Tips

[Dthomas1]

5 minutes ago, not-enough-cruising said:

The little guy’s guaranteed salary is protected by international convention, they are being well taken care of. 

Well taken care of? You need to research from actual cruise ship employee's opinions on that topic.

[Dthomas1]

10 minutes ago, Dthomas1 said:

Well taken care of? You need to research from actual cruise ship employee's opinions on that topic.

Mainly Carnival employee's.

[Dthomas1]

3 minutes ago, Dthomas1 said:

Mainly Carnival employee's.

 Average Royal Caribbean group hourly pay ranges from approximately $7.25 per hour.

[time4u2go]

40 minutes ago, not-enough-cruising said:

The little guy’s guaranteed salary is protected by international convention, they are being well taken care of. 

Very true. Also consider that the average income (and cost of living) in many of the workers' home countries is very low.

[CanHardlyWait4NextYear]

8 hours ago, DaKahuna said:

 

 Forgive me, but don't you sleep on sheets and pillow cases (changed every few days by your room steward), use tablecloths and napkins in the restaurants placed there by your wait staff, etc... I see the laundry the same as cooks and dishwashers.  in fact, I would be hard pressed to name a service that included in the behind the scenes tip pool that does not provide a service or support of a face to face service.  

 

I don't give a rat's... about the laundry staff etc. Worrying about there salary and tips or lack there of, is not my job. (It can't be.) I don't have the means or responsibility to set the word to rights. I don't leave tips for laundry workers when I stay at a hotel. And if you think that just because they live and work in America that there set, boy would you be wrong. Nobody leaves money in a hotel room for the people who wash the sheets because they used them. They paid for the room. Clean sheets are expected for that price. It's a ridiculous argument. As I said before. I treat service workers on a ship the same as land. No better, no worse. And that does not make someone a bad person. 

[not-enough-cruising]

36 minutes ago, Dthomas1 said:

 Average Royal Caribbean group hourly pay ranges from approximately $7.25 per hour.

 

18 minutes ago, time4u2go said:

Very true. Also consider that the average income (and cost of living) in many of the workers' home countries is very low.

Guaranteed MINIMUM for any crew member is roughly $1200 per month, which is roughly 3 times what the same person could make at home in the same period. (Based on Filipino statistics)

[not-enough-cruising]

54 minutes ago, Dthomas1 said:

Well taken care of? You need to research from actual cruise ship employee's opinions on that topic.

The same employees that sign new contracts every 9 months for years on end?? Yeah OK, must be terrible 

[Dthomas1]

4 minutes ago, not-enough-cruising said:

The same employees that sign new contracts every 9 months for years on end?? Yeah OK, must be terrible 

Only because of the poor countries that they are from.

[not-enough-cruising]

2 minutes ago, Dthomas1 said:

Only because of the poor countries that they are from.

Well isn’t that the entire crux of it all? World economies aren’t equal, never have been, never will. 

 

Almost anyone would take a job anywhere doing almost anything if they were offered three times their annual salary in a 9 month period. Sorry, but I do not view this situation as the “poor staff being taken advantage of”. I prefer to view it as “good for them for seizing an opportunity” 

[Ret MP]

WOW, I can't......... As much as I like to debate, I am at a loss here.  The generosity here (by some) is so underwhelming.  I guess I'll just have to stop donating to T2T, Make a Wish, ,,,,,,,, as those people are well taken care of otherwise.  

 

 

[not-enough-cruising]

26 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

WOW, I can't......... As much as I like to debate, I am at a loss here.  The generosity here (by some) is so underwhelming.  I guess I'll just have to stop donating to T2T, Make a Wish, ,,,,,,,, as those people are well taken care of otherwise.  

 

 

Choice is a wonderful thing 

[Ret MP]

Just now, not-enough-cruising said:

Choice is a wonderful thing 

Sure is and so is discretion.  

[CanHardlyWait4NextYear]

1 hour ago, Ret MP said:

WOW, I can't......... As much as I like to debate, I am at a loss here.  The generosity here (by some) is so underwhelming.  I guess I'll just have to stop donating to T2T, Make a Wish, ,,,,,,,, as those people are well taken care of otherwise.  

 

 

If I'm reading your statement wrong, I apologize in advance. But this is the problem with this topic. You put "Make a wish" in a posting about tipping gainfully employed cruise ship workers. Children dying of cancer and gainfully employed adults are two very different things. The endless tragic stance made about the lives of these fully employed compensated individuals is just too dramatic for some. They are not on a slave ship. They are not suffering a deadly illness. Salary vs salary plus tips is not tragic. Again, I can only do so much. I do not see how a person decides to go about tipping as a tragic situation. 

[clskinsfan]

On 9/16/2022 at 11:40 AM, klfhngr said:

They probably got more out of me back in the day!

