Withdrawing Daily Auto Gratuity fees onboard

[Gunther1]

What is essentially unanswered from those that remove the automatic  tips is the question: How, if at all , do you tip the laundry personnel, the people that you see polishing the stairwells and the promenade  deck, the people in the kitchen (some you see and some you don’t see), the barback, the people that clear the tables on the Lido deck, the assistant waiter, etc ?

[57redbird]

37 minutes ago, HappyInVan said:

 

 

 

Edited February 9 by 57redbird
delete

[HappyInVan]

1 minute ago, Gunther1 said:

What is essentially unanswered from those that remove the automatic  tips is the question: How, if at all , do you tip the laundry personnel, the people that you see polishing the stairwells and the promenade  deck, the people in the kitchen (some you see and some you don’t see), the barback, the people that clear the tables on the Lido deck, the assistant waiter, etc ?

 

HAL should return to the previous practice of paying real wages, rather than using a pseudo gratuity. You can be sure that HAL will be raising the gratuities per day.

[Torquer]

35 minutes ago, HappyInVan said:

Actually, in Europe, the restaurant staff expect you to leave 20% etc. There are consequences if you under-tip and return to restaurant.

Huh?  Specifically which country in Europe are you talking about?  Every European country I have been to has a vastly different attitude to tipping than the US and Canada, and I have traveled extensively in western Europe.  In most European countries tips are not even expected and if you leave a couple Euros or round up the bill to an even 5 Euros (or pounds or whatever the currency is) the servers are very appreciative.

 

Your comment makes me wonder if you have ever even been to Europe.

[kazu]

28 minutes ago, regnig said:

@HappyInVan if you are going to keep score, count me as one!  I have in the past and will continue in the future to leave the auto tips in place and then tip extra to the deserving.

 

+1 more 🙂. We normally have excellent service and tip additional accordingly.  

 

One exception and I very much  regretted when I was so quickly medically evacuated and there was no opportunity to additionally tip my stewards or wait staff on that cruise 😢 

[QuestionEverything]

OP, I totally appreciate your analysis and post here on CC.

Thank you for posting.

The issue is Management not the beleaguered staff. 

Like the tellers at the bank or the servers at the fast food, they get the brunt of the downside of corporate decisions.

Let us be frank - the cruise lines, like restaurants, hotels etc, have cut back significantly and the poor front line staff take the blame.

Also, there are many staff who take care of guests that are hidden from our view - the gratuities (hopefully) work their way down them. Hard working and site unseen, the dear ones.

Like recommended by other posters - please communicate your concerns and displeasure to management.

My suggestion is to consider the premium cruise line level Oceania, Azamara, etc, it is a better product overall, and often for not much more than the mass cruise line costs.

None of the cruise lines deliver the product they used too, all of them are busy downgrading and increasing costs.

As a consumer, you can consider moving some of your travel $ to other vacation options, like I have.

The more competition the best for our travel $ is the way we the consumer benefit.

Thanks for your post. Take care.

 

[julia]

Sigh...  24 years of being on Cruise Critic and still this battle wages on. That poor dead horse is done.

[bobomonkeyrage]

3 minutes ago, kazu said:

One exception and I very much  regretted when I was so quickly medically evacuated and there was no opportunity to additionally tip my stewards or wait staff on that cruise 😢 

I think in that situation everyone can agree you get a pass...

[Mary229]

20 minutes ago, HappyInVan said:

I have provided critical ratings on a room steward. On the next cruise, he was almost tearful as I embarked. There are consequences if we merely use the post-cruise survey to provide feedback

Oh my.   

[Vict0riann]

We consider the crew appreciation fee (gratuity) to be part of our cruise fare.  But say, if one is paying $100pp a day as your cruise fare, $17 is 17%, if you're paying, say, $170, you are "tipping" 10%, and so on.  If the cruise line had to remove those tips and include an additional $17 into the wages of the crew that were originally covered by the gratuity charge, because of tax implications for HAL and for the crew involved, they might have to double the charge to the passenger, so instead of paying $100 a day, one would be paying $134 a day, or $204, and so on, with no option to remove anything....

