Gratuity in specialty dining

[Devil Dog]

I tip the head waiter of the restaraunt 10 and the tableside waiter 20 and the busboy 10. We always enjoy ourselves very much at all the specialty resaurants. We have been going to these restaraunts at least twice a week and when we cruise for a couple or more weeks we get to be regulars becasue we see them again and they remember we had a great time and the were tipped accordingly and appropriately and therefore, the dinners just keep getting better and better with regards to service and of course they remember what you liked so you get plenty of what your druthers are becasue they want to keep you happy and coming back. We cruised the panama canal in 07,08, and 09 and the bayou cafe supper club became my hangout. we loved the oysters and the music Jean Mac trio) was great and they waitstaff remembered us from each yr previous, it was deja vu big time with one waiter named Ben he has been with Princess for 19 yrs and we were on the perfect time each yr to catch him on the ship each time we were on. He introduced us to everyone and made us feel special as if we were good old friends of many yrs. we truly felt he was sincere and he made it super for our cruising experience.

[Cyberhwk]

Further, I was served the wrong dish, which the waiter switched with another passenger before placing the correct dish in front of me!!!

Wait...so did he just set the wrong dish in front of the wrong person? Or were you served the wrong dish and had to call him back to the table to get the correct one?

[Ando]

Living generously is great for the soul :-)

[Pia1913]

We are usually very generous tippers, especially to those who work extra hard for us, because I waited table through high school and college, and I know what a thankless job it can be.

 

We tipped $20 for the two of us at Crown Grill because the service was excellent. We left $10 at Sabitinis because the guy ignored us for about half our meal. We had taken $20, but he didn't deserve the entire thing, and if wouldn't have been for the amount of food he had to bring us, I would not have tipped extra at all.

 

As to the person above who asked about waiters, we had anytime dining, and we always took a little cash just in case. A couple of nights we had a great service (like the waiter who looked all over for a bottle of wine we had left the night before, and the waiter who was very concerned about me not eating because I didn't feel well) and we tipped those people because they earned it.

 

I would love the job of ignoring people and would do it for $10.00 in a heartbeat. Seriously though, good service deserves a tip. Bad service derserves nothing. What some of you are forgetting is that you are already paying EXTRA for the service.

[Treven]

I also leave a $20 cash tip.

[Dorset Cruiser]

I knew several managers at Princess so I asked what is appropriate when dining in the premium restaurants. All told me the same thing, the waitstaff is taken care of by the autotips charged to your account. I always dine in each premium restaurant and every time the server has presented the bill a little line has been drawn for me to add $$$.

 

At the Crown Grill on one sailing, I perceived I received the old lady rush treatment and tipped accordingly, nothing and did not adjust my auto tips. Further, I was served the wrong dish, which the waiter switched with another passenger before placing the correct dish in front of me!!! The waiter openly acted shocked when I entered a zero in the little hand drawn line. He took that as an opportunity to remind me of the true value of the meal which according to him was over $100. Having eaten at many fine restaurants, e.g., Morton's; the meal was never $125. Besides Morton's never switched a food dish from another diner with mine-ick! The Crown Grill fell considerably short of Morton's on the menu offerings, quality of ingredients and mostly on the service. Upon asking my Crown Grill waiter a question, I was "corrected" in a condescending tone. NEVER have I been spoken to in this manner at a high dollar restaurant. The food and moreover the service at the Crown Grill on the Caribbean Princess was so bad, I considered refusing to pay for the meal. I did pay for the meal.

 

In Sabatini's I joined a large party. They too had drawn the little line on the bill. We were quite a demanding group and we handed cash to the entire service team; two waiters + assistant waiter.

 

In all premium restaurants on every Princess ship, I have seen the little line drawn and frequently have been reminded the value of the meal "on land would have been" and a rather large (and hard to believe) amount was quoted. Obviously the expectation and hope is that we would not have consulted the Purser's Office, Princess ship managers or known a Princess VP before we dined, and would tip 20+% on the meal's reported land value.

 

Tipping is extremely personal. I over tip when service is good or I ask for anything extra, however, why should we tip 'twice' when we had already paid via the autotips? Remember, many Princess employees have told me and other passengers, "there is no need for further tipping of wait staff", including the premium retaurants. No one should ever tell another how much to tip and it is offensive when we are encouraged to tip above and beyond the customary amount.

 

Breakfast waitresses (Denny's et. al.) always get $10 from me. That job has got to suck.

 

Before anyone slams me, I respect your decision to tip and how much to tip. I only pass this on. If you have any question, just ask the on duty manager in the Purser's office or any crew manager.

 

 

We had a similar experience in the Sterling Steakhouse on Sea Princess last year. Our waiter was extremely off-hand with us. He threw my salad plate down on the table so hard, it bounced. The food was at best mediocre with tough steaks. We had asked for well-done but these were incinerated. We did think about complaining at the table, but instead, we decided to do what we have never done before - we went back to our cabin and wrote an immediate letter to the Maitre D' and went down and handed it in at the Pursers desk. The result was that we were contacted the next day by his Assistant who asked for an early meeting with us to discuss our experience. In the final event, we were offered another meal in the Sterling which we reluctantly agreed to. We told him that we had not complained to get another meal but in order to give him some constructive criticism of how we perceived our treatment in one of the ship's specialty restaurants. When we went back for our complimentary meal, we had such first-rate service that I could not believe we were in the same restaurant - our salad was personally dressed and tossed by the Assistant Maitre D', our steaks were sublime and we had a superb complimentary bottle of wine. In fact, I think other diners were wondering just who we were:D So it always pays to 'complain' about inferior service.

 

As an aside, on the tips, if someone visits a specialty restaurant and gives an extra cash tip to the waiter, what happens if they take their autotips off their account at a later date in the cruise. Does the waiter still have to hand back the cash tip? Do they have to declare these tips when they receive them?

[Alan64]

The price of dining in a specialty restaurant is lower than at a land-based restaurant because one has already paid for a meal in the regular dining room. The auto-tip is supposed to cover those regular dining room servers (unless one wants to tip more because of exemplary service), correct?

 

That makes me think that when one tips more at the specialty restaurant, it wouldn't be on the entire value of the meal but rather on the difference between that meal's value above the standard dinner.