Another cut being tested: Once per day cabin service

[Ret MP]

6 minutes ago, Wineaux007 said:

Why aren't they happy?  They will make more gratuities with 7 extra cabins.

 

3 minutes ago, fredmdcruisers said:

Much more work. Feel like they are already working too much. 

Also, the stewards generally aren't stupid.  They fully understand that the hand to hand/cash gratuities (tax free) will fall dramatically with just once a day cabin cleaning/refreshment.  And I don't believe they believe having 7 more cabins will make up for that difference.  

 

As much as I preach to tip often, tip generously, I still believe in getting good value for my money.  Reducing the service by ~50%, I don't believe is getting a good value for my money, my gratuity money.  I'm afraid that the cabin steward employees are being used as pawns in the profit margin game.  

 

As a very loyal fan of the crews on RCCL ships, I feel sorry for what they are going through and will go through in the future as the industry is going to use personnel, food quality & quantity, and services in the never-ending quest to make up for their losses during the COVID debacle.  I don't completely blame the industry for that either.  Yes, they were hurt and hurt bad for the ~2 years of COVID.  Now they are being squeezed with inflation as well.  It's been and is now a tough industry, for sure.  I don't see things getting any better for a couple of years, at least.  

[goldfish65]

15 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

 

Also, the stewards generally aren't stupid.  They fully understand that the hand to hand/cash gratuities (tax free) will fall dramatically with just once a day cabin cleaning/refreshment.  And I don't believe they believe having 7 more cabins will make up for that difference.  

 

As much as I preach to tip often, tip generously, I still believe in getting good value for my money.  Reducing the service by ~50%, I don't believe is getting a good value for my money, my gratuity money.  I'm afraid that the cabin steward employees are being used as pawns in the profit margin game.  

 

As a very loyal fan of the crews on RCCL ships, I feel sorry for what they are going through and will go through in the future as the industry is going to use personnel, food quality & quantity, and services in the never-ending quest to make up for their losses during the COVID debacle.  I don't completely blame the industry for that either.  Yes, they were hurt and hurt bad for the ~2 years of COVID.  Now they are being squeezed with inflation as well.  It's been and is now a tough industry, for sure.  I don't see things getting any better for a couple of years, at least.  

Corporations really don't care, those in jobs where they have no power must somehow "make it happen," get the job done no matter what. Because they always do. Until what we are seeing now on land, people won't work grueling jobs for peanuts anymore, and you have the staffing shortages you see every day. 

[cruisin from florida]

41 minutes ago, goldfish65 said:

Corporations really don't care, those in jobs where they have no power must somehow "make it happen," get the job done no matter what. Because they always do. Until what we are seeing now on land, people won't work grueling jobs for peanuts anymore, and you have the staffing shortages you see every day. 

I think we're seeing that already. Which is one of the reasons for staffing shortages on board. Working the existing staff harder isn't going to entice those who returned home and found other ways to support themselves without having to leave their families for months on end to come back to the ships.

It's very short-sighted, and as a customer and stockholder, I am concerned for the long-term effects on the brand.

[cruiselvr04]

Hoping this doesn’t go forward, but as previously posted by others, I won’t be tipping extra like I do now for once a day with the gratuity being at $16 pp per day.  Last cruise we didn’t step foot in the windjammer or the MDR  but I didn’t remove the tips, just tipped extra at all the speciality restaurants where we ate.  
 

We are very easy to pick up after.  Make the bed, take out the trash and replace towels is it.  I could see more people removing tips….which is so not fair to the staff.  
 

If this goes fleet wide, I will ask for double the towels to be left so we can have fresh in the am and pm and just step over the dirty ones I guess.  At home I do reuse a towel but at sea they don’t dry as well.  Plus the DH and I never share even hand towels so to me there’s not enough space to hang everything up to dry between uses.  Trash will often be overflowing ( Royal please get bigger cans if you do this) and if we order room service we will have to call back to have them picked up. I don’t want breakfast sitting in my cabin until I’m out for the evening. I won’t do it but I can imagine this would mean a lot more room service trays in the halls.

 

 

[Ret MP]

27 minutes ago, cruiselvr04 said:

I won’t be tipping extra like I do now for once a day with the gratuity being at $16 pp per day.  Last cruise we didn’t step foot in the windjammer or the MDR  but I didn’t remove the tips, just tipped extra at all the speciality restaurants where we ate.  