[bobomonkeyrage]

21 minutes ago, HappyInVan said:

I have provided critical ratings on a room steward. On the next cruise, he was almost tearful as I embarked. There are consequences if we merely use the post-cruise survey to provide feedback.

Is almost reducing a grown man to tears something you're saying you're proud of...?

[mcrcruiser]

23 hours ago, Mary229 said:

I agree with @cbr663    I only complain when I feel something was more than just my personal opinion but was a true failing of the promised services, that is I don’t expect the Seabourn experience for my HAL cruise rate.  
 

There have been two sailings where there were such issues.  Both times I complained well directly to corporate and both times I was offered generous compensation.  

 

As a matter of fact the compensation I received in the  last incident far exceeded my expectations.  
 

The prior incident caused me to break up with HAL for a few years but after trying other travel companies including other cruise lines, supposedly superior, I decided to try HAL again and have been satisfied so far and they honored the compensation they had offered .

Mary  we been on over 100 cruises .We cn honestly say that  only once did I have misgivings   on a HAL cruise ship  necause it was I could not locate my wife who I said meet me at a point on the ship .she did not show up .I went to the cabin the door was open & no wife there . That was more than concerning .I went to desk relations & they did nothing to help ;which yo this day I felt was highly unusual . The long & the short was  my wife did not hear me when I said meet me here . she went to the  main show room  .Well we did find her after a senior officer stepped into the matter .

 

 so over 100 cruises this is the worst I ever had to deal with . We have sailed mostly with Celebrity ,royal Caribbean & then Holland  America . We also have sailed Pricess & Carnival .  

 

 Holland America well suits us now . for any one who has a llegitimate complaint best to start at customer relations . If need be their supervisor level . From there if you do not get a proper response go to the Hotel director  . In either case your problem will be resolved on board the ship 

 Cliff

[mcrcruiser]

We never though of  cutting tips pn any cruise . Those people work hard & they give excellent service on holland america ships . We never found them un courteous  . From time to time  problems come up like in any other business . It is how you deal with those problems that makes the difference 

 

Cliff

[MISTER 67]

On 2/8/2024 at 1:14 PM, Sea42 said:

I'm sure the HAL staff will be sorry to hear that.

You can make light of it but we also think HAL has issues, we are 4 Star Mariners and HAL has had just too many cutbacks with service, entertainment and dining. Our last cruise on the Nieuw Amsterdam was horrible, one morning I had scrambled eggs that were frozen, they rationed out butter like it was gold, I like lox and bagels for breakfast and the lox was gray instead of pink and tasted like it was tainted, I complained to the head waiter in the Lido had brought me some nice and pink fresh lox but the next day it was back to gray so I just gave up. Meals in the MDR were so so but I did have some pretty good Dover sole one night but the portion was a joke, 3 bites and done.

Entertainment on HAL is a joke with hardly any shows in the main showroom, now they’ve cut out Lincoln Center and I heard BJ Kings is being phased out. Since the pandemic sort of ended we have sailed 10 times on HAL, Princess and Celebrity, HAL is the only line that cut out evening turndown service so we are done with HAL after many wonderful cruises with them, it’s too bad but they have lost us as loyal passengers.

As far as gratuities, we have never lowered or withdrawn them but the last 2 cruises with HAL we didn’t reward anyone with any extra cash gratuities during or on the last day of the cruise.

Edited February 9 by MISTER 67

[albingirl]

Personally, I really don't give much thought to the onboard tipping, except I'm inclined to give more.  Tipping, for me, goes into the general accounting of how much the cruise is costing me, and that's that.  No more, no less. When I overhear people in guest services lines removing their tips, I always think, well, they would never be friends of mine.  That's it.

[rodndonna]

42 minutes ago, HappyInVan said:

 

HAL should return to the previous practice of paying real wages, rather than using a pseudo gratuity. You can be sure that HAL will be raising the gratuities per day.

