sparks1093

Interesting. Never noticed that.

Except the control is completely illusory. It's like handing a waitress in a land-based establishment that pools tips a $100 bill with a tricky wink and saying, "this is only for you, don't put it in the tip pool". The waitress may assure you that she won't, but she probably will (although there are some who wouldn't, human nature being what it is). For me as a customer having the gratuities added to my account removes all of the guess work out of it since who is supposed to get a share of it, does. It also keeps me from having to carry a lot of cash around. Then if a crew member does something that warrants providing extra then I can do that, knowing that said crew member receives the full benefit of that extra.

I don't know if it is a function of my computer or of Cruise Critic but misspellings are underlined in red (and grammatical errors in blue). Posting too quickly is the weakness of computer forums, we post without thinking about it. Still, our posts appear to us as they will be posted, so I'm not sure an actual preview would help. If you meant to type "two" and typed "too" instead, then it was a typo.

But how many volunteer workers make their living at it?

That is what most errors do, especially typos. In ancient Rome when a conquering general was being paraded through the city a servant stood behind him holding a crown of laurel and repeating the words, "remember, you are mortal", to remind the general that the adulation he was receiving was only temporary. The typo serves the same function for us today.

In our for what it's worth department, our head waiter on our last cruise confirmed that she and her staff do share in the gratuity for drinks sold by them in the dining room and they get to keep any additional tip provided if someone has Cheers.

The way things change I doubt that much is valid after a couple of years, but I should have added "6 months of inactivity". If a thread is routinely active there is no need to lock it. But my suggestion wasn't adopted so it's a moot point.

They may not obsess over it as much, but I have certainly seen some obsessing over those folks as well.

Maybe, maybe not but until the employees that work for tips and the companies that use them want to end the practice, it won't end. I have no trouble with tipping and once I've left a tip I no longer care what happens to it. There have been times where I probably tipped someone who was making more than I made at that point in my life, but I still gave them a tip because they earned it.

Don't you mean "reading", Laura?🤣 Sorry, couldn't resist. As for older posts there is a delimiter that shows up in threads that says something like "posted 3 years later". It can be missed, but the date of the original post also appears on the main page under the thread title (and it also shows who the original poster is). I did suggest one time that posts be automatically locked after a certain passage of time (say, 6 months) but it wasn't adopted. A few threads down from this one I found: Flying to cruise with only personal bag 1234 By nycruise3, July 22, 2021 82 replies 2.3k views i-think-i-thank-i-thunk 6 hours ago From this we see that the thread was started by nycruise3 on July 22, 2021, has a recent reply of 6 hours ago, 82 replies and 2.3k views.

It's not surprising since society has been trending toward this age of self-centeredness since the 50's, at least.

Yes, that is also a common form of tipping but many establishments also pool the tips. (Many bars as well, that tipping jar is divided among the bar staff...as no doubt are the tips that are left via credit card.) I suspect that the most common method is employees keep their own tips, but pooled tips are also common.

The beauty of tipping pools, from an employee's perspective, is that the law of averages works in their favor. So with Cheers it undoubtedly works out in the crew's favor (if it did not then Carnival wouldn't be able to retain their staff). The beauty of Carnival's system is that the crew gets to keep any additional tip they receive over and above the daily amount/Cheers amount. I suspect in most land based establishments all tips go into the pool, so if you leave a little extra for your waitress (let's say 20% instead of 18%) that goes into the pool as well. (There may be some establishments that separate it out but that seems like an admin nightmare so probably not.)

Just ask Henry Hill.

We might not be at home, but our home is not empty.

I get that, but threads often take on a life of their own, especially these type.

The other thing to consider- if you remove the gratuities their manager is going to ask them why because the presumption is because of poor service on their part. If too many people remove gratuities in their section it can cause them a lot of grief.

Just like in many land based establishments tips are pooled and divvied up in accordance with agreements customers know nothing about. It is a matter of honor for a crew member who receives cash to verify that the customer left the auto gratuities in place, and if the customer did that than the crew member gets to keep it. If they did not then the crew member needs to turn it in. So, by removing the gratuities and tipping in cash customers are making these hard working crew members waste their precious off time to sort this out. (This is what I have discerned over years of reading different thread and articles about shipboard tipping.)

Gratuities for us have always posted to our account on the second or third day.

I don't mind telling people what I do, but at the same time I don't dive into specifics either. I used to fly with TACAMO when I was in the Navy and I knew that the response "ending the world as we know it" would stop any conversation, but I never had the chance to use it.

There is this, as well. It took me several Carnival cruises before I was able to give Blue Iguana a try.

If you only wanted one credit though that is what you should have gotten. One for $250 with $100 OBC leaving a net of $150.

It sounds like the Cruise Next desk sold the OP 2 future credits for $500 and the OP received $250 in OBC which left a net of $250 due. I have read about this before from other cruisers.

This is why I want to try the clam chowder, to compare it to what I'm used to eating. I'm hoping that it is at least passable. (Well, there is also the fact that I love clam chowder as well.)

They will have crew members directing you and with limited mobility the elevators are an option, as I understand it (in addition to the above).