I've been thinking of that a little and I've come up with what I MAY do if they do reduce cabin service to once a day.  If the steward does a good job, I'll probably give him/her the hand to hand tip, afterall, it's probably tax free and not try to hurt the steward by not tipping generously, if providing good to great service, even if reduced by the "mothership", it's not the stewards fault for company policy.  I'd probably reduce the pre-paid gratuity as there is a record of it, they can gather statistics from that.  Something they can't do with cash tips.  If they notice that tipping is going down, statistically, and it gets harder and harder to find employees, they have a verifiable way to place the blame, themselves.  Not that they would ever admit to it, publicly.  But, it could lead to a reversal of policy, quietly of course. 

 

And yes, I know that there are more people than just the steward(s) that get the prepaid gratuities.  But, I feel it's better to spread the hurt over a greater number of people than just one or two.  "Embrace the suck" as we would say in the Army.

Edited January 4, 2023 by Ret MP

[Ret MP]

2 hours ago, goldfish65 said:

Corporations really don't care, those in jobs where they have no power 

That's why I believe it is up to us, the cruising public to support the powerless in the industry as well as protection the traditional services we have become accustomed to.  We need to make statements that can be heard by the mother ship, as stated above, make an impact that is verifiable by statistics.  Reduce prepaid tips (which is verifiable and and tracked statistically) and hand tip/cash tip stewards often and generously.  

[Morecruisesplz]

5 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

That's why I believe it is up to us, the cruising public to support the powerless in the industry as well as protection the traditional services we have become accustomed to.  We need to make statements that can be heard by the mother ship, as stated above, make an impact that is verifiable by statistics.  Reduce prepaid tips (which is verifiable and and tracked statistically) and hand tip/cash tip stewards often and generously.  

Yes because cabin attendants are smart enough to know most will still want ice 2 x day, sofabed put away during day then made up at night, etc. And they will have to fit those requests into their schedule. 

 

[cruisin from florida]

21 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

That's why I believe it is up to us, the cruising public to support the powerless in the industry as well as protection the traditional services we have become accustomed to.  We need to make statements that can be heard by the mother ship, as stated above, make an impact that is verifiable by statistics.  Reduce prepaid tips (which is verifiable and and tracked statistically) and hand tip/cash tip stewards often and generously.  

As much as I like the convenience of prepaid gratuities, I agree. If this and other service reductions continue, we'll remove the prepaid gratuities and tip generously, in cash, the people who provide us direct service. Let the bean counters try to figure it out.

[mramella]

4 hours ago, cruisin from florida said:

As much as I like the convenience of prepaid gratuities, I agree. If this and other service reductions continue, we'll remove the prepaid gratuities and tip generously, in cash, the people who provide us direct service. Let the bean counters try to figure it out.

 

Yep, I like this idea. I’ll probably do the same.

 

On a similar note, I remember when tips weren’t automatically added. Seems like the service was better back then. The current automatic tipping thing is a bit Socialistic, in my mind… Why work any harder when you’re going to get the same amount as your colleagues? There’s no incentive to work harder… 

 

“Trying to do good things by methods of force leads to bad result.” - Milton Friedman

 

Thanks!

 

Edited January 5, 2023 by mramella

[HappyTexan44]

 

I had been on the fence about switching to cash tips (of the same or greater amount) or leaving the pre-paid gratuities in place.  This might make me more likely to switch to cash.  I hate the stuff in the hallways.   But at some point I might start doing that too.  We'll be four people in two rooms each with max. occupancy of two, and two of the people being teen girls.  We also believe in bringing our creature comforts, and will drive, so we'll have lots of stuff.  

 

On the other hand, we won't need a genuine clean twice a day.  If they do a mini-service, e.g. ice and new towels, later in the day, that would be fine.  If they kept the hallways clear with frequent passes to pick stuff up, I wouldn't mind putting stuff in the hallways.  I suspect though, that what I call a mini-service is what the second clean was anyway.  

 

[Longford]

14 hours ago, mramella said:

 Why work any harder when you’re going to get the same amount as your colleagues? There’s no incentive to work harder… 

 

The incentive for cabin stewards to work harder or to satisfy guests is the expectation that if they do they'll be additionally rewarded with an end-of-cruise cash tip.  The percentage of the pre-paid gratuities a room steward is probably small ... as are wages paid by the cruise line.

 

The comments in this discussion thread - overall - raise the question in my mind:  How many of us tip the housekeeping staff - the maids- who clean the hotel rooms we stay in when we travel on land?  Do we tip - or always tip - the maid at the Holiday Inn or Comfort Suites?  And the hotels don't ask for pre-paid gratuities that are shared amongst all employees.

