Tipping on excursions???

[mythreesons5]

Do you tip the tour guide for private and/or ship sponsored excursions? How much?? We are a family of 5 doing a private jet ski tour and a ship sponsored catamaran sail. Not sure what is appropriate..please help.

[blue_water]

Do you tip the tour guide for private and/or ship sponsored excursions? How much?? We are a family of 5 doing a private jet ski tour and a ship sponsored catamaran sail. Not sure what is appropriate..please help.

 

It is customary to tip anyone providing a service that you are happy with. We always tip a guide or crew if the service is excellent. We recently did both and I would consider $5/couple a minimum for a decent 4- hour experience, definitely more if the experience was really good or it was a longer day.

[marci22]

Do you tip the tour guide for private and/or ship sponsored excursions? How much?? We are a family of 5 doing a private jet ski tour and a ship sponsored catamaran sail. Not sure what is appropriate..please help.

 

The ship sponsored catamaran tours are usually pretty crowded: ~75 people more or less. In my experience, they usually make a request for tips towards the end of the excursion. I usually give them at least a few bucks, maybe $10? Once I gave $25 for the 5 of us and the guy was thanking me like mad so I'm sure they don't usually get that much. I noticed that most of the people on our ship excursions usually -do not- tip anything.

 

A private tour is a little different because you are getting more personalized attention. Usually there will be a mention of tips on the website telling you what is 'customary' so look there first. If there isn't any info available, use your judgement based on the price you paid, how much service you got, and how happy you were with the tour. There isn't usually a set amount.