Tips on board

[devonuk]

10 hours ago, Purdey16 said:

Sorry you had a bad first day on sky princess she is a lovely ship I was on her a few weeks back and everything was perfect staff and all so helpful, Wowzz and a few others are on her today so hopefully they all have a perfect time. 
can you share your bad experience? so it might help any others on board now.

Woeful waiting staff, being charged for a bottle of wine we never ordered, being led to our table via the waiters corridor in Cielo, being sat next to a ‘waiters station’ despite specifically requesting moments earlier not to be. I could go on but I guess you get the picture. The bar staffing was woefully inadequate too with 20+ mins waiting for a drink being the norm..! This all in the first night…
Once discussed with the maitre d the following evening was so much better in the Cielo but the bar issue never really improved 😞
Despite all of this the waiters and stateroom attendant did very well for their Crew Incentive direct from us. 

[wowzz]

12 hours ago, Purdey16 said:

Sorry you had a bad first day on sky princess she is a lovely ship I was on her a few weeks back and everything was perfect staff and all so helpful, Wowzz and a few others are on her today so hopefully they all have a perfect time. 
can you share your bad experience? so it might help any others on board now.

We have the Princess Plus package, so even if we wanted to, it is impossible to withhold the autotips.

Only got onboard at 15:15 (90 minutes in total from arriving at the terminal to entering our cabin)

Obviously early days, but drink waiters are everywhere asking if we want a drink, and the staff are uniformly friendly. Much more cheerful than P&O staff, due to the different demographic make up of the crew.

Obviously a virtually brand new ship, and it is immaculate - it will be a bit of a culture shock when we go on Arcadia in March.

 

[Purdey16]

49 minutes ago, wowzz said:

We have the Princess Plus package, so even if we wanted to, it is impossible to withhold the autotips.

Only got onboard at 15:15 (90 minutes in total from arriving at the terminal to entering our cabin)

Obviously early days, but drink waiters are everywhere asking if we want a drink, and the staff are uniformly friendly. Much more cheerful than P&O staff, due to the different demographic make up of the crew.

Obviously a virtually brand new ship, and it is immaculate - it will be a bit of a culture shock when we go on Arcadia in March.

 

Have a lovely time wowzz we did on her , only had 1 hiccup with waiting for a drink and that was the day the crew done emergency drills and we were docked in Portland and crew were aloud off for the first time in months, so low on crew serving drinks in the hot tub 😁 I waited for a hour and asked any waiter I saw and in the end 3 came at once 😂 , don’t forget you can ask for a beer unopened to take back to your room to drink later but I’m sure you know all that stuff 🥂 enjoy yourselfs 😎

[picsa]

On 10/22/2021 at 7:17 AM, devonuk said:

In conversation with my cabin attendant he revealed he gets $2 a day per person per cabin. 

Let’s do the maths.

 

$2 per person per cabin is $4 on average per cabin per day.

 

The steward takes around 15 minutes to deal with my cabin, so let’s assume everyone is the same, that is four cabins an hour at $16, which equates to around £12 an hour.

 

Not too bad as their pay is tax free and comes with accommodation and food, and certainly better than the (taxed) £8.36 an hour the hotel staff in the UK are paid.

 

And whilst you were discussing the personal subject of salaries, did you tell them how much you were paid…

 

 

 

[davecttr]

52 minutes ago, picsa said:

Let’s do the maths.

 

$2 per person per cabin is $4 on average per cabin per day.

 

The steward takes around 15 minutes to deal with my cabin, so let’s assume everyone is the same, that is four cabins an hour at $16, which equates to around £12 an hour.

 

Not too bad as their pay is tax free and comes with accommodation and food, and certainly better than the (taxed) £8.36 an hour the hotel staff in the UK are paid.

 

And whilst you were discussing the personal subject of salaries, did you tell them how much you were paid…

 

 

 

If they service say 15 cabins that is $60 per day for say 12 hours which is $5 per hour. However I remember a discussion some time ago about how much they actually earn but can't find it.

Edited October 24, 2021 by davecttr

[Cruisemeister2002]

On 10/21/2021 at 7:40 PM, yorkshirephil said:

There are thousands of posts on many threads on here about tipping, many arguments between Brits and Americans and their opinions on tipping.