[cruisin from florida]

49 minutes ago, Longford said:

 

The incentive for cabin stewards to work harder or to satisfy guests is the expectation that if they do they'll be additionally rewarded with an end-of-cruise cash tip.  The percentage of the pre-paid gratuities a room steward is probably small ... as are wages paid by the cruise line.

 

The comments in this discussion thread - overall - raise the question in my mind:  How many of us tip the housekeeping staff - the maids- who clean the hotel rooms we stay in when we travel on land?  Do we tip - or always tip - the maid at the Holiday Inn or Comfort Suites?  And the hotels don't ask for pre-paid gratuities that are shared amongst all employees.

I don't always tip at US hotels. But US hotels have to at least pay state/US minimum wage. I don't think that is the case on cruise ships. I DO always tip at restaurants, because servers are not paid minimum wage.

Edited January 5, 2023 by cruisin from florida
Addition

[Longford]

28 minutes ago, cruisin from florida said:

I DO always tip at restaurants, because servers are not paid minimum wage.

Like you, I, too, tip at restaurants.  I struggle with that  internally, though.  We're made to feel guilty if we don't tip all of the time because waitstadd are grossly underpaid by their employer ... and we are, in reality, expected to provide wages restaurant owners refuse to.  Aren't cruise pre-paid gratuities the same thing?  Underpaid employees - and guests are asked to supplement the low wages ... not paying a gratuity in advance not  because of exemplary services received.

[cruiselvr04]

What the breakdown now for tips?  How does your $16 supposedly get broken up?  
 

 

[Biker19]

It never fails - all threads eventually somehow end up being a tipping thread.

🍿

[cruisin from florida]

6 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

It never fails - all threads eventually somehow end up being a tipping thread.

🍿

Sorry! I'm stopping now.

[Ocean Boy]

8 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

It never fails - all threads eventually somehow end up being a tipping thread.

🍿

Well, service and tipping are pretty intertwined.

[Ret MP]

Discussions about gratuities almost always generate, let's say, energetic discussions.  I'm a big proponent of the gratuity/tipping system.  Here's a few reasons why:

 

1.  Good/professional tip earners in good tip generating venues (Restaurants, Valet Parking Attendants, Grocery Baggers, ........) control their own wage.  Minimum producers don't, not generally.  Many, especially the overachievers make a lot more than minimum/living wage, a lot more.

2.  As a consumer, I can control and have immediate feedback for the service I receive.  In a hourly wage situation, minimum producers make the same as the overachievers, not good!

3.  I look at tip earners like I do piece workers, they get paid by how many widgets they assemble.  I pay a tip earner for the level of service they provide.  For me, it starts at 15% and will go up or down from there, usually up.

4.  Good/professional tip earners don't want a minimum/living wage.  They're better than that and they know it.  

5.  If I knew that a tip earner was being paid a minimum/living wage like they do in Australia and other countries, I don't think I would give a gratuity unless it was extremely great service.  But, like I've said in the past, a guaranteed minimum wage almost guarantees a minimum level of service by far too many employees, NOT ALL but far too many.  

 

Now, if you are a tip earner in a very low-end business, you may make more if you would get minimum wage/living wage.  But, if you don't have the skills, energy, or made some very bad life choices to improve their place in life, I probably don't want you serving me anything anyway.   

 

Just a short "no BS" story:  My best friend's son married a girl that was, shortly before they got married, a bartender at a very popular bar (Marco Polo) on Miami Beach.  In just 3 or 4 years of doing that, she paid off her student loan(s), and saved enough money to put 50% down on an upper middle class home in West side of Davie, Florida.  They got married after she became a very successful and respected Broward County Shariff's Deputy with no debt or very little.  

 

As a Director and General Manager of a very high-end parking management company, I can tell you the Valet Parking Attendants, the hustlers,  made a lot more than the Cashiers made at our self parking facilities at FLL and Port Everglades where we paid the cashiers a living wage.  The Valet Parking Attendants at Pier 66 and Marriott's Harbor Beach Hotels, even at some high-end malls in Miami, the hustlers, were raking in hundreds of dollars a day, and I'm going back a long time ago.  They were begging to work extra hours/days for the money. 

 

Disclaimer:  This is the world according to Jay.  It isn't an attempt to force anything upon anybody.  It is my experience and my opinion based upon my experience.  Your mileage may vary.  

 

 

[Longford]

51 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

It never fails - all threads eventually somehow end up being a tipping thread.

🍿

With almost 600 replies since the discussion topic was started, the subject of gratuities was first raised at reply 3, and since ... throughout.  

[HappyTexan44]

Well, it is natural.  Tips are for service.  Less service means less tips.  

