Question for those who remove auto tips

[brillohead]

I'm sure someone will shoot this down as well. After so much discussion about tips/gratuities on CC, whatever you want to call it, on our last cruise I asked the steward a question. If I had prepaid the gratuities and I chose to give him something over and above in cash, was he able to keep that money and not turn it in to the pool? He said yes.

 

I'll back you up on this one. On my last cruise two years ago, I asked my MDR server (a 20 year veteran with RCCL) about this same thing. He said that if he gets cash money in addition to the auto-gratuity amount, he does not have to add that to the pooled money. But if auto-grats are removed by the passenger, he is supposed to put any cash tips received into the pooled funds. He was amazing and he got extra from all of us in addition to keeping the auto-grats in place.

 

So... I was wondering if I could add tip $ to staff members on my onboard account.

 

Has anyone done it that way?

 

Wendy

 

I haven't, but one of my girlfriends did on the cruise we took two years ago. She was running low on cash, so she went to Guest Services and added an additional tip over and above the auto-grat for the MDR waiter and his assistant and also the cabin steward.

[suekay]

We had non refundable obc left at the end of the cruise and the casino was closed so no way to cash it out. Guest services gave us a printed form to complete authorising extra tips to be given to our waiter, assistant waiter and cabin steward. I'm sure they'd be pleased with the unexpectedly generous bonus