sparks1093

That's the exact way auto gratuities work- you leave it in place and they do with it what they will. Instead of doing that you hassle with taking a bunch of cash onboard with you, determining who should get a tip and how much, and seeking that person out to give them said tip. They then have to take their off time, which is precious to shipboard workers, and go to turn your largesse in as they are required to do. All so you can prove a point that at the end of the day is rather pointless to begin with. (This argument is not directed at you, but is made to show others who are trying to decide what to do how fatuous this course of action is.)

The company doesn't care that their employees aren't getting their full due so your course of action won't have the desired effect, you'll just hurt the people that have absolutely nothing to do with the decisions. If you really want to stick it to the man then take your money elsewhere. If enough people did that then maybe they would change. Since a lot of these issues are very likely being driven by the pandemic I believe that eventually things will get better, although I'm not sure we'll ever get fully back to "normal". And if these issues are mainly driven by pandemic fallout then no amount of complaining or removing gratuities or anything else will make one bit of difference.

It's on the radar but DW prefers cruises going to warmer climes so we will have to see. I hate to say it but the airfare to Vancouver from Montreal is a lot less expensive than to Seattle, so even if we made it out there Seattle might not be on the itinerary 😞. As for the passport thing, the nickel dropped when I was looking at the railroad's website, this might be a case of the company requiring it even though the governments involved don't (similar to luxury lines requiring passports for everyone on a closed loop cruise). (And living 8 miles from the border I fully understand what you mean 🙂.)

Howdy! I understand but the two documents that I mentioned are also valid for crossing the land border, so there is no real reason why they shouldn't be accepted.

WHTI doesn't extend to land border crossings so the BC/DL won't work for any shore excursion that crosses the land border. I would expect that a passport card or an Enhanced Drivers License would also be acceptable for the excursion since those may be used for land border crossings.

I think I have already mentioned onboard baggage handlers and the folks who are responsible for cleaning public places as receiving a share of the tips. Yes indeed, they do get a share, but I don't think it's a large share. How much exactly they get doesn't matter to me at all.

Not quite, I wasn't asking anything, I was pointing out that while your steward may only get 25% of your tip ALL of the stewards receive a share based, in part, on their seniority and possiblity other factors. Some folks do get tipped out from the amount of the tips that is designated for the stewards, but their percentage isn't larger than what the stewards get. When you worked as a waiter you wouldn't have tipped out 75% of your tips to anyone and I don't think that happens here.

My apologies for circling back to this (I feel like Dectective Columbo whenever this happens) but I had a thought related to it. You say that "75% of those tips go to people you never see". In a manner of speaking that might be so, but I believe that the stewards are the ones that get the lion's share of the tips designated for them, just as when you tipped out as watistaff you kept most of your tips and the tipped out folks got a small percentage. I believe that Carnival also has different pay scales based on seniority, so if someone has several cruises as a steward with Carnival they will receive a larger percentage from the tip pool then a first timer. I don't have anything to back this up, of course, since this is all proprietary information to begin with, but it does make perfect sense that it would be set up like this to reward longevity and give the staff an incentive for signing on again.

If you have or are experiencing less service then it is because of changes made by Corporate, not the employees providing the service. If you want to take this out on them that's your business, but I don't think that it is the right thing to do. You'll give them cash and then they'll have to use their off time to hand it in as they are required to do and it will still go into the pool.

Would this be mentioned in the report if it were only hearsay and not substantiated? This scenario makes a lot more sense to me than anything else. (Back in my Navy days I did manage to set myself on fire with one of those burning drinks, served in a bar, when it poured down my bare arm. No damage as I was very lucky and I haven't messed with burning drinks since then, but I can only imagine what would have happened had I spilled it on my clothes.)

Who exactly says that you have to have a passport with 6 month validity? You might be sailing with a cruise line where this is actually the case, but they are typically the upscale cruise lines and I don't see them doing many 3 day booze cruises. What you might have read was a poorly written recommendation because for the vast majority of closed loop cruises there is no requirement to have 6 months validity remaining, it only needs to be valid on your return to the States. This is a lesson for anyone who is following this thread though, make sure that you have the required documentation for your cruise well before hand, that you know where it is and if you are using passports make sure they are valid.

And then there is Person C, who isn't trying to convince either person A or person B since their minds are made up, but is trying to make sure that persons D through Z who are reading the thread have as much information as they need to make up their minds.

That is a healthy way of looking at it. As I've said everyone who receives a share earns it and even if I'm not seeing them they are contributing to my cruise enjoyment. I also believe that Carnival is using a salary plus tip, with the understanding that the salary is very small (in the $50 to $100 per month range, depending on source read, but it might be a little higher). There is a guaranteed amount the employees are supposed to get and if tips don't get them to that amount then the company is expected to make up the shortfall (very similar to tipped employees ashore working for a lower minimum wage, with the employer expected to bring them to full minimum wage if the tips they receive don't get them there).

Different business models are run differently and each has it's own advantages and disadvantages for whatever business is using it. Tip pools increase teamwork among tipped staff, it levels out the highs and lows for all (such as being stuck at a slow station one night). It isn't the only way tips are handled and may not be as effective in one business as it is in another. As with any attempt to control human behavior it can be hit or miss.

