Norwegian Cruise Line Changes Service Charge Policy

[GUEST080219]

My guess is that they have a system set up for the incentive program (which they clearly state is funded by the DSC) and if a crew member gives bad service and it is reported, it is probably notated on their file and is taken into consideration when the incentive program is paid. I would also bet that those crew members that get accolades from passengers for their great service, probably gets a larger percentage of the incentive program. With regard to those that remove the DSC for no reason other than they don't want to pay, it affects everyone since the incentive pool is reduced by that amount.

 

 

Makes sense but would be quite easy for NCL to just publish it to stop speculating.

When this is true even more reason to remove the DSC as incentive programs are the worst idea ever. We had those as well and they are never fair. And especially not in favor of the customers as they reward behavior that benefits the company and their revenue which is very much different from what I as a customer would want to see rewarded.

[luddite]

I have a question, don't know if you know the answer, but someone might.

 

When I was in London, we went to a restaurant who added a service charge of, I think 13%, to our bill. Does anyone know where that money goes? Does it go directly to the company? I planning a trip to England next year and wonder if I can tell them to take that off my bill?

 

:)You didn't ask if I care. I don't care what they do with the money.

[NLH Arizona]

Makes sense but would be quite easy for NCL to just publish it to stop speculating.

When this is true even more reason to remove the DSC as incentive programs are the worst idea ever. We had those as well and they are never fair. And especially not in favor of the customers as they reward behavior that benefits the company and their revenue which is very much different from what I as a customer would want to see rewarded.

The last 16 years of my career, I was in a management position where there was an incentive program and it was fantastic. Ours was based on the overall company goals, plus our participation in those goals. The company that I worked for did not publish our incentive program details to our customers, as they felt it was none of their business and I really don't think that NCL's is any of my business. Not sure why you feel that they are rewarded for their behavior that benefits the company and their revenue and not in favor of the customer. I believe that the employees receive incentives based on how they treat the customer and the feedback from those customers, thus it is to the employees benefit to give great service to the customers - something that I've always gotten on NCL. I'm sure that everyone would have a different way of running a company, but since NCL makes the decisions, it is their choice how they run their company. Edited September 17, 2015 by NLH Arizona

[SteveH2508]

I have a question, don't know if you know the answer, but someone might.

 

When I was in London, we went to a restaurant who added a service charge of, I think 13%, to our bill. Does anyone know where that money goes? Does it go directly to the company? I planning a trip to England next year and wonder if I can tell them to take that off my bill?

 

This was quite a political 'hot potato' recently over here. The government are currently investigating companies who deduct a share of the tronc for admin charges.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-34146032

[insidecabin]

You bring up an interesting observation. What will a credit card company do, if someone disputes a charge with the reason that they just don't want to pay it? Also, if they tell the credit card company something different from what they told NCL and NCL shows a copy where they said they didn't want to pay it, what then?

 

Much simpler.

The charge is a discretionary, cutomer choses not to pay it so no authorization

 

NCl charge it anyway disput an unauthorised transaction just like you would if they made a mistake and charged you twice.

Edited September 17, 2015 by insidecabin

[SuiteCruiser]

I believe it's handled differently. The worker in the DSC pool still gets their same paycheque every week, the incentive programs are less monetary and more reward based. A worker who gets regular praise is on the list to move up the ladder, for more time off, invited to crew only get togethers for high achievers, etc.

 

I don't believe that NCL actually takes cash away from their staff if someone removes the DSC. I believe the pool for doing the extras for the staff (that they really enjoy, BTW) dries up. The only person they'd be able to track to reduce their pay if they did that would be the room steward, as all of the behind the scenes people can't possibly be tracked, so saying it would come out of their cheques doesn't make sense.

 

This is based on various discussions I've had on board.

 

Leave your DSC in place and tip extra if you have amazing service, and everyone is happy.

[sparks1093]

Here's the thing- if we leave the service charges in place everyone that is supposed to get a share of that service charge gets a share of it. Before the increases the service charges were comparable to what one would pay for tips on other lines (and semantics aside the service charges were designed to take the place of tips). The other lines give a rough breakdown of how the tips are distributed- $X for stateroom services, $Y for wait staff, etc. Logic tells me that if NCL is compensating their staff through the service charges that they have to be distributing them similarly to the way the other lines distribute the tips because NCL is competing in the same staffing pool as the other lines. So the stewards and wait staff end up with most of the service charge.

