Agree entirely with Bob's assessment on reasons for removal of gratuities...this was not in the main about service, rather meanness!

We certainly encountered a significant number of North American passengers, some Latin American, some Australian, and many various European. No-one could really assess accurately but I would say there were less than 80% Brits, but at least 50%.

Bon Voyage W'J, and I know you will make the most of this ship as many of us did. Are you doing the 2 night one before the 12 night Norway?

Hi Hamrag, thanks for the send off,

This is a bit special so we splashed out on Aft AF,s to start with and a load of people we new were in the same area at one point we had all 7 of the aft cabins including the handycaps(for people that needed them) with our international cruise group so we were in for a good one.

But luck has shone on us, struck Jackpot with the upsell fairy, we are all now scattered around the ship in ADs,A3s,AA, everyone is now in something better than booked and at very reasonable extra cost. Did what I hope is the last cabin change for our group today we are all now in something we like a lot better than the perfectly good cabins we booked in

The two day trip was on the list, but we are behind on the packing, we would have to move cabins which is just not worth the hastle and it has not come down to the magic £49 yet, so we think we will give it a miss and turn up early on Sun be first onboard and all meet up for lunch in Cagnies.

We have three group dinners planned and booked, a romance package to use up so thats the Bistro or Cagnies another night and few nights to go with the flow to sample the other offerings.

Nothing better than 12 days on a ship to the most picturesque destination in the world with, family, great cruise company, hopefully a great team that can make this a very special trip.

Considering that last Oct Just before we stepped onto the Gem inaugeral cruise we were looking at that £500pp inside cabin on a 14n med, decided the med was getting boring and ended up with this.

Back on topic,

I now have a butler and the concierge to tip on top of my $10pppd how much do I give them?
(BTW, I know the answer and it is not zero)

Yes do have a fantastic cruise and you will love the fantastic scenery. Some compare it to Alaska and I would very much agree with that. I am wondering how the Sounds in NZ will compare although I know someone who said it was very misty and they could see nothing.

Yes fine to have a Butler! and as you agree I think it is a disgrace what happened on Graham's cruise re tipping etc.
I think as a few have said many have jumped on the bandwagon and thought well I am not going to be here again so I simply don't care. I do hope that others on future trips behave in an honest way and do give credit when it is due. What will happen otherwise as many will not want to work on Ships that have a UK mainly travellers.
I suppose the other alternative would be to pay people who do work on them an incentive to work on these ships and reward them financially. Who knows? Anyway do have a great time and we all look forward to reading your review when you get back. BON Voyage

Sue

just try and pay them a proper wage and then see what happens............dont keep blaming the passengers..they have paid for their holidays once.

W/J, not sure if Cagney's will be available for lunch on embarkation day. The other option is to lunch in the Grand Pacific restaurant (definitely was on for our cruise), thus avoiding the scrum in the Garden Cafe! Very few people realised the main restaurant was available for lunch, and it was extremely quiet.

Either way, enjoy and get there parking by 11.00am.

Look forward to hearing your views on return.

Johndoe said "just try and pay them a proper wage and then see what happens............dont keep blaming the passengers..they have paid for their holidays once."

OK, so they add £75 or $140 to the cost of the cruise, and no tips required....go figure! Personally would welcome such a move, meaning that no one could avoid paying.

Great idea Johndoe, and this would certainly make final days less stressful for the guest relations staff.

hamrag wrote:

Johndoe said "just try and pay them a proper wage and then see what happens............dont keep blaming the passengers..they have paid for their holidays once."

OK, so they add £75 or $140 to the cost of the cruise, and no tips required....go figure! Personally would welcome such a move, meaning that no one could avoid paying.

Great idea Johndoe, and this would certainly make final days less stressful for the guest relations staff.

Problem is that of that of that $10pppd that currently goes to the crew, some goes in comissions to TAs, the tax man gets a cut and there will be tendency to not tip extra, (exact number on the deductions would need more research)

This will result in reduced wages, to bring them back up to similar levels that $140 that goes into the tip pool onboard becomes say $200 on the cruise fare.

P&O and Cunard the foundations of the british cruise industry have worked the same way for years and we don't hear of this problem.

Celebrity,Princess have never had the problem to the extent that RCI and NCL are getting with their push into the budget end, I expect that the more expensive routes like this North Cape, Baltic, Round UK will probably not see the same numbers doing the tip removal(we will see).

Mass market cruising in the UK needs to adapt to the passenger demographics it is attracting. The budget end, which has always aimed to atract the traditional british package holiday customer have tip included fare but this is one reason that the headline rates for Thomsons,Island and OV are looking a tad more expensive these days than these great value mass market Med trip ex UK. so I think people are transitioning.

The solution will probably have to be tips/service included in the UK pricing systems but they will have to change the invoicing system on board to not show these charges at all.

NCL uk have allready made the first part of this change for on-line booking not sure if you phone in, but UK TAs have not, charges will show and even if prepaid they can still be removed.

