New houskeeping and tipping

[mz-s]

5 hours ago, ldubs said:

 

Over the years I've read the cash tips must be turned in and I've read they belong to the individual.  IDK, maybe it varies by cruise line.   Do we know for certain what the actual policy is?  Beyond what we read here on CC that is.   

 

I swore I've read or watched Heald say that if you hand cash over to a crew member, that cash stays with that crew member. But I can't find it. And Carnival doesn't say anything official. So it's all hearsay in the absence of something like that.

[sparks1093]

On 3/2/2023 at 4:52 AM, Carnival Cheerleader said:

What may be irrelevant to you isn't necessarily irrelevant to me. The cabin steward performed a reduced service and was tipped accordingly. And please don't tell me to go sail another line if I don't like it because I don't and I have. Royal offers a MUCH better loyalty program and MSC offers better pricing and both still give twice a day service (since you have a problem with me saying twice a day cleaning). I have 7 cruises booked for this year and where normally all would have been Carnival, this year only 2 of the 7 are Carnival and I don't have any Carnival booked for 2024 (4 for Royal and 1 for MSC for 2024......so far). Granted, I correct my auto grats on every Carnival cruise I take now so I'm not paying for a service I no longer receive but there are many other issues that are coming to light with the Carnival product and it really isn't the "Fun Ship" it used to be, for me at least.

If you don't want to recognize that you are venting your spleen on innocent folk then you won't, but that is what you are doing. The steward had nothing to do with the decision that you are so opposed to and reducing your auto grats won't change a thing, other than the steward's income. Carnival is still the "Fun Ship" for us in what really matters and I'm not going to pay more to sail another line. Should the day come that Carnival doesn't meet our needs that will likely cause us to stop cruising all together.

[mz-s]

38 minutes ago, sparks1093 said:

If you don't want to recognize that you are venting your spleen on innocent folk then you won't, but that is what you are doing. The steward had nothing to do with the decision that you are so opposed to and reducing your auto grats won't change a thing, other than the steward's income. Carnival is still the "Fun Ship" for us in what really matters and I'm not going to pay more to sail another line. Should the day come that Carnival doesn't meet our needs that will likely cause us to stop cruising all together.

 

The automatic gratuities are not mandatory amounts. Just as people are free to pay more if they decide to, people are free to pay less if they decide to. As others have reported on this thread, the grats are split with so many brilliant "behind the scenes" crew it's anybody's guess how much of that $16/day your individual steward actually receives anyway.

[ldubs]

3 hours ago, mz-s said:

 

I swore I've read or watched Heald say that if you hand cash over to a crew member, that cash stays with that crew member. But I can't find it. And Carnival doesn't say anything official. So it's all hearsay in the absence of something like that.

 

Yeah, I have heard it both ways here on CC for a number of years.  It could very well vary by cruise line.  I don't know the answer and am not saying anyone is wrong.   I just wonder if we really know what the actual practice might be.   

[mz-s]

28 minutes ago, ldubs said:

 

Yeah, I have heard it both ways here on CC for a number of years.  It could very well vary by cruise line.  I don't know the answer and am not saying anyone is wrong.   I just wonder if we really know what the actual practice might be.   

 

A big problem I have with the constantly increasing automatic gratuities and constantly decreasing level of service is the lack of transparency.

[Buffettfan 225]

4 hours ago, mz-s said:

 

I swore I've read or watched Heald say that if you hand cash over to a crew member, that cash stays with that crew member. But I can't find it. And Carnival doesn't say anything official. So it's all hearsay in the absence of something like that.

I asked steward and he says all cash or “envelopes”goes into shared pot. Bummer. He also said no longer has an assistant and 35 cabins. Especially hard he said coming up spring break even tougher as most cabins extra bunks full, more to do. 

[mz-s]

3 minutes ago, Buffettfan 225 said:

I asked steward and he says all cash or “envelopes”goes into shared pot. Bummer. He also said no longer has an assistant and 35 cabins. Especially hard he said coming up spring break even tougher as most cabins extra bunks full, more to do. 

 

That is a shame and explains why Carnival isn't transparent about it.