 

Behind the scenes people do not extend as far behind the scenes as many presume- we are talking staff that is traditionally tipped out, such as bus persons, assistants etc.

 

The service charge system may not be perfect but what system is? The crew is happy with it as long as too many people don't adjust the charges. I'm sure if NCL was playing fast and loose with the service charges they would have a mass exodus of trained staff as a result.

 

If less than 10% of the service charges are removed then the crew doesn't lose too much, over that and it starts to really impact them (from what I've read if the percentage is higher than that upper management has to answer to corporate and my presumption is that is factored in to everyone's pay). There was a large number of people on this board that stated they were removing the service charges because of the changes made by NCL and it appears that many carried through with that because NCL had to do something to slow down the arbitrary removal of the service charges (and while we represent a small percentage of cruisers I believe that many non-CC members also removed the charges).

[SailorSam42]

trying to avoid paying the Service Charge on the grounds of 'don't wanta' wouldn't pass as a fraudulent charge.

 

Discretionary means at the discretion of the customer and not at the discretion of NCL. Any card company would remove the charge for that reason alone.

 

As an aside, I also don't believe that there is a significant number of people that would remove the service charge for frivolous reasons. There are a few exceptions of course but, in the main, my experience in business has shown me that most people are decent and honest.

[hypercafe]

I was just reading the FAQ section on the NCL site. There is a section which talks about the DSC. It says it is used to pay the crew, can be adjusted if there is a service issue that is reported on the ship but not addressed. It does not say it is discretionary.

 

There is a section section about tipping. It says tipping is not required however the crew may receive cash tips if you feel they did a great job.

 

So i guess this answers the question if the DSC is a tip, no it is not. It is a surcharge used to pay the crew. Tips are extra. Another squeeze by FDR!!!

[Oppalopa]

Will you tip the dishwashers and the laundry people with cash?

Thank you. That really needed to be said. :)

[LMaxwell]

I was just reading the FAQ section on the NCL site. There is a section which talks about the DSC. It says it is used to pay the crew, can be adjusted if there is a service issue that is reported on the ship but not addressed. It does not say it is discretionary.

 

There is a section section about tipping. It says tipping is not required however the crew may receive cash tips if you feel they did a great job.

 

So i guess this answers the question if the DSC is a tip, no it is not. It is a surcharge used to pay the crew. Tips are extra. Another squeeze by FDR!!!

 

The FAQ is useless. People try to use the FAQ to get packages honored and NCL won't do it. The only thing that counts is the contract which states they are discretionary.

 

If NCL were delivering top notch service you'd hear less about people removing the fees. Maybe there are service issues? Maybe the cutbacks have gone too far and the value equation has rotted?

[jb456]

I was just reading the FAQ section on the NCL site. There is a section which talks about the DSC. It says it is used to pay the crew, can be adjusted if there is a service issue that is reported on the ship but not addressed. It does not say it is discretionary.

 

There is a section section about tipping. It says tipping is not required however the crew may receive cash tips if you feel they did a great job.

 

So i guess this answers the question if the DSC is a tip, no it is not. It is a surcharge used to pay the crew. Tips are extra. Another squeeze by FDR!!!

 

Your getting caught up in marketing / PR lingo.

 

FAQ does say what you wrote. FAQ also says no tipping is required. HOWEVER read terms and conditions when they have a dsc promo... The terms and conditions say it's actually gratuities.

 

Then the guest service contract is what you agree to and the legal binding document between consumer and corporation. Guest contract says discretionary.

 

FAQ is all marketing in "hope" they can sell you on fancy words like any other company does. They also charge automatically hoping a guest will let a bad service issue go so they dont waste vacation time to go to gs and complain (which many on these forums have said they done many times) this is merely another sales tactic to make sure only a small percent agjust the dsc.

 

They can use all the fancy words they want in the end the guest ticket contract is the final say not the FAQ.

 

Its funny how one section says service charge another says gratuities and people on these forums try to say its one in the same. The main thing for it to be a gratuity is that it's at the consumers discretion on who and when to tip and for the amount they choose. NCL should not have any wording about gratuties but they do as they are sneaky not telling anyone really where the money goes.

 

Do you beleive that when they offer an entire ship free gratuties that they pay out of their pocket the dsc? Or do they just mark zero in the computer?

 

Marketing at its finest to get money out of you!

Edited September 17, 2015 by jb456

[jb456]

I was just reading the FAQ section on the NCL site. There is a section which talks about the DSC. It says it is used to pay the crew, can be adjusted if there is a service issue that is reported on the ship but not addressed. It does not say it is discretionary.