And they got it in cash. Tax free. I miss the old days of cruising for many reasons. But the tipping policy is definitely one of them. 

[yogimax]

1 hour ago, not-enough-cruising said:

Choice is a wonderful thing 

An awful lot of people make  terrible choices and others often suffer because of them.

[CanHardlyWait4NextYear]

1 minute ago, yogimax said:

An awful lot of people make  terrible choices and others often suffer because of them.

No one will suffer from how and who people here decide to tip. That's exactly the drama I'm talking about.

[Ret MP]

1 hour ago, CanHardlyWait4NextYear said:

Salary vs salary plus tips is not tragic. Again, I can only do so much. I do not see how a person decides to go about tipping as a tragic situation. 

You quoted me so I assume that is intended towards me.  Please note that I never said the word "tragic".  I did, however, use the word "Generosity".  I, for one, don't consider $7.XX per hour anywhere close to being well off (my words).  Like I said, I'm concerned about the 3rd World nation citizens working on a cruise ship that only make ~ $7.XX per hour (if the above post is correct, I don't know for sure).  Many of whom, like I said, send almost every penny they make to support their family and in some cases their extended family.  3rd World Nations, for the most part, have a very high poverty rate/unemployment rate.  So, many of the crew's families don't/can't work because of the lack of opportunity/education/politics/whatever.

 

I'm not saying that we/I should be supporting them.  But, we can do a little to help and TIP generously.  I'm not proposing we buy each of them a Cadillac. A buck or two above and beyond the 18% won't break the bank of anybody cruising.  If it does, maybe they should reevaluate their decisions.  And I'm not saying that all Servers deserve a generous tip even though they may deliver bad service.  Not at all.  If they preform well, I will give them a little extra.  I don't criticize those that don't TIP above and beyond.  However, I do not understand the thought process the leads to thinking that a ship's minimum wage is more than enough to not reward, with a little extra, a little generosity.

 

I talk to the low level crew members.  Most importantly, I listen to them.  A fairly hefty % of them will tell you a story of struggle, I fully understand that some will ingratiate their stories and some outright lie.  But, as a retired Law Enforcement individual, I've become fairly good at detecting B.S., not perfect but good.    

 

The crew work long hard hours and months away from home.  I fully understand that that is their decision.  But, in most cases it is a decision made out of necessity, a decision to try to better their lives and that of their family's.  I'll make no apologies about how I feel about this and my public/vocal feelings about it.  I don't feel that we should help those that don't try to help themselves.  But, these people are actually trying to make a better life for themselves and their families.  I put a ship's crew, especially the lower level employees, in a very special category.

 

YMMV

 

BTW, none of this is "DRAMA". I don't do drama.

Edited September 19, 2022 by Ret MP

[Ret MP]

1 hour ago, CanHardlyWait4NextYear said:

 You put "Make a wish" in a posting about tipping gainfully employed cruise ship workers. Children dying of cancer and gainfully employed adults are two very different things. 

BTW,  being generous isn't a status symbol.  I'm not saying here what I support or what I don't.  The Make a Wish foundation, which has generously made a wish come true to a couple of my family members, is a great organization.  They support many kinds of different tragic situations.  Many, not all, of those tragic situations are also supported by other, sometimes many other, organizations that make the young folks and their families not have to worry about the illness being a catastrophic drain on their resources.  But, I still think donating generously to the origination is a good thing.    I never tried to draw a tragic equivalency to the different issues, just a generosity equivalency.  Hell, some of the crew members are taking care of a family member that is tragically ill with very dire illnesses and don't get any support from an organization or government.  Again, I don't believe we can cure the world's under privileged situation and I'm not trying to.  But, I can help a very little at a time.   

[CanHardlyWait4NextYear]

37 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

You quoted me so I assume that is intended towards me.  Please note that I never said the word "tragic".  I did, however, use the word "Generosity".  I, for one, don't consider $7.XX per hour anywhere close to being well off (my words).  Like I said, I'm concerned about the 3rd World nation citizens working on a cruise ship that only make ~ $7.XX per hour (if the above post is correct, I don't know for sure).  Many of whom, like I said, send almost every penny they make to support their family and in some cases their extended family.  3rd World Nations, for the most part, have a very high poverty rate/unemployment rate.  So, many of the crew's families don't/can't work because of the lack of opportunity/education/politics/whatever.

 

I'm not saying that we/I should be supporting them.  But, we can do a little to help and TIP generously.  I'm not proposing we buy each of them a Cadillac. A buck or two above and beyond the 18% won't break the bank of anybody cruising.  If it does, maybe they should reevaluate their decisions.  And I'm not saying that all Servers deserve a generous tip even though they may deliver bad service.  Not at all.  If they preform well, I will give them a little extra.  I don't criticize those that don't TIP above and beyond.  However, I do not understand the thought process the leads to thinking that a ship's minimum wage is more than enough to not reward, with a little extra, a little generosity.