 

I wish I had a facebook so I could frankly and directly ask JH, "If I give my steward a $20 bill next cruise, what happens to that money? Who gets to keep that $20?"

 

No assistant and 35 cabins to clean every day is ridiculous. Obviously Carnival fired half or more of their stewards, and then hiked our gratuities to give the few that remain a small pay increase on the back of their customers. Shameful!

Edited March 3, 2023 by mz-s

[ldubs]

2 hours ago, Buffettfan 225 said:

I asked steward and he says all cash or “envelopes”goes into shared pot. Bummer. He also said no longer has an assistant and 35 cabins. Especially hard he said coming up spring break even tougher as most cabins extra bunks full, more to do. 

 

That pretty much confirms.  Thanks.   

[ray98]

Say what you want but something isn't adding up.  They have cut service in half for the customer which freed up the stewards to basically handle twice as many cabins.  They did this while raising the gratuity even though the service is halved.  That is a lot of extra gratuity out there for far fewer workers.  Where is it going?

[mz-s]

10 minutes ago, ray98 said:

Say what you want but something isn't adding up.  They have cut service in half for the customer which freed up the stewards to basically handle twice as many cabins.  They did this while raising the gratuity even though the service is halved.  That is a lot of extra gratuity out there for far fewer workers.  Where is it going?

 

Speculation is NCL cut their base salary to compensate for fewer crew and higher grats. Wouldn't surprise me if CCL and RCL have done / will do the same thing. The end result is the customer pays more to get less, cruise line pays less, and the crew get screwed. The cruise lines get the gold mine, we get the shaft.

[BlerkOne]

1 hour ago, mz-s said:

 

Speculation is NCL cut their base salary to compensate for fewer crew and higher grats. Wouldn't surprise me if CCL and RCL have done / will do the same thing. The end result is the customer pays more to get less, cruise line pays less, and the crew get screwed. The cruise lines get the gold mine, we get the shaft.

Speculation = not a shred of evidence and just a pernicious rumor.

[BlerkOne]

4 hours ago, mz-s said:

 

That is a shame and explains why Carnival isn't transparent about it.

 

I wish I had a facebook so I could frankly and directly ask JH, "If I give my steward a $20 bill next cruise, what happens to that money? Who gets to keep that $20?"

 

No assistant and 35 cabins to clean every day is ridiculous. Obviously Carnival fired half or more of their stewards, and then hiked our gratuities to give the few that remain a small pay increase on the back of their customers. Shameful!

If there are any facts in that post, they escape me.

[mz-s]

49 minutes ago, Carnival Cheerleader said:

Ask at Guest Services and they will tell you. I believe it was about $7 per day, per person on my last cruise on the Mardi Gras.

 

They will tell you how much the "housekeeping team" gets but not your individual room steward.

[Illbcruzn4life]

9 hours ago, mz-s said:

 

I swore I've read or watched Heald say that if you hand cash over to a crew member, that cash stays with that crew member. But I can't find it. And Carnival doesn't say anything official. So it's all hearsay in the absence of something like that.

I seemed to remember that if you pulled your tips and tipped in cash the steward could keep any amounts over the normal weekly tip.

[mz-s]

5 minutes ago, Illbcruzn4life said:

I seemed to remember that if you pulled your tips and tipped in cash the steward could keep any amounts over the normal weekly tip.

 

What makes no sense to me here is how does that $5 bill know whether or not I've removed my autograts?

[BlerkOne]

2 minutes ago, mz-s said:

 

What makes no sense to me here is how does that $5 bill know whether or not I've removed my autograts?

The crew knows who removes gratuities. You don't think they keep track of generous tippers and cheapskates?

[Illbcruzn4life]

5 minutes ago, mz-s said:

 

What makes no sense to me here is how does that $5 bill know whether or not I've removed my autograts?

beats me. Above my paygrade. I just resolved myself to, this is the way it is and just pay our part.

[Tink10]

We always tip $100 in cash when they introduce themselves (on top of the pre-paid), They work way to hard to get the paltry pre-paid grats (if they even get all of them)

[mz-s]

1 hour ago, BlerkOne said:

The crew knows who removes gratuities. You don't think they keep track of generous tippers and cheapskates?

grats are are not posