What to do about bad service.

[Orcrone]

A hypothetical question that Ekerr made me think of.

 

You're aboard the HAL Idontgivadam. Your DR steward gives you wonderful service, however your cabin steward leaves a lot to be desired. Your bed is barely made up any day, towels are not changed, trash is not emptied and forget about any special requests.

 

So you go to speak to the head of housekeeping, who says the situation will be rectified. It is now three days into the cruise. Two days later you notice no difference and at this point in time figure "why bother". So the last full day of the cruise arrives. You fill out the survey card and appropriately rate the steward. However, it's really bothering you that this person is getting a part of the automatic tip.

 

Your choices according to HAL are to leave the tip in place or remove it. However, if you remove the tip you stiff your excellent DR steward. You could give him a seperate tip, but then he would be required to pool the tip.

 

What would you do in this circumstance. I didn't make this a poll, as I'm curious to see if there are any creative solutions. I don't have any.

[emsachs]

I wouldn't wait the 3 days. If my problem wasn't rectified the first time, I would go at least 2 levels higher to complain the very next day. Not to be ugly, just to get the problem fixed.

"He who yells the loudest will gets to the top of the list"

 

I have booked HAL cruise (our first) to Alaska on Volendam in June.

I am getting worried with all of these negative posts that I am reading about poor service.

Can anyone tell me if these are just people being nit picky, or if they are just comparing this to the "way it used to be".

[RuthC]

I don't have a solution, either. Finer minds than mine may come up with something; I'd love to hear about it.

 

You're right: there's a dilemma for the passenger in this situation, and it has come up already. longtimecruiser (if I may drop her name) posted about this exact situation on the Rotterdam's 17-day return from Amsterdam to NYC last summer. In her case there was even a much longer opportunity to have the situation rectified, but it was not.

Under HAL's arrangement the two stewards---and everyone else swimming in the tipping pool---is a package deal. The tips can be left in place, reduced, or removed all together. In only the first instance does the dining room steward get his just reward; the only way to fail to reward the cabin steward is to stiff everybody.

Were I faced with the situation I would feel obligated to leave the service charge in place to reward those who deserved it. I would also make sure to commend the superior crew on the survey as well as find fault with the cabin steward. I would tip extra as usual.

I might also give the offending steward a thank you note for the service done, with an explanation that an improvement would have justified an additional tip. (In case I ever run into him again.)

[ekerr19]

Marc-

 

Quite the dilemma, I must admit. We were very fortunate to have excellent service in both the dining room and by the cabin steward.

 

I think I would try and talk to the cabin steward if possible, then go up the chain - I would probably leave the auto tip in place, but note on the comment card an area that may have been lacking.

 

This is one reason I don't like the auto-tip. It covers much too broad of a spectrum, also having the ability to remove it sends the wrong message imo.

[the2ofus]

I came up with what I think would be a workable solution. I detailed it on another thread and it's too long to rehash here. Essentially, remove the autotip. Then, give what you would have tipped to a tablemate who will very generously overtip the waiter and asst. waiter (her $$ and yours). Tablemate could casually say something like.."I was really impressed by the way you made sure my friend Mrs. Notip and I were provided with our beverages each night and you made sure my friend, Mrs. Notip and I were happy with our menu selections. It's a shame that her cabin steward was not as efficient and hardworking as you have been." I would guess that the waiter would understand the situation completely.

 

Of course, you would have also contacted the housekeeping supervisor and the hotel manager early in the cruise. You would have documented on paper the poor service and their response to it, and had them sign a copy for you to keep. You would have filled out the cruise evaluation card completely, carefully describing that the cabin steward's performance was abysmal while the dining room staff were excellent.

 

Let's see HAL try to prove that the tip received by the dining room staff from someone else was related to your dissatisfaction with your cabin steward.

