Don't be stupid like me

Boy do I feel bad. On my recent Constellation cruise, I could not understand why they were suggesting tips for the Assistant Chief Housekeeper. I thought this was the person in charge of a certain amount of room stewards. I wanted to charge my tips to my FF credit card to get the miles and tried to take this off the list but was told I could only increase the amounts not remove anyone if I wanted to charge my tips.

The suggested amount was only 50 cents a day but I couldn't see why this manager should get a tip as I never saw the person. It was only $14 for the 14 day cruise so I let it go but increased the amounts for others as we had super service.

Well, Celebrity ought to explain this position better or change the name. I just found out that the Assistant Chief Housekeeper is not the room steward's boss but the room steward's assistant. I recall him doing a lot of things but I thought he was just another steward covering for ours. I would have increased that tip too if I had known it was for him. Now I'm glad I at least tipped the suggested amount. Celebrity should change the name of this position to assistant room steward.

I thought I'd post this so that others might profit from my ignorance.
Frank-in-CA

Hi Frank,

The fact that you feel badly about this says a lot about you. [img]http://messages.cruisecritic.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]

I've never even heard of an assistant to the cabin steward. Every time you turn around, there is a new person with a new title.

I do agree that calling somebody the Assistant Chief Housekeeper is misleading, I would have assumed the same thing you did.

All the cruises I've been on suggest tipping your cabin steward, waiter, and assistant waiter, and tip the head waiter and/or maitre d' if you think appropriate.

I've never sailed with Celebrity. What is the expected tip breakdown? That is, who are you supposed to tip and how much?

Just curious.

T

Thanks for this info. You're right, the title is misleading, I had also thought this person was the manager. So, don't think you're stupid at all, I'm sure the majority of people reacted the same as you.

Have you posted this over on the Celebrity board? I occasionally read about people being upset about tipping so many staff members.

Kathy

I do not think you are stupid at all. If anything, you came on this board to let everyone know about the title of these people so that when we go on the ship we will not feel so s----d. [img]http://messages.cruisecritic.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_wink.gif[/img] Again thanks


Marilyn

I also did not understand who the Chief housekeeper was, and did not leave a tip for that person. I did however realize I had an assistant room steward (I saw him more than our head steward, although both were great) and I did hand him a seperate tip at the end of the cruise. INHO, he deserved (and received) more than the .50 they request for the chief housekeeper.

Stefanie

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Cruise on the pride

Hi everybody,
It seems that there is still some misunderstanding about who is who and the tipping, especially on the Celebrity ships.
Let me explain:
Every ship will have a person that is called the "Chief Housekeeper" and that person is usually introduced on the stage during the first night introduction of all of the 'officers' and that person is definietely 'management' and he/she is in charge of all of the housekeeping operations of the whole ship.
The Chief Housekeeper can not oversee/manage the large number of stewards, on presently build large ships so there are Assistant Cheif Houskeepers; usually one per each deck. These people are the ones that make sure your luggage gets delivered where it belongs, make sure your rooms are cleaned according to some accepted standards, they conduct daily inspections of your rooms, they will open your safe if and when you have problems with it, they will 'consult' the stewards if you have problems and or complains, they are the ones that often walk through the halways late in the evening, making sure nothing wrong or unusual is taken place. They are somewhat the same as your headwaiter in the restaurant. They do make an effort to introduce themself to all of the people in his 'district/deck' but often they miss many who are not in the cabins when they knock on the door. On Celebrity ships the guidelines suggest that they should be offered a customary tip of $0.50 p/p per day.

Why Celebrity and not other cruise lines suggest this tip:
I have asked this question before and got an explanation few years ago. Before Celebrity was created in late 80s, it was a smaller company owned by a Greek family and at one time or another, there was a small number of ships and the ships were small. At that time it was a common practice to bring on board some relatives and give them some supervisory duties, there was not much money offered so to make it worthwhile for the people to stay and make a living on the ships, the practice of tipping the Chief Housekeeper or the assitant got started. And it is still continued today on all of the Celebrity ships. Their pay from cruise line is smaller (in comparison with other lines) and they depend on the tips to make a living.
I have heard and read on the boards that if the 'guests' will not tip the Assistant Chief Housekeeper their suggested tip will be taken away from the room steward.
I personnally met number of the 'assistant Chief Housekeepers and I believe that they do a very good job and deserve the tip, even if one does not have a chance to meet them on a particular cruise. All of the 'right' things that happen every day are a credit to those people.

Now, the cabin/stateroom steward: some will have assitants and they will have a larger number of cabins to take care of and therefore a much larger total tip from all of these cabins, so they in turn will share some of their tip with the assitants or helpers. There is no need to tip the assistant/helper.....their money come from the steward, that is an accepted practice. Some stewards will not have assitant and they will have a smaller number of total cabins to take care of and they do keep the tip provided for themself.
I hope I clarified the above, because there are some conflicting views.

Wes

Hi everybody,
I was not sure if my post got posted, so I just started to write it again, but I just refreshed the screen and see it is there.

Wes