 

I have heard mention of people not turning up on the last night yet in almost 50 cruises have never experienced it on our tables, we opted for tables 8/10. Lots of cruise lines started adding tips to the onboard account, but most allowed people to remove them which again was a bone of contention on here. There were threads stating that said cruise lines informed their staff of people who removed tips, which also caused many arguments and bad feeling. Whether that was true is doubtful IMHO, but some folk claimed they knew it to be true.

 

Have definitely heard of people going to the Services desk and filling in a form saying they don't wish to tip. There is I believe an option where you can put an amount, rather than decline paying altogether. As I say, I much preferred tipping as it's more personal. A friendly gesture for good service and I do believe it keeps standards up. I know this as I was once a waiter many years ago. We had a "Trunk" which was where all tips were put and shared out at the weeks end. To show you how long ago it was The Maitre D and wine waiters got about £5. Me being a junior got £2. This would be a way for Cruise Companies to go. But I suppose why they did what they did was because A) People went AWOL from their tables the last night, so as to avoid having to tip B) Because Bar staff and others missed out.

[majortom10]

12 hours ago, picsa said:

Let’s do the maths.

 

$2 per person per cabin is $4 on average per cabin per day.

 

The steward takes around 15 minutes to deal with my cabin, so let’s assume everyone is the same, that is four cabins an hour at $16, which equates to around £12 an hour.

 

Not too bad as their pay is tax free and comes with accommodation and food, and certainly better than the (taxed) £8.36 an hour the hotel staff in the UK are paid.

 

And whilst you were discussing the personal subject of salaries, did you tell them how much you were paid…

 

 

 

Yes but staff in the hospitality trade in the UK get paid by the hour for the hours employed where as a cabin steward will only get paid $2pp per cabin and is dependent on how many cabins he/she is allocated to service. Not knowing how many let's just say 10 for example with 2 people in each cabin that equates to $40 for a days work which starts in the early hours of the morning  and finishes after turndown if carried out with perhaps a rest period in between that the is average at todays exchange rate approx £30. For living on the job with very little free time and working 9 months away from home that is IMO very poor wages and you wouldnt get anyone doing it for that price in hospitality trade in the UK.

Edited October 25, 2021 by majortom10

[wowzz]

Equating crew wages to those in the UK is irrelevant. The point is that the crew earn more than they would do in their home countries, and, to all intents and purposes, given that their board and accomodation are paid, their salary is totally theirs.

Many of the crew return on multiple contracts - they are not press ganged into signing up.

I do not care what they are paid - their choice, none of my business.

[brian1]

2 hours ago, Cruisemeister2002 said:

Have definitely heard of people going to the Services desk and filling in a form saying they don't wish to tip. There is I believe an option where you can put an amount, rather than decline paying altogether. As I say, I much preferred tipping as it's more personal. A friendly gesture for good service and I do believe it keeps standards up. I know this as I was once a waiter many years ago. We had a "Trunk" which was where all tips were put and shared out at the weeks end. To show you how long ago it was The Maitre D and wine waiters got about £5. Me being a junior got £2. This would be a way for Cruise Companies to go. But I suppose why they did what they did was because A) People went AWOL from their tables the last night, so as to avoid having to tip B) Because Bar staff and others missed out.

A trunk full of money,"gis a job".

[devonuk]

19 hours ago, picsa said:

Let’s do the maths.

 

$2 per person per cabin is $4 on average per cabin per day.

 

The steward takes around 15 minutes to deal with my cabin, so let’s assume everyone is the same, that is four cabins an hour at $16, which equates to around £12 an hour.

 

Not too bad as their pay is tax free and comes with accommodation and food, and certainly better than the (taxed) £8.36 an hour the hotel staff in the UK are paid.

 

And whilst you were discussing the personal subject of salaries, did you tell them how much you were paid…

 

 

 

I retired aged 48 yrs and he wouldn’t believe how much my pension is 😬 That said I would never be so insensitive as to ‘rub it in’. He certainly got a lot more from me than he would have ordinarily 👍 

[wowzz]

22 minutes ago, LynnForestgate said:

 

Having spoken to the Waiters and Cabin stewards about tipping, its normally the Brits who do a runner on the last evening of the cruise and don't tip at all.

Have heard this many times

Although now that tips are included on many lines, there is no need to do a runner at all.

