Free gratuity??

[rekarlu]

Princess (and some other cruise lines such as RCCL) are trying to avoid deep discounts to the base fare to fill up the ships.

 

So by offering perks such as free gratuities, they can maintain the base fare and still in effect give a discount.

 

Princess (and the other cruise lines doing this) hope to "educate" passengers to book early since there will theoretically not be deep discounts to the base fare later. The cruise lines would rather sail with a few empty cabins than

"cheapen" the image of the cruise line.

 

In practice, at least with Princess, there are still some last minute (in the couple weeks leading up to a cruise) deep discounts, but by then if you need to fly to/from a port, the airfares will be high and only those living near the port would be likely to take advantage of these last minute discounts.

 

So very true. Last-minute deals and I am talking about deeply-discounted fares seem to be getting harder and harder to find!

Although yesterday I did score an inside cabin on the 10-day Ruby Princess sailing Feb 29 for $607 per person including port charges, taxes/fees. And

Princess did kick in various OBCs totalling $112 per person.

But like I said, these deals seem to be getting harder to come by.

 

Thanks.

[SoBaycruiser]

The crew still gets the gratuity. It is a promotion. I got the free gratuity and a better cabin and free dinner at one of the pay restaurants for our 2017 cruise. Along with a 30 percent discount it was a great deal. I asked my Princess travel agent about this when I booked and she assured me that the staff gets the gratuity as if we paid it but it is paid by Princess..So no worries. We even take small cash amounts to tip here and there for service ubove and beyond. I know there is already a tip added but this is what I do. What everybody else does is their business.

 

 

Did you see this anywhere in your personalizer beforehand. We got the same good deal you did....better cabin, free gratuity, etc and it is listed on our confirmation from our TA. However, I see nothing on our Princess personalizer account page.

[Mike A]

I have the 3 for free with the free gratuities for our cruise on the Royal Princess on 5/7. On the Personalizer in the Optional Gratuity Pre Payment Section the gratuities show the amount for my wife and I of $97.65 each as well as the fact they are paid. You need to click select as if you are pre-purchasing to see this as it is a drop down.

[Astro Flyer]

Did you see this anywhere in your personalizer beforehand. We got the same good deal you did....better cabin, free gratuity, etc and it is listed on our confirmation from our TA. However, I see nothing on our Princess personalizer account page.

 

I have the 3 for free with the free gratuities for our cruise on the Royal Princess on 5/7. On the Personalizer in the Optional Gratuity Pre Payment Section the gratuities show the amount for my wife and I of $97.65 each as well as the fact they are paid. You need to click select as if you are pre-purchasing to see this as it is a drop down.

That's where I found our prepaid gratuities & I have printed copies of it just in case there's a snafu on the ship which I've read can sometimes occur.

[SoBaycruiser]

That's where I found our prepaid gratuities & I have printed copies of it just in case there's a snafu on the ship which I've read can sometimes occur.

 

 

Ugh! I looked there and didn't see anything. That's why I asked. I guess it's time to call the TA.

[skynight]

Yes, its not really free gratuities, just free OBC for the exact amount of the DSC. Princess is just following the current industry trend of moving the $90.65 savings (in the case of a seven night cruise in a non-suite) from your cruise fare to your onboard spend. To me its all the same.

 

Not really OBC in the standard sense. We had free gratuities on the Royal just a few months ago. The hotel charge (auto-tip) never showed as a line item on our accounts, and there was no credit shown for a gratuity amount. There was no way you could adjust the amount applied for free gratuities, as these amounts were never shown.

[Grego]

Princess (and some other cruise lines such as RCCL) are trying to avoid deep discounts to the base fare to fill up the ships.

 

So by offering perks such as free gratuities, they can maintain the base fare and still in effect give a discount.

 

 

Yes, this is exactly how it is done so they don't erode the fare level.

[IDsailor]

We have a 48 day cruise booked on this offer and it is saving us $1242.00. Nothing to sneeze at. A great savings.

[pablo222]

The crew still gets the gratuity. It is a promotion. I got the free gratuity and a better cabin and free dinner at one of the pay restaurants for our 2017 cruise. Along with a 30 percent discount it was a great deal. I asked my Princess travel agent about this when I booked and she assured me that the staff gets the gratuity as if we paid it but it is paid by Princess..

 

As regular readers of cruise critic know, if three people call princess

and ask the same question, they will get at least four answers.

 

So, if someone at princess said so, it MUST be true.

[snowskier]

As regular readers of cruise critic know, if three people call princess

and ask the same question, they will get at least four answers.

 

So, if someone at princess said so, it MUST be true.

 

And if three people ask on cruise critic they will get 5 different answers. So if someone on cruise critic said so it MUST be true.

[triple7tahoe]

We just returned from 3 B2B2B cruises on the Diamond Princess, starting in Auckland and ending in Perth. The first two cruises we used Australian dollars while the third was in US $. We had booked under a "bucket list" offer which included prepaid gratuities ON THE FIRST cruise ONLY! Once aboard, I asked the Passengers Service Officer (James) how that worked and did the crew get "stiffed"? My wife was concerned that that Princess offered prepaid gratuities at the expense of the crew. We had also heard that on cruises around Australia, booked by Australians in Australia, that the tips were included in the fare so did not show up on your statement. So that makes the question, when in Australian waters are the stewards, waiters, etc. get paid more to make up for the fact that the fare is increased to make up for lack of tips? Maybe some of our Aussie friends can give us an answer? James (PSD officer) told us that it was not so???

Now comes the surprise; We had the offer for prepaid on first cruise only but in checking our bill as we continued we were never charged. Not on any of the three cruises. Now wife is in a panic and starts finding envelopes to give tips to those that we used the most.

As a side note, I worked in the personal service industry (barista) and was interested in seeing just how true the statement was that we have heard from our Aussie friends about "paying such folks a living wage so they don't need to be tipped". I found that to be a fairly true statement. Small sample of baristas found that they are paid about one and a half times what we pay here. Along with that, they received very nice holiday increases-up to 2 and a half times pay. One barista, working on Good Friday, said she was making $40 Australian per hour or $32 US. We would not even come close here in the US. I did a similar survey in NZ and found that was not the case.

Sorry to be so long:D

[shredie]

Oops. Another tipping thread. We just did a cruise in NZ/Aus, and when in the towns, we felt like cheapskates when not tipping. It's a cultural thing. I imagine it's the same for Aussies, feeling like it's not right to be expected to tip everywhere in the USA. Cruising really drives home the notion "When in Rome..."

[Lucky TGO]

There is nothing to understand. FREE is good it doesn't cost you anything :D

Tony