 

I talk to the low level crew members.  Most importantly, I listen to them.  A fairly hefty % of them will tell you a story of struggle, I fully understand that some will ingratiate their stories and some outright lie.  But, as a retired Law Enforcement individual, I've become fairly good at detecting B.S., not perfect but good.    

 

The crew work long hard hours and months away from home.  I fully understand that that is their decision.  But, in most cases it is a decision made out of necessity, a decision to try to better their lives and that of their family's.  I'll make no apologies about how I feel about this and my public/vocal feelings about it.  I don't feel that we should help those that don't try to help themselves.  But, these people are actually trying to make a better life for themselves and their families.  I put a ship's crew, especially the lower level employees, in a very special category.

 

YMMV

 

BTW, none of this is "DRAMA". I don't do drama.

Baby it wreaks of drama. Just my opinion. I make less then $45k a year and work with plenty of people in this country that make $7, $8, $9 per hour and know the struggles because I Am One of Them. I don't need you telling me about hard working people in this country or any other. Get over yourself.

[not-enough-cruising]

45 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

You quoted me so I assume that is intended towards me.  Please note that I never said the word "tragic".  I did, however, use the word "Generosity".  I, for one, don't consider $7.XX per hour anywhere close to being well off (my words).  Like I said, I'm concerned about the 3rd World nation citizens working on a cruise ship that only make ~ $7.XX per hour (if the above post is correct, I don't know for sure).  Many of whom, like I said, send almost every penny they make to support their family and in some cases their extended family.  3rd World Nations, for the most part, have a very high poverty rate/unemployment rate.  So, many of the crew's families don't/can't work because of the lack of opportunity/education/politics/whatever.

 

I'm not saying that we/I should be supporting them.  But, we can do a little to help and TIP generously.  I'm not proposing we buy each of them a Cadillac. A buck or two above and beyond the 18% won't break the bank of anybody cruising.  If it does, maybe they should reevaluate their decisions.  And I'm not saying that all Servers deserve a generous tip even though they may deliver bad service.  Not at all.  If they preform well, I will give them a little extra.  I don't criticize those that don't TIP above and beyond.  However, I do not understand the thought process the leads to thinking that a ship's minimum wage is more than enough to not reward, with a little extra, a little generosity.

 

I talk to the low level crew members.  Most importantly, I listen to them.  A fairly hefty % of them will tell you a story of struggle, I fully understand that some will ingratiate their stories and some outright lie.  But, as a retired Law Enforcement individual, I've become fairly good at detecting B.S., not perfect but good.    

 

The crew work long hard hours and months away from home.  I fully understand that that is their decision.  But, in most cases it is a decision made out of necessity, a decision to try to better their lives and that of their family's.  I'll make no apologies about how I feel about this and my public/vocal feelings about it.  I don't feel that we should help those that don't try to help themselves.  But, these people are actually trying to make a better life for themselves and their families.  I put a ship's crew, especially the lower level employees, in a very special category.

 

YMMV

 

BTW, none of this is "DRAMA". I don't do drama.

Why are you worried about the crew member making $7.XX per hour. You should happy that he isn’t making $1.XX per hour elsewhere (which could easily be the situation in their home country)

I fail to see the need for concern 

[not-enough-cruising]

1 hour ago, yogimax said:

An awful lot of people make  terrible choices and others often suffer because of them.

And you can’t name a single example of that on this thread, so it really is a moot point. 

[yogimax]

2 minutes ago, not-enough-cruising said:

Why are you worried about the crew member making $7.XX per hour. You should happy that he isn’t making $1.XX per hour elsewhere (which could easily be the situation in their home country)

I fail to see the need for concern 

How about a response that doesn't mention their home country or the Philippines?

[rudeney]

 

25 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

Again, I don't believe we can cure the world's under privileged situation and I'm not trying to.  But, I can help a very little at a time.   

 

I much prefer to help with tips to cruise ship crew, land-based servers, and donations to charities, civic organizations, etc. when I see how hard those people are working toward their goals.  Even a sub-par server who is really trying and realizes that improvement is needed is deserving of a tip from me.  

[not-enough-cruising]

1 minute ago, yogimax said:

How about a response that doesn't mention their home country or the Philippines?

Because that FACT is the most important part of this entire economical formula. 

International labor and economics are full of examples such as these, this is how the world works. 

[yogimax]

2 minutes ago, not-enough-cruising said:

International labor and economics are full of examples such as these, this is how the world works. 

Salaries are not based on the home countries of employees.  Someone from India, for example,  living and working in the USA, will be compensated based on US norms and standards not Indian standards.