 

Or the obvious solution,  you should cruise on cruiselines that don't collect autogratuities.

[Gunther1]

As my mom once said to me years ago when we were discussing something somewhat similiar, “I can sleep well at night knowing that I am trying to do the right thing”.

[Wehwalt]

10 minutes ago, rodndonna said:

 

Or the obvious solution,  you should cruise on cruiselines that don't collect autogratuities.

+1!

[SumoCitrus]

We had some staffing related issues on our recent Eurodam cruise. Nothing crazy but definitely noticable. Not once did I ever consider cancelling gratuities.

[daisy-mae]

32 minutes ago, MISTER 67 said:

Since the pandemic sort of ended we have sailed 10 times on HAL, Princess and Celebrity, HAL is the only line that cut out evening turndown service so we are done with HAL after many wonderful cruises with them, it’s too bad but they have lost us as loyal passengers.

 

I always find it interesting to learn what is important to some folks. Of any of the services offered on board, the evening turn down would be last on my list in terms of essential to a satisfactory experience. And it would certainly have no bearing on my future cruise plans.

[Real NHDOC]

They never stopped offering turn down service on Holland America. You can request it when you meet the room steward on the first day and it will be provided. We started our post covid cruising in August of 2021 and never have been told we could not have service morning, evening or both. 

[kazu]

27 minutes ago, Real NHDOC said:

They never stopped offering turn down service on Holland America. You can request it when you meet the room steward on the first day and it will be provided. We started our post covid cruising in August of 2021 and never have been told we could not have service morning, evening or both. 

 

I had turn down service on my Rotterdam and Oosterdam cruise without requesting it.  I didn’t ask for it on my Koningsdam cruise but the stewards had obviously been in and freshened things and left my programmes, etc on the bed.

 

I have to say that on my 3 (one was a B2B2B) cruises post covid, I have had great service from my cabin stewards.  

[Real NHDOC]

There was a time post covid when the cabin stewards would ask if you wanted “morning or evening service” which made people think they could no longer get both but they never stopped providing both if you simply asked. Now it seems like things are more back to normal but sometimes we occasionally run into a steward who still will ask because some people prefer one or the other. But nightly turn down was always available. 

[MISTER 67]

1 hour ago, daisy-mae said:

I always find it interesting to learn what is important to some folks. Of any of the services offered on board, the evening turn down would be last on my list in terms of essential to a satisfactory experience. And it would certainly have no bearing on my future cruise plans.

You didn’t bother to post my whole thread but yes when you’re use to evening turndown service for 44 years of cruising with chocolates on the pillow then all of a sudden it’s one thing after another that is being taken away from us then it’s good bye HAL, we will stick with Celebrity and Princess.

Edited February 9 by MISTER 67

[Mary229]

2 hours ago, mcrcruiser said:

Mary  we been on over 100 cruises .We cn honestly say that  only once did I have misgivings   on a HAL cruise ship  necause it was I could not locate my wife who I said meet me at a point on the ship .she did not show up .I went to the cabin the door was open & no wife there . That was more than concerning .I went to desk relations & they did nothing to help ;which yo this day I felt was highly unusual . The long & the short was  my wife did not hear me when I said meet me here . she went to the  main show room  .Well we did find her after a senior officer stepped into the matter .

 

 so over 100 cruises this is the worst I ever had to deal with . We have sailed mostly with Celebrity ,royal Caribbean & then Holland  America . We also have sailed Pricess & Carnival .  

 

 Holland America well suits us now . for any one who has a llegitimate complaint best to start at customer relations . If need be their supervisor level . From there if you do not get a proper response go to the Hotel director  . In either case your problem will be resolved on board the ship 

 Cliff

My issues were not caused by me or my spouse in any part,  my issues were failures on the part of HAL to uphold their contractual obligations and were too broad or too large to be dealt with at the ship level.  They were reported at the ship level so they could ask questions and document the issues but I did not ask for immediate redress.  I am not going to rehash them now, I did openly discuss them at the time