I think if it was me running the ship I think I would announce

"If you have any issue with the service on board please bring this to the attention of the management or the front desk, to avoid reduced service levels at the front desk, all those that have been happy with the service but still want to remove the service charges these will be done at X:00 at location XYZ"

Have the cabin stewards administer the refunds. I think the line would be a lot shorter, If not also have the dinning room wait staff do a walk by.

Or perhaps do it in the theatre just before a show.

have a row of desks ready and have the cabin stewards/wait staff man the desks, announce

" here are a selection of the people that have hopefully made your cruise great", pause for applause, " now those of you that have been happy with the service but want to remove the service charges please queue stage left and we will deal with you as quickly as possible then start the show"

People with genuine service issues will still be able to go to the desk or speak to management to get them resolved and if not adjust the service accorgingly.

I wonder how many also removed the 15% on their drinks bill.

Yes people have paid for their holidays but it states clearly you have not finished paying there are charges for drinks, shore excutions,$10pppd service, etc.

Problem, needs a solution but I don't think it is as easy as some might think.

The confusion is in the word 'Tip'. As it means something different in American and English. In American it means 'Wage' in English it means 'Gratuity'. An American expects to pay a service charge of 20% (tip) and then 'tip' on top of that. A Brit expects that the worker's wage is included in the price they pay and that the tip is a 'thank you' for good service.

I am taking my first cruise ever in the Summer. We shall pay the $10 pppd as recomended but as far as we are concerned that is it! I expect we shall also have to pay the 15% added onto drinks as well.

The confusion is in the word 'Tip'. As it means something different in American and English. In American it means 'Wage' in English it means 'Gratuity'. An American expects to pay a service charge of 20% (tip) and then 'tip' on top of that. A Brit expects that the worker's wage is included in the price they pay and that the tip is a 'thank you' for good service.

That's what it means to me I have to admit.

Of course the taxman expects people working in a service industry to have received a certain amount in tips. From the above, it looks as the US tax authorities would assess crew members as having received the whole of the $10s per day and tax them accordingly which makes withdrawing it even more unfair to the crew.

I didn't notice any big queues on the last night of our cruise on the Jade, and I think I'd have notices since we had to call into reception about our passports and there was no one around at all. Guess all the passengers on our cruise had better things to do with their time than stand in a queue for hours on end. We certainly did.

It gets even better now with Jade if you book a cruise and have no children they are going to pay your "TIPS" onboard yes they are calling them tips now is the crew going to suffer yet again next year I can't imagine NCL actually putting $140 into the kitty for each guest but maybe I am wrong

It is my understanding that ship management are very carefull to make sure that the money goes in the pool, they even absorb the CC charge if you do put it on the account.

It is not worth the cruise line trying to skim this money.

Do you have link/reference to this no kids we pay tips policy.

I had 2 different offers one has gone into the paper bin but the one I am reading from now is from cruise 365.com / hope I am allowed to say this / Travelling without kids free tips plus free parking at Southampton that is for med 2009 and the other offer is for the Jewel free tips and free parking at Dover for the Baltics that has a price for May & early June £899 inside

Have a great cruise on Jade you have had fab upgrades, sadly I just had to stay down on 4 but that was great for going ashore. I never worry if I am up or down but the one thing that did disappoint me on the Jade was the fact they would not give the coffee makers to the cabins on deck 4 I asked 3 times but our little cabin steward did tell us they had been removed to the better cabins and they had none left to give out - and I survived - the coffee was lovely on Jade

Why worry that is what room service is for. Never had a coffee maker in any cabin I have been in and I had absolutely no problem with this. My room is often on the deck just below the self service cafe and I would often just go upstairs for a cuppa and sometimes take it down to my room.

Sue

Sue Have stopped using room service a long time ago found I was up waiting and ready to open the door and not at all relaxing for me early in the morning if we are close to self service hubby pulls on the tracks and gets me my cuppa if not well I just can wait

Try Room Service on Royal Caribbean- the order form gives a 30 minute time frame for delivery, but they call 5 minutes before your tray is set to arrive.... slip a dressing gown on and here they come!

Yes just put out your order the night before and they are collected some time in the night. As has been said they will call you to say it is on its way. Plenty of time to get the robe on. Never had a problem and I order what I like even if it is not on the menu eg berries figs etc etc.

Sue

Re ordering off menu- I just tried that on Navigator and was told " You can only order what is on the Menu"- .... the times they are a-changing!

I can see how easily this has drifted off topic and I almost added to it.
Can I ask you all to stay on topic, ie re tips and gratutities?

Please feel free to start a new topic on Room Service.

luci

More feedback from the Jade and the tips.

Talking to the management it looks like the 2 early 14n cruises were the bad ones for the removal of tips, this cruise the preliminary results showed there was still a problem but no where near as bad, the current cruise is expected to be much better (more Americans)

I did spend a short time(30mins) mid morning down at reception on the last day people watching, no sign of big queues getting tips removed, most were just getting printouts to do an account checks.

My account had no errors this trip.