Gift ideas for outstanding crew members?

[wilsonzoo]

Would love to hear of any unique or fun ideas for gifts that we could present to any "above and beyond the call of duty" crew members we will encounter. With HAL's very confusing new tipping policy, I'm thinking small gifts might be a good way to insure that the person gets to actually keep what is intended to be a personal Thank You, as opposed to this "pooling" thing.

I've heard international calling cards; we've given baseball hats and T-shirts to rave reviews. Any other ideas?

Thanks!

[Krazy Kruizers]

:)

Remember that they can always toiletries like shampoo, soap, toothpaste, etc.

You can always buy a few of those and put them in a pretty gift bag.

The crew do not always have a chance to buy those things in ports where prices are cheap. We have talked to crew members who said that in some ports prices were really high on some things.

:)

[Mary Ellen]

Others have mentioned the pre-paid phone cards on the 'old' board. They'd need to usable for International calls for the crew to call home. I 'think' the AT&T ones I've seen at Sam's Club use more minutes for Internaltional calls, so a 30 minute card probably won't go very far.

Next time we'll take some 500 and/or 1000 minute cards to give to crew who have gone 'above and beyond'. If we have extra, they'll still be useful to us.

[sail7seas]

CASH........That is all they want. They have no room in their cabins for more junk they only will throw out when they pack to go home. They don't want or need t-shirts from where we all live; if they want a cap, they'll buy one; they want MONEY.

.....PHONE CARDS ARE NICE AS "A LITTLE EXTRA" SOMETHING, BUT

DID I MENTION WHAT THEY REALLY WANT?


CASH

[Stevesan]

What did you say?

[sail7seas]

Sorry......thought you'd be able to hear that shout. :)

Shall I scream it a little louder?:p

[Cruiseoften]

Thinking about 'thank you gifts' for waitstaff - IMHO hard cash is the best way to go.

We'll go with the gratuity charge to our shipboard account and, in addition, we'll tip at our discretion for good service.

Handing out baseball caps, T shirts, toiletries, etc. sounds good but it must be remembered that every crew member has very limited storage space......and they're on board for months at a time.

Phone cards are a gamble too - we've been advised that crew can and do buy the cards they need for much less than passengers can - shore dealers buy favored cards in bulk and sell them at a discount.

[sail7seas]

Cruiseoften is Absolutely correct.


The phone cards the stewards want, we are not supposed to be able to buy aboard the ships :)

The cards most of us would select to buy for them do not provide very many minutes to the Philipines and Indonesia. We think they look good but they are not nearly as good as the ones they buy in their quarters.

The AT & T cards I've seen folks hand out that they think will give them a 30+ minute call, do not do that!

[RevNeal]

I always write a thank-you note that I put in each envelope along with my tips. I usually put my note on my personal stationary, which has my email printed at the top under my name. Three times, now, I've had staff email me to say "hello" and such and to thank me for the tip. Of them, my cabin steward from the Statendam kept up a 4 month exchange (an email a week) with me before he departed for Jakarta and home. Since then I've heard from him twice; he's now back with HAL, on the Veendam. Nice fellow. While at home he asked me to send him a book -- any book, so long as it was in English. I did (hehehe, I sent him one of mine).

Other than that note and cash tips I don't give much. I make a donation of the books I've written to the ship's passenger Library (you'll find them on the Maasdam, Volendam, Statendam, Ryndam, and soon the Zaandam). I also leave a copy of each book with a note telling the cabin steward to put them in the ship's crew library. While on the Volendam an officer asked me if I was the author of Grace Upon Grace, and I told him yes (my picture is on the back). We ended up talking about it for several hours one night in the Explorer's Lounge.

[dst]

I agree with s7s, although I won't shout as loudly as she did, give CASH! :)

[Krazy Kruizers]

:)

We have always given cash. Even when the new policy went into effect in May on our cruise we left the tips on our account and gave extra cash to those who went went out of their way to make our cruise another cruise to remember.

I only mentioned those other items because the original poster was concerned about the extra cash tips being pooled.

:)

[emmalbrent]

We gave AT&T card to our Cabin attendant when in Caribbean on NCL. She used it at the next U.S. port and came to our cabin and said she had talked to her husband and children for....minutes. We also gave her cash.

We have given extra cash also, but heard that Princess makes them turn it in or they get in trouble, up to getting fired. Don't know how true this is. Tried asking different crew and got different answers. Or they were leery of telling what happens to tips/cash, etc.

The first or second day we tip the cabin attendant. Has usually gotten extras for us, wine glasses, bigger drinking glasses, robes if not there, more hangers, foam pad, extra blanket, take away big luggage. carry ons go under bed & keep some stuff in them.

[wilsonzoo]

OK, so I'm getting that everyone pretty much agrees that cold, hard CASH is still the best way to go!! :-)

The only reason I asked at all was that, all over the HAL boards, there seems to be no consensus as to whether crew are actually allowed to KEEP any cash you give them, over and above the "manditory" end-of-cruise tip that is pooled to the entire staff. The overriding opinion is that ALL monies must be pooled, and unfortunatley it sounds as if the crew is strongly discouraged from discussing or clarifying the tipping policy with passengers, thereby leaving us very much in the dark as to what the official hard and fast policy is, and who REALLY is going to wind up with the bucks we part with. It sounds arbitrary from day to day, cruise to cruise and ship to ship. I guess we'll scrap the idea of trinkets and stick with cash, in the hopes that those deserving folks WILL possibly be able to keep it themselves.

