. If it's not worth $70 or whatever FTTF would cost to make sure the kids are on board, fed and comfortable then it's really not important enough to make a fuss over. IMO

I'm sure you can find a local childrens museum or park for them to spend some fun time at instead of sitting in a car if you want. Have a picnic and some family time pre cruise.

When the seas get rough they shut them down, even if people are playing them, they will stop them from playing and shut them down. When we are on the Holiday, we ran into a big storm and it tossed it around good. They shut those babies down quick. They pulled the players off and told them sorry, they would open them back up when the seas settled. If they would have left them open even 3 or 4 more minutes those guys would have cleaned up lol