[bepsf]

Orcrone--

 

First, I had to finish laughing @ the Idontgiveadam...:D

 

Personally, I would not wait a moment to have this rectified. If I've come back in the afternoon and the room hasn't been made up and I also haven't seen my steward in the corridor cleaning other staterooms - I'd ring down to the desk to "remind" them that the room hasn't been made up.

 

If I have to ring down every single day, that's what I'll do - and make comments to the members of the cruise staff and the Hotel Manager when I see them in the evenings.

 

I'd probably leave the "auto-tip" on just to not shortchange the others - but the steward would not receive a good comment or an additional tip.

 

I've never had this type of experience - but who's to say that it may not happen to others...

[Orcrone]

the2ofus,

 

If you were comfortable enough with your tablemates, I think that is a very workable solution.

[Arubalisa]

Is it not the job of the cruise line to provide proper training and incentives for their employees? Why should passengers on their vacations, who believe they are not receiving the service they have paid for, whether through their cruise fare or automatic tip, have to do all of this extra work? Why should a passenger be placed in charge of chasing after supervisors, waiting in line to remove tips and then get home and writing letters and emails which are sometimes never acknowledged?

 

Filling out the survey/comment card seems to have a lot of weight in the cruise industry so why not use this as the tool to rectify poor service/conditions. Let's face facts that the cruise line has implimented the auto tip policy as part of their salary plan. Can we not reward for service above and beyond and consider the "auto tip" as part of our cruise fare. Imho, this is what the cruise line intended in the first place. We as the passenger are supplementing their employees salary through auto tip rather than the cruise fare no?

The only people I perceive, who are "winning" this "game" are those who remove auto tips. Obviously not everyone plays fair, so why not stick to auto tip OR add it to the price of the fare and we can all continue to offer addtional monetary rewards to those who WE feel have gone above and beyond what is expected of them.

[ekerr19]

I don't know... to me, the extra $10 per person, per day just didn't seem like all that much. We always tip more than that, and we did this time.

 

In my mind, there is no REAL excuse to remove the auto-tip, even if the service is less than stellar. We still tip 10% in a restaurant at home for less than or even pretty bad service.

 

I think it is far better to try and rectify the problem by communicating your needs and expectations than wait til the end and say "oh well, the service wasn't that great" in order to justify removing the tip.

[dakrewser]

As a couple of others have stated, I'd speak to the offending person immediately (if I could find them). The next problem would bring a call to their supervisor with a further escalation each time.

 

 

The "auto-tip" I consider to be a service charge, not a tip, so I won't touch it (unless everyone provides bad service) but will tip those who provide good service - and recommend that HAL simply raise fares and go back to the Way It Used To Be.

 

:) -dave

[peaches from georgia]

HAL is trying to have it both ways and satisfy everyone which is impossible. They want to keep fares looking low so they don't want to increase fares by adding the tip to the basic fare quoted when a potential pax thinks about booking. They want to have the pax supplement the salaries of a long list of employees, so they have come up with this additional charge. They then leave it up to the pax as to whether to remove it or not, but they make that difficult to do and on top of that penalizes the good employees by making them split a hand-given cash tip with the other employees who were the reason the pax cancelled his auto-tip to begin with.

 

The whole thing is ridiculous. Treat ME like an adult who knows how to spend his own money. Either include tips in the fare totally, and I will be able to see the forest for the trees and make an intelligent decision as to the true fare of this cruise vs. a cruise where tips are additional, or just let me tip on my own at the end of the cruise. This other stuff is nonsense and way more than I should have to think about on vacation.

[longtimecruiser]

RuthC is correct, this did happen to me last summer on my return transatlantic cruise on the Rotterdam. I kept the auto tip in place as I did not want to stiff our excellent waiter and others who had given good service. I did not tip my cabin steward any extra and I resented that he even got the auto tip. The first thread described my cabin steward to a tee so those cabin stewards do exist. This was the first time on Hal or any line that I had such a terrible cabin steward. I felt that Hal had NOT trained him well. I complained from the first day on and so did most everyone down my corridor, but to no avail. I wrote to the Hotel Manager, spoke several times with the Chief Housekeeper, whom I knew from other cruises. Frankly, I felt Hal just kept passing the buck and waiting until we all got off and the problem would go away. I'm sailing on the Rotterdam in acouple of weeks and I hope he is Not my cabin steward. He did not even KNOW how to make a bed. All I kept hearing was that he had come from Windstar and had been under contract for 6 months. My reply was "Don't they know how to make beds on Windstar?" It was hinted at one point that they had complaints with him on Windstar and I guess they decided to move him around. They should have moved him right off any of their ships and back to more training of fire him. It really made Hal look bad to have someone like this as a cabin steward. At one point, they got my first cabin steward back to show this new one what to do. My first cabin steward(who was excellent) told me that it was a waste of time as he did not know what to do even after being told. I do not think that Hal is training their cabin stewards like they used to.

[Randyk47]

We were on the Oosterdam just before the new tipping policy and glad I didn't have to make a decision for that cruise. Our room steward was just fine. Now by fine I mean he kept the room well. It wasn't quite the "steward must be hiding under the bed" routine as our cabin would go several hours without new towels, the bed made, etc., but he got it done. I talked to him at the end of the cruise and he told me they'd up the number of cabins for every steward by 1/3 and it just was taking him longer. Now the dining room staff, they're a whole different story. That was the biggest disappointment. Even after complaints the service was only just acceptable and, by the way, we're no nit-pickers. Admittedly we were used to outstanding service from our previous HAL cruises. Waiters who learned quickly what we liked and didn't or who would take the time to make a recommendation or talk about the menu for the evening. We barely got the courses served. I tipped them anyhow but certainly below what I've tipped our wait staff in the past. The bar staff, particularly in the Crow's Nest, was outstanding, maybe the best of any of our HAL cruises and we tipped accordingly. So what to do?

[bookworm0911]

I don't think a decline in service has anything to do with a new tipping policy. It's from the cutbacks in # of stewards. You can't expect any of them, room or dining, to have time for chit-chat anymore or that your room can be tended to the minute you leave it. Too much is asked of each steward without there being a decline in service. Fares go down to attract more pax, labor costs go down to make up for the lower fares and still make a profit (by decreasing # of stewards), service goes down. I don't understand a few posters still saying there has absolutely been no decrease in service. There is no way there can't be.

[Giorgi-one]

My understanding is that you can specifically reduce the portion of the tip that goes to the room steward if you so desire.

[RuthC]

My understanding is that you can specifically reduce the portion of the tip that goes to the room steward if you so desire.

That's not my understanding at all. You can leave the service charge in place, reduce it, or remove it altogether. If you reduce it you may not specify who to reduce; everyone is reduced proportionately.

There have been numerous threads about this since the new policy went into effect, and I was aboard a cruise where this became an issue. The Front Desk staff and the Cruise Director could not have been more clear.

[Sailboater]

Maybe the reduction thing is the clue. Reduce the autotip but not remove it. Then tip very generously the good service staff. They don't have to pool the tips since you didn't remove autotip but the staff that didn't do the job gets dinged. I saw in another post where they are now asking why? when you reduce or remove autotip so it would be another way to get HAL's attention to the problem areas.

 

If enough of us do this AND comment about the issues we see on our comment cards, maybe HAL will get the message.

[HeatherInFlorida]

IMHO, the very fact that this issue even rears its ugly face points out how confusing and annoying this new policy is. We've never been in a position of having a really bad one or the other so the problem hasn't come up. But if it ever does, I will wend my way to the Main Desk and ask them how they think I should handle the situation.

 

I don't think the HAL main office has really thought out all the twists and turns this policy can take and I still believe that over the course of time they are going to tweak it quite a bit to make it more palatable for the passengers. We shall see.