 

There is a section section about tipping. It says tipping is not required however the crew may receive cash tips if you feel they did a great job.

 

So i guess this answers the question if the DSC is a tip, no it is not. It is a surcharge used to pay the crew. Tips are extra. Another squeeze by FDR!!!

 

SEE THIS LINK

 

http://www.ncl.com/nclweb/cruiser/cmsPagesPopup.html?pageId=wave15terms&stop_mobi=yes&cid=DM_MKD_NA_PRO_NA_TAC_NA_WAVE15M_22935_NA_22935

 

Free Pre-Paid Gratuities

*Available for Ocean View and above categories only

Prepaid gratuities, otherwise referred to as "Service Charges," applicable to the 1st and 2nd guest in the stateroom 3 years of age and up.

 

But there FAQ says no tipping required. SO WHO IS REALLY PLAYING WHO??

[abe3]

I was just reading the FAQ section on the NCL site. There is a section which talks about the DSC. It says it is used to pay the crew, can be adjusted if there is a service issue that is reported on the ship but not addressed. It does not say it is discretionary.

 

 

 

There is a section section about tipping. It says tipping is not required however the crew may receive cash tips if you feel they did a great job.

 

 

 

So i guess this answers the question if the DSC is a tip, no it is not. It is a surcharge used to pay the crew. Tips are extra. Another squeeze by FDR!!!

 

 

I don't know what the fascination is about FDR and calling him out on the DSC. This is something that has been in place long before FDR has been the head of the company. If you want to believe that you are getting "squeezed" then take the charge off and take your wad of cash and tip who you please.

 

The DSC charge is really minimal and a great value for people not having to worry about carrying around cash and eases the mind of knowing that the money is used to help compensate the crew. But if you are really concerned about money and cost of the cruise and say "I only tip in cash and heck with this DSC and being scammed by NCL" then you are a hypocrite, because in reality you are spending more handing out cash and would actually be saving if you just keep the DSC in place. To me it's all about convenience to leave it in place and not to worry about who to tip.

[hypercafe]

I don't know what the fascination is about FDR and calling him out on the DSC. This is something that has been in place long before FDR has been the head of the company. If you want to believe that you are getting "squeezed" then take the charge off and take your wad of cash and tip who you please.

 

The DSC charge is really minimal and a great value for people not having to worry about carrying around cash and eases the mind of knowing that the money is used to help compensate the crew. But if you are really concerned about money and cost of the cruise and say "I only tip in cash and heck with this DSC and being scammed by NCL" then you are a hypocrite, because in reality you are spending more handing out cash and would actually be saving if you just keep the DSC in place. To me it's all about convenience to leave it in place and not to worry about who to tip.

 

I have never removed the DSC nor will I. My point is NCL now Talks about the DSC and tips separate. To me that is a squeeze by RDF to make you pay the crew on one hand and them tip on top of it.

[sparks1093]

I have never removed the DSC nor will I. My point is NCL now Talks about the DSC and tips separate. To me that is a squeeze by RDF to make you pay the crew on one hand and them tip on top of it.

 

NCL has always talked about service charges and tips separately, it's nothing new.

[jb456]

NCL has always talked about service charges and tips separately, it's nothing new.

 

Seperate? Really?

 

Why does terms and condiions on promos say "prepaid gratuities referred as serice charge"??

 

Free Pre-Paid Gratuities

*Available for Ocean View and above categories only

Prepaid gratuities, otherwise referred to as "Service Charges," applicable to the 1st and 2nd guest in the stateroom 3 years of age and up.

[sparks1093]

Seperate? Really?

 

Why does terms and condiions on promos say "prepaid gratuities referred as serice charge"??

 

Free Pre-Paid Gratuities

*Available for Ocean View and above categories only

Prepaid gratuities, otherwise referred to as "Service Charges," applicable to the 1st and 2nd guest in the stateroom 3 years of age and up.

 

I meant in the FAQ section. But back when NCL switched to the service charge model they did make it clear that this replaced the traditional tips.

[insidecabin]

The FAQ is useless. People try to use the FAQ to get packages honored and NCL won't do it. The only thing that counts is the contract which states they are discretionary.

 

If NCL were delivering top notch service you'd hear less about people removing the fees. Maybe there are service issues? Maybe the cutbacks have gone too far and the value equation has rotted?

 

Uk/eu bookings the web site and any brochures form part of the contract as all cruises are subject to package holiday regulations.