Unfortunately, I suspect they'll end up with less money.  My guess is that Royal will say, "Well you have more rooms, but you only have to do one service on each.  Since we didn't double the number of your rooms, we are being generous in keeping your share of the auto-grats the same."  Then the cash tips will drop to basically zero, because people aren't receiving the service to warrant cash tips.  


 

[Morecruisesplz]

I have a feeling once per day cabin service might go fleet wide this week. On the Explorer day 4 of 5 they took all of the magnetic "make up my room" and the reverse "sleeping off" off of all cabin doors overnight. Checked several floors and saw none. Cabin stewarts are also conspicuously missing from hallways. Odd, at the very least. Will update after my nap and dinner. 😃 

[Mikew0805]

2 hours ago, fredmdcruisers said:

I have a feeling once per day cabin service might go fleet wide this week. On the Explorer day 4 of 5 they took all of the magnetic "make up my room" and the reverse "sleeping off" off of all cabin doors overnight. Checked several floors and saw none. Cabin stewarts are also conspicuously missing from hallways. Odd, at the very least. Will update after my nap and dinner. 😃 

Why would they get rid of those magnets? I am okay with once per day service, but I am still not okay with being woke up before I am ready for them to come in.

[bucfan2]

4 hours ago, cruisin from florida said:

Sorry! I'm stopping now.

Too late....grab a drink, some snacks, and enjoy.  Won't be word-for-word when compared to the previous 1k tipping threads this year, so maybe we'll pick up a little tidbit.  (Doubt it tho).

[DirtyDawg]

5 hours ago, Ret MP said:

Discussions about gratuities almost always generate, let's say, energetic discussions.  I'm a big proponent of the gratuity/tipping system.  Here's a few reasons why:

 

1.  Good/professional tip earners in good tip generating venues (Restaurants, Valet Parking Attendants, Grocery Baggers, ........) control their own wage.  Minimum producers don't, not generally.  Many, especially the overachievers make a lot more than minimum/living wage, a lot more.

2.  As a consumer, I can control and have immediate feedback for the service I receive.  In a hourly wage situation, minimum producers make the same as the overachievers, not good!

3.  I look at tip earners like I do piece workers, they get paid by how many widgets they assemble.  I pay a tip earner for the level of service they provide.  For me, it starts at 15% and will go up or down from there, usually up.

4.  Good/professional tip earners don't want a minimum/living wage.  They're better than that and they know it.  

5.  If I knew that a tip earner was being paid a minimum/living wage like they do in Australia and other countries, I don't think I would give a gratuity unless it was extremely great service.  But, like I've said in the past, a guaranteed minimum wage almost guarantees a minimum level of service by far too many employees, NOT ALL but far too many.  

 

Now, if you are a tip earner in a very low-end business, you may make more if you would get minimum wage/living wage.  But, if you don't have the skills, energy, or made some very bad life choices to improve their place in life, I probably don't want you serving me anything anyway.   

 

Just a short "no BS" story:  My best friend's son married a girl that was, shortly before they got married, a bartender at a very popular bar (Marco Polo) on Miami Beach.  In just 3 or 4 years of doing that, she paid off her student loan(s), and saved enough money to put 50% down on an upper middle class home in West side of Davie, Florida.  They got married after she became a very successful and respected Broward County Shariff's Deputy with no debt or very little.  

 

As a Director and General Manager of a very high-end parking management company, I can tell you the Valet Parking Attendants, the hustlers,  made a lot more than the Cashiers made at our self parking facilities at FLL and Port Everglades where we paid the cashiers a living wage.  The Valet Parking Attendants at Pier 66 and Marriott's Harbor Beach Hotels, even at some high-end malls in Miami, the hustlers, were raking in hundreds of dollars a day, and I'm going back a long time ago.  They were begging to work extra hours/days for the money. 

 

Disclaimer:  This is the world according to Jay.  It isn't an attempt to force anything upon anybody.  It is my experience and my opinion based upon my experience.  Your mileage may vary.  

 

 

Thanks Jay. I too favour a tipping system. But mine is a simple reason. For almost 30 years in the investment industry, I worked on a bonus system. The better our clients did financially , the better my compensation was. As the old saying goes, if's is good for the Dawg - it's good for the the other 8.05 billion non-Dawgs on the planet. 😁

 

BTW the U.S. Junior hockey team just won the bronze medal in the world Juniors' tournament. Wild game! Sorry, but Canada is playing for the gold tonight! 🏒 🏆

[DallasGuy75219]

9 hours ago, cruisin from florida said:

I don't think that is the case on cruise ships.

One of the benefits of flags of convenience.