RCCL Babysitting

[sas80]

Just got back from the Freedom.

RCCL does not have access to the information on the ages of the passengers in your stateroom.

 

I lied (yup, I'm a liar) and said I had a one, two and three year old that I needed to arrange babysitting for.

 

The truth was that I needed to arrange a sitter for my kids (ages 8 months and 3 years) and some friends I was sailing with were going to bring their kid to my room to have her watched (she is 2). Our room was the big corner aft and we knew that Sky would have fun playing with David.

 

I told the lady at the front desk that I needed to arrange babysitting for my 1,2 and 3 year old. She asked what cabin, I said 1400 and she started typing. At this point I wondered if she was accessing our cabin information BUT she then said "Hang on, I need to access the babysitting form to fill it out". THAT is what they are doing. They are not accessing your stateroom information, they are accessing the word document to fill it out for your babysitting request.

 

I was able to arrange sitting for 3 hours every night, except the first night, and we paid the sitter $20 an hour for the three kids. I did mention to the guest relations person that, if she thought we needed 2 sitters for the 3 kids that would be fine, because 3 kids is a lot to handle. The guest relations person said she would find us the "best" sitter that they had. They only sent one, Verdeen. She was very nice and enjoyed sitting with the kids.

 

Anyways, the point - they don't know how old your kids are. They go by what you tell them.

 

Happy Sailing! :)

[6rugrats]

I'm guessing that they do have access to this information, but that this staff member just did not look it up.

[sas80]

I'm guessing that they do have access to this information, but that this staff member just did not look it up.

 

You are probably right BUT I don't think it is standard procedure to look it up as part of the babysitting request process.

[Iluvjo]

Awsome, good for you! I can't wait to try it i a couple of weeks.

[sas80]

Just got back from the Freedom.

RCCL does not have access to the information on the ages of the passengers in your stateroom.

 

I lied (yup, I'm a liar) and said I had a one, two and three year old that I needed to arrange babysitting for.

 

The truth was that I needed to arrange a sitter for my kids (ages 8 months and 3 years) and some friends I was sailing with were going to bring their kid to my room to have her watched (she is 2). Our room was the big corner aft and we knew that Sky would have fun playing with David.

 

I told the lady at the front desk that I needed to arrange babysitting for my 1,2 and 3 year old. She asked what cabin, I said 1400 and she started typing. At this point I wondered if she was accessing our cabin information BUT she then said "Hang on, I need to access the babysitting form to fill it out". THAT is what they are doing. They are not accessing your stateroom information, they are accessing the word document to fill it out for your babysitting request.

 

I was able to arrange sitting for 3 hours every night, except the first night, and we paid the sitter $20 an hour for the three kids. I did mention to the guest relations person that, if she thought we needed 2 sitters for the 3 kids that would be fine, because 3 kids is a lot to handle. The guest relations person said she would find us the "best" sitter that they had. They only sent one, Verdeen. She was very nice and enjoyed sitting with the kids.

 

Anyways, the point - they don't know how old your kids are. They go by what you tell them.

 

Happy Sailing! :)

 

Just to clarify - when I said "RCCL does NOT have access to your personal information" I meant "guest relations does not have access to your personal information." And I don't think that that statement is correct either. As 6rugrats said, and I agreed, guest relations probably does have access to your personal info but I don't think it is standard procedure for them to access it as a matter of taking a babysitting request.

[sas80]

Awsome, good for you! I can't wait to try it i a couple of weeks.

 

My unsolicited advice for you would be to go to guest relations alone. Don't take the baby with you.

[Iluvjo]

Pssssssssst! its our little secret:cool::cool:

[CruisingCatherine]

Thanks a bunch for the info. We are wanting to get sitting for my 10 month old, 9 year old, and 12 year old. My 9 year old is a girl who is my little mother! When the baby does have a sitter she is actually the one who is sitting. I am just wanted to make sure all are safe when we enjoy the ship on a couple of late nights.

[sas80]

Thanks a bunch for the info. We are wanting to get sitting for my 10 month old, 9 year old, and 12 year old. My 9 year old is a girl who is my little mother! When the baby does have a sitter she is actually the one who is sitting. I am just wanted to make sure all are safe when we enjoy the ship on a couple of late nights.

 

Ask for Verdeen as your sitter on the Freedom. She was very nice and really enjoyed the baby. If you can remember, you can tell her that Ashley, Skylar and David (the one who liked the Adventure Ocean Train) say hello :)

[CruisingCatherine]

Ask for Verdeen as your sitter on the Freedom. She was very nice and really enjoyed the baby.

 

Did you feel safe with her? I am always so leary of babysitters. I am sure that RCCL only uses those employees that have been back ground checked and cleared, but you never know.

[dianeandmike2004]

Ask for Verdeen as your sitter on the Freedom. She was very nice and really enjoyed the baby. If you can remember, you can tell her that Ashley, Skylar and David (the one who liked the Adventure Ocean Train) say hello :)

 

 

We're going on the Freedom on the 18th with our 18-month old, so we will ask for her. It's great that they offer that service so that parents can have a nice dinner together.

 

This will be our first cruise with a child, so we have never used their babysitting service. I understand that the cost is $10 per hour for one child and is payable to the babysitter in cash. Is that the payment to her or do you tip on top of that or how does that work? I really have no idea.

 

Thanks so much!

Diane

[cb at sea]

I would tip on top of the fee---after all, you tip your babysitter at home, don't you?

[dianeandmike2004]

I would tip on top of the fee---after all, you tip your babysitter at home, don't you?

 

We've never gotten a babysitter before, so I don't know what the going rates are or what is expected.

[sas80]

We're going on the Freedom on the 18th with our 18-month old, so we will ask for her. It's great that they offer that service so that parents can have a nice dinner together.

 

This will be our first cruise with a child, so we have never used their babysitting service. I understand that the cost is $10 per hour for one child and is payable to the babysitter in cash. Is that the payment to her or do you tip on top of that or how does that work? I really have no idea.

 

Thanks so much!

Diane

 

It's $10 per hour for up to two children in the same family(IIRC) $15 per hour for up to three children in the same family. Since I made the reservations for both the families I presented it as if they were MY three kids (not to be sneaky, but because I figured there would be less confusions in terms of which stateroom to go to, how many sitters, etc)

Presenting it this way would have meant that we (the 2 couples) could have paid only $15 an hour for the sitter, but we paid her $20 per hour. (she made $360 off us that week, that's not chump change!)

 

You pay in cash at the end of the night.

 

We also always pay for the amount of hours that we asked for originally. there were a few nights were we only used her 2.5 hours and the last night we used her for 2 hours but we always paid her as if we used her 3 hours because I feel that was our original contract. But that is my preference and is what works best for our family.

 

If you were going to tip her I would consider tipping an extra $2-$3 per hour. Your call. She only expects $10 an hour. If you take our situation into consideration, she expected to get $15 an hour and we tipped her $5 extra an hour OR no tip at all if you look at it a different way.

[dianeandmike2004]

Thanks so much! That was very helpful. We are thinking about getting a babysitter for two evenings. I babysat when I was a teenager all the time, but at the time, the going rate was just over a dollar an hour!