 

They require any modifications to the contract formed at booking time to be notified to the customer.

For new bookings this needs to be done at the time of booking.

 

NCL are yet to notify anyone there is a change.

 

UK contact says discretionary adjustable on board that what people are signing up for.

 

Anything else is deflection from the issue a charge has been changed from discretionary to compulsory. What the charge is for is not relevant.

[Wendy&Grumpy]

Seperate? Really?

 

Why does terms and condiions on promos say "prepaid gratuities referred as serice charge"??

 

Free Pre-Paid Gratuities

*Available for Ocean View and above categories only

Prepaid gratuities, otherwise referred to as "Service Charges," applicable to the 1st and 2nd guest in the stateroom 3 years of age and up.

 

Because promos and official contract/T&C's are from two different departments and one hand doesn't know what the other is doing. ;)

 

I'm telling you, NCL is watching the backlash, and over time we will see the terms firmed up, DSC's become compulsory/non-refundable, and a daily per person "suggested gratuity" added to onboard accounts "for your convenience." ;)

Edited September 17, 2015 by Wendy&Grumpy

[NLH Arizona]

For those US customers that think that NCL can't charge you for these while you are on your cruise, really needs to read the passenger ticket contract, because you agreed that they could charge you these. NCL agrees, in the same contract, that you may adjust them and none of that has changed. The only thing that has changed is how you have to ask for your money back and how you get your money back.

 

c) Service Charges: Certain members of Carrier’s crew are compensated by a combination of salary and incentive programs that are funded in part by the service charge paid by each Guest. The charge , which is automatically added to your onboard account and subject to adjustment at your discretion, is intended to reward service provided in all departments and job categories and is distributed to employees according to Carrier's evaluation of job performance. A portion of the service charge collected by Carrier is also used for fleet-wide crew welfare programs.

 

So, you will have to go to Guest Services and ask for the form, scan it and email to the address listed on the form. A few more hoops, but the amount you pay in the end is still at your discretion. So, for those that are saying it is compulsory or mandatory, it is not.

 

And just in case you want to bring the FAQ into it, it also says that it will be automatically added to your account:

 

How much are the service charges:

For sailings prior to August 1, 2015 rates are as follows:

• $12.95 for guests staying in Studio, Inside, Oceanview, Balcony and Mini-Suite categories

• $14.95 for guests staying in Suite and The Haven categories

 

Effective August 1, 2015 rates for all sailings are as follows:

• $13.50 per person per day for guests staying in Studio, Inside, Oceanview, Balcony and Mini-Suite categories

• $15.50 per person per day for guests staying in Suite and The Haven categories

 

(This will be automatically added to your onboard account)

[LMaxwell]

For those US customers that think that NCL can't charge you for these while you are on your cruise, really needs to read the passenger ticket contract, because you agreed that they could charge you these. NCL agrees, in the same contract, that you may adjust them and none of that has changed. The only thing that has changed is how you have to ask for your money back and how you get your money back.

 

 

This is precisely what I have been saying for days. Same policy; new procedure. Nothing more, nothing less.

[NLH Arizona]

Because promos and official contract/T&C's are from two different departments and one hand doesn't know what the other is doing. ;)

 

I'm telling you, NCL is watching the backlash, and over time we will see the terms firmed up, DSC's become compulsory/non-refundable, and a daily per person "suggested gratuity" added to onboard accounts "for your convenience." ;)

I think also, since this system replaced the old "tips" system (and some of the cruise lines call this automatic charge gratuities), many passengers (especially those of my age group), still refer to them as tips. In advertising, if NCL were to say "free daily service charge", I think that some would think that this is a charge in addition to the tip system. Not to mention, as we have all seen the premium items and the UDP, you get so many different answers, so basically what you are saying is true....the right hand doesn't have a clue what the left hand is doing. I'll be in Miami in January for a cruise on another line and I would love to go to NCL corporate and introduce their right hand to their left hand!!!

[hypercafe]

Because promos and official contract/T&C's are from two different departments and one hand doesn't know what the other is doing. ;)

 

I'm telling you, NCL is watching the backlash, and over time we will see the terms firmed up, DSC's become compulsory/non-refundable, and a daily per person "suggested gratuity" added to onboard accounts "for your convenience." ;)

 

I think you are 100% right. The NCL of present under FDR seems really intent on squeezing money out of passengers under gray wording and poor practices.

[abe3]

So let me ask this to the people that remove the DSC. Why don't you go to customer service the very first day of the cruise and ask for the DSC to be removed?