No, I replied from my phone and it would let me quote you and for some reason inserted all of those returns. I personally don't care what someone makes, so I would never think to ask. The tips belong to the pool 100%, John Heald has stated as much over the years. Carnival may not be transparent in this, but then neither is any other cruise line. How their compensation is done is proprietary in nature and they will not discuss it. Another thing John Heald confirmed is that if the auto gratuities remain in place then the employees keep any additional tips. I have no reason to doubt him. I think until you figure out exactly how things work, conclusively and not by guessing, that you should leave well enough alone and leave the auto gratuities in place since you have no idea what the ramifications are to the employees, but that's just me. I am pretty confident that removing them doesn't hurt the company one little bit.

Yes, all of that, but they still move much faster than a government organization does, don't they? They would certainly, if the fire was the reason for the change in policy, be able to implement such a policy change in well under 6 years. This is one thing that I witnessed regarding a major policy change for a cruise line: NCL got a new CEO and while he was touring one of their ships he made an off hand comment about the number of dishes that he saw in the hallways. Upper management reacted to his off hand comment by banning passengers from taking any food from any dining venue. This change was implemented within a couple of months of the CEO's tour. (Yes, it was a very unpopular change which resulted in its reversal in a short time but that is neither here nor there.) As for smoking areas on a ship that has always been 100% under control of the ship's master and the company, there are no regulations to consider, no legal issues. If you want to believe that it took a private company 6 years to implement this change in response to the fire you are free to do so. It seems to me if the fire was the reason for the policy change they would have done that right away in order to give themselves more time to spend all of that money retrofitting their balconies, which is the one thing they did do immediately, having to take ships out of service in order to do so.

Ok I have a clearer picture now. I don't know why you think they're getting screwed, they're working on a contact that clearly delineates what is expected of them and what they will make, broken down by what the company contributes (little), what their minimum tips will be (in the event too many people remove tips) and what they'll make at full tips. In short they know full well goingbin what they'll be doing and for how much. We don't know who the folks are who get a share but I doubt that it extends to the back of the house. My guess is it covers traditionally tipped out staff (bussers) but also some folks who do a job onboard that would be regular hourly wage ashore. I've mentioned the folks moving luggage on embark and debark. I would also guess that the folks busy cleaning the public places while you sleep are also part of the pool. In any event if they are part of the pool they are earning what they make. These folks get most of their income from our auto grants. Finally, since you mention your work history what would your reaction have been if a customer asked you anything about the tips you earned? I know that would have found a polite way to tell it's none of their business. You didn't earn a salary but you probably earned an hourly wage less than what the hourly wage was and the law required your employer to make up the difference if your tips didn't bring you to full minimum wage. Those two amounts are represent the first two amounts that I mentioned above, the little bit they get from the company and the minimum they are guaranteed under the agreement the cruise line and the association that represents the workers *which isn't an employee union as we understand it). So, you certainly have the right to do as you wish with the auto grants but that doesn't mean it's the right thing to do. I do know this- when I leave the auto tips in place I know that every employee that is supposed to get a share does. That's good enough for me, I don't need to know exactly where it's going.

Nope, no additional questions would be called for since it is in full compliance with the DHS regulations in place.

Proof that you would accept? Doubtful, but I do know how tipping pools work and it's much easier for me to believe that a tipping pool is being used then it is to believe that a single steward is making $2450 per week as you calculate. Seems to me you might be upset that a lowly employee is making so much money, even though you acknowledge how hard they work. You don't think about it at all when you eat out at a restaurant and probably assume that your server is getting 100% of what you leave, when that is very probably not the case.

As long as it's a government issued birth certificate that is all that the regulations require. Presenting a birth certificate for another use may have, and often does have, different requirements. Our first two or three cruises I cruised with a short form certificate with no parent name one them, but it was still sufficient to verify my citizenship. (And no, the requirements haven't changed since then.) As Carnival's website points out a legible photo copy is also acceptable.

I don't know why people think this is wrong. The crew work as a team and when one member of the team excels, the entire team excels. It may not be the team member who is providing you the service directly that is excellng. As has been pointed out multiple times this is no different from a land-based restaurant or resort pooling tips for the staff, a practice that most people are probably ignorant of to begin with. In those establishments the tips are pooled and then divided in accordance with the agreement made between the establishment and the employees. And note- management and the establishment are forbidden in most states from sharing in tip pools, it all has to go to the employees. When tips are pooled the customer cannot give a server a tricky wink with the gratuity and say "this is only for you, don't share it with anyone else" because they can't do that without potentially losing their job. For those who say you want them to know how grateful you are they know that by the size of your tip and by your words, especially if you share your words with their bosses.

For a closed loop cruise on Carnival it is acceptable along with a government issued ID for 16 and older. It only matters if you are applying for a passport.

You might not mind if it costs you more but there are plenty of folks who would and they wouldn't leave a tip, either. In any establishment that pools tips, and that is quite a good number of places, any tip you leave is split among the employees and yes, that does help the establishment's bottom line.

Some notes- roll your items so you can get more in the bag and the bag does not need to be able to close. There have been several times when there was a layer of clothes on top that stuck out of the bag. Having the self-serve option is a plus, but I figure we do enough laundry at home during the year. I can splurge on getting it done.

Every cruise line has changed in the last 30 years. What attracts us to Carnival is the price and when another company can meet or beat that price then we sail with them. Yes, some little things have gone but I feel that the overall product is still solid and meets our needs. If the day comes when that isn't the case then it's likely the end of our cruising days.