[picsa]

On 10/25/2021 at 11:23 AM, majortom10 said:

Yes but staff in the hospitality trade in the UK get paid by the hour for the hours employed where as a cabin steward will only get paid $2pp per cabin and is dependent on how many cabins he/she is allocated to service. Not knowing how many let's just say 10 for example with 2 people in each cabin that equates to $40 for a days work which starts in the early hours of the morning  and finishes after turndown if carried out with perhaps a rest period in between that the is average at todays exchange rate approx £30. For living on the job with very little free time and working 9 months away from home that is IMO very poor wages and you wouldnt get anyone doing it for that price in hospitality trade in the UK.

 

But why would the cabin steward only be allocated 10 cabins? Ten cabins would take less than three hours to service in the mornings (and evening turndown service no longer happens) - what else are they doing with the rest of the day?

[wowzz]

39 minutes ago, picsa said:

 

But why would the cabin steward only be allocated 10 cabins? Ten cabins would take less than three hours to service in the mornings (and evening turndown service no longer happens) - what else are they doing with the rest of the day?

And I also not convinced that stewards get paid on a per cabin basis.

[Son of Anarchy]

50 minutes ago, picsa said:

 

But why would the cabin steward only be allocated 10 cabins? Ten cabins would take less than three hours to service in the mornings (and evening turndown service no longer happens) - what else are they doing with the rest of the day?

Helping out in the MDR at dinner service.

[davecttr]

5 hours ago, picsa said:

 

But why would the cabin steward only be allocated 10 cabins? Ten cabins would take less than three hours to service in the mornings (and evening turndown service no longer happens) - what else are they doing with the rest of the day?

Of course some passengers only stagger out of their cabins late morning  but the steward has to wait for them. They are also doing additional duties clearing tables etc etc

[terrierjohn]

3 minutes ago, davecttr said:

Of course some passengers only stagger out of their cabins late morning  but the steward has to wait for them. They are also doing additional duties clearing tables etc etc

Well the sooner they get back to full time stewarding, the better as far as I am concerned.

[emam]

12 hours ago, picsa said:

 

But why would the cabin steward only be allocated 10 cabins? Ten cabins would take less than three hours to service in the mornings (and evening turndown service no longer happens) - what else are they doing with the rest of the day?

 

Sleeping. That's what our steward said she did on an afternoon. Granted this was pre Covid. 

 

What I can't understand is, if they are so poorly paid why are they so desperate to return for another stint. It must be beneficial for them to want to keep returning. (That's not criticism, just genuine bewilderment). 

 

One waitress was telling us that they were having a birthday party that night. The next day we asked if the party went well. She replied yes but someone had drank too much and had been confined to their cabin before being sent home and loosing their job.

[wowzz]

36 minutes ago, emam said:

Sleeping. That's what our steward said she did on an afternoon. Granted this was pre Covid. 

Correct, in normal times.  Service the cabins from 8 until 13:00, and again from 16:00 until 21:00 with free time in between.

Seems easy, but the stewards have to try and work around  the comings and goings of the guests. 

One of the advantages of the Medallion system on Princess is that the steward is automatically informed when you leave the room and enable the "service my room " function on your door portal.

[Snow Hill]

On 10/21/2021 at 3:35 PM, LynnForestgate said:

 

Thanks for the information.

Unfortunately its behind a paywall.

 

Thanks

 

The Guardian doesn’t have a paywall, I can see the full article. 

[majortom10]

Currently on QE and we have 2 cabin Stewards for our PG suite and they told us on first day if we needed them how to contac them and they said they would be as quick as possible to respond but between the 2 of them they are responsible for 35 cabins between the 2 of them.

 

[Son of Anarchy]

18 hours ago, emam said:

 

Sleeping. That's what our steward said she did on an afternoon. Granted this was pre Covid. 

 

What I can't understand is, if they are so poorly paid why are they so desperate to return for another stint. It must be beneficial for them to want to keep returning. (That's not criticism, just genuine bewilderment). 

 

One waitress was telling us that they were having a birthday party that night. The next day we asked if the party went well. She replied yes but someone had drank too much and had been confined to their cabin before being sent home and loosing their job.

One of the officers (one of the medical staff) once told us that she'd had to breathalyse one of the crew following one such party.

 

That evening at dinner we asked one of our waiters how his day had been.  He replied that he'd had a very good evening after service had finished, but was now quite worried as he was in trouble for having drunk too much!  He didn't get offloaded and remained our waiter till we disembarked.