Thanks for all the opinions.

[RevNeal]

Yes, indeed. With a very few exceptions, that's the VERY BEST course. And, when you think about it, it makes perfect sense. You like cash. I like cash. We all like cash together! So do those who clean up after us and bring us booze and food. :) So long as we don't let it rule us, we'll be ok. Just remember that the eye of a needle is VERY small (MUCH smaller than an N-Category inside cabin :D), and we camels are VERY big. :)

[gizmo]

You could wrap up the cash in a little box and tell them it is a "gift".

[NorthGal]

I'm tagging this question on to this thread since it seems appropriate. Just what would discretionary equal??? I plan on leaving the auto-tip - but I'm going to play thick as a brick! I've always wanted to know, but it's not a question I feel comfortable asking my table mates: Nudge nudge wink wink "Hey fella, what exactly is in your envelope?"

Really - I need numbers, figures, an Emily Post Guide to over and above tipping even? While I realize that tipping is a very personal matter - even a ballpark figure would be helpful! $20, $40, $100????

[Stevesan]

Tipping is, of course, a personal choice. There is a tipping guide for cruise ships that is useful. HAL isn't included, so just substitute Carnival. "Above and Beyond the Call of Duty" might warrant extra. Use the same judgement as in land based establishments.

http://members.aol.com/CruiseTip/

[Stevesan]

S7S - maybe we shouldn't play too much with the new toys. Uncle Walt might take them away from us.:eek:

[sail7seas]

I don't think I have misused the toys. I am sorry if you think I have.

[Mary Ellen]

I didn't mean to imply that we'd only give the phone cards. Based on past experience, we'll also be be tipping $$ above the amount added to our shipboard account. But by giving an additional gift, I'm hoping that this will something the crew members(s) will be able to keep -and NOT go into a pool.

[Peggy Sue]

I certainly agree that Cash is the best thing to give the crew, but we also gave them pictures along with cash and our thank you note.

We bring a long a digital camera and a small printer - 4x6 pictures. We take pictures throughout the cruise of all the kind staff assisting us, we gave them all a couple of pictures of themselves to mail home. The crew really liked this. They were always very gracious when we asked to take their picture..we also only took a minute of two fo their time as we know they are very busy people.

During the week we shared photos with our fellow passengers of formal nights etc. Sometimes we got great shots of total strangers who were sitting around us when we took pictures of the baked alaska parade, etc...we make copies for them to take home as well..a great way to break the ice to meet fellow passengers.

Revneal--how fantastic that you have had a opportunity to chat with past crew members! next cruise we'll bring along some stationary with our names and email address..maybe we'll be able to strike up an email conversation post cruise too! Great idea!!

Peggy Sue

[NorthGal]

Mary Ellen - I understood that that was what you meant. No worries. The same applies here as well - I'll tip the automatic amount - but still am curious about what amount is generally given above and beyond for outstanding service.

[sail7seas]

Peggy Sue....what a fun thing to do. I am very sure the crew enjoys having pictures to send to their families. How do you manage to bring along a printer? Do you fly or drive to the ship?

[Peggy Sue]

S7S - we fly. Printer is very compact. Fits in a camera bag, and our digital camera is very small. It doesn't take much space at all. We bring along a package of 100 4x6 photo paper. I'm one of those folks who loves to send post cards to family..so we now print a picture, bring along some address labels and use the photos as our post cards. It's a great way to share a little of our vacation with family! Camera and Printer fit in our small carry-on suitcase (a small one, that meets airline requirements) with room to spare for other stuff.

Printer is an HP. Can find them at best buy. I think the current models are even smaller than what we purchased over a year ago.

Last week we had a co-worker retire after 30 years of service. I brought in the camera and printer and gave her a memory book before the end of the day of pictures taken with co-workers who stopped by to wish her well. It was a lot of fun and she really loved leaving with the photos in hand.

DH loves gadgets and also brings along the necessary cords to plug our camera into the TV so we can enjoy a slide show of the pictures we took during the day on-shore while we're having an evening cocktail and dressing for dinner.

Peggy Sue

[sail7seas]

Absolutely fabulous. That is one of the best "travel tips" I've heard in ages. Thank you so much for sharing it.


Great idea IMO....and no disappointment to find you missed the photo you really wanted. Plenty of chance to try again if you aren't happy with a particular shot.

[RevNeal]

Peggy Sue,

It wasn't intentional. I use my personal stationary all the time for personal notes and smail and such ... so much, in fact, that I forget that it has my email and website printed on it. The first time I got an email from one of the people I tipped it took me for surprise. When they write, I always send a short answer back and do NOT make any kind of demand; I certainly don't ask any questions that would make them feel like they had to respond. I simply thank them for writing and offer my hopes that they are doing well. That's it. A few have written back a time or two beyond that, offering information, but only one wrote back asking me a bunch of questions -- mostly about religion. With that exception, I've not attempted to continue any kind of communication. I certainly don't ever expect a response, but when it has happened I've been pleasantly surprised. They are good people.

[Stevesan]

I don't think I have misused the toys. I am sorry if you think I have.
No criticism intended. It was a joke. Apparently the humor was lost somewhere.

[sail7seas]

No problem. Sorry I misunderstood your comment. :)

That is what is so difficult about conversations on BB's...one cannot see a person's expression, hear their tone of voice or see their body language.

Again, sorry I didn't reread to see if the comment could have been taken another way.