[longtimecruiser]

I was told by the Front Office that I could not reduce the auto tip. I specifically asked if I could give more to my waiter and nothing to my cabin steward. I was told flatly "no" and in not a very nice way, I might add!!!!

[Krazy Kruizers]

Trust me - if there was a problem with either cabin service, cabin steward, dining room staff, etc., it would be addressed right away - and we wouldn't be waiting for 3 days before reporting anything.

Yes - some of you read about our air-conditioning problems on the Statendam - reported right away. And maintenance kept coming everytime we called or went to the concierge. We had to actually sit in our cabin while they were there and waited till they ripped the ceiling apart along with the ceiling in the hallway until everything was fixed.

[Krazy Kruizers]

In looking over my posts, I remember sail7saes mentioned that she had some friends on our last cruise and that they had a partial part of the auto tip removed from their account.

Check with sail7seas on this.

[Lisa63]

We ran into this situation in August. Here's an excerpt from my review (link = Lisa63s Maasdam review on Cruise Critic )

 

"Our only sub-par experience was on the first night, when our cabin steward did not prepare the beds for the evening. Ordinarily, it would not have been a big deal, but we needed the sofabed for our son and had no idea how to open it. A quick visit to the Front Desk took care of it. The person on duty called our cabin steward (it was after hours) and the cabin was made up promptly.

 

"...This leads me to automatic tipping, a policy that HAL instituted shortly before our cruise. In our document package, as well as our boarding package, it was explained that a gratuity of $10 per guest, per day, would be automatically posted to shipboard accounts, and that adjustments could be made at the Front Office on the last full day of the cruise. The letter from the document package expanded on this policy by stating that “dining and cabin stewards are required to turn in any tips they receive directly from those guests who have removed or reduced the gratuities on their onboard bills.” While this sounded reasonable to us before we boarded, our experience with our cabin steward made me wonder about the fairness of this policy. Fortunately, our cabin steward was fine the rest of the cruise, and we left the full amounts on our account (and gave additional gratuities to those we felt deserved it). But if that had not been the case and we reduced his tip, our fine dining room waiters would have been required to turn in any cash tips they received from us, assuming our interpretation of this policy was correct. This didn’t seem right to us, and was duly noted on our comment cards at the end of the cruise. "

[iluvcruzin]

You're aboard the HAL Idontgivadam. .

LOL! Is that like the Saunadam? Let's see.. I could say something like I'd leave the tip on and just mark the comment card. However, in all honesty, if I had to go to housekeeping and they STILL didn't rectify the situation, I would remove the autotip and adjust the tips. I can say I wouldn't.. but I confess I get hot-headed (be it right or wrong).

[Charliesmom]

I believe, in general, that cruise prices have come down more than $70.00 per person per week. Why not consider the autotip part of the cruise cost and then tip those who give ultra good service?

 

Didn't HAL have a "no tipping necessary policy before"? Add the tip to the price of the cruise in your head and let it go. John D. Rockefeller said when asked how much it cost to operate his boat, "If you have to ask how much, you can't afford it." Aren't we lucky we can afford a cruise?

 

Roberta

[Winks]

My wife and I ran into a problem on a brand X ship last summer. It had to do with handicap seating in the show area. My wife is in a wheel chair and she was not able to get to the seating area due to the show people putting all their equipment in the hallway leading to the handicap seating. Thie affected all the other handicap people. Two calls to the Cruise Director got me no where. So, I waited until the third evening when the Captain was greeting people. He saw me and my wife and greeted us. When he asked how we were enjoying the cruise, we told him right there in a public area. Another passenger overheard and said he would like to participate in this as he was dealing with the same issue. The Captain quickly got us into the office area, called in the Cruise Director and questioned him. When it turned out nothing had yet been done, the Captain went through the overhead bulkhead. We had no problems after that. In fact, the Captain gave us his direct line and said if we had ANY problem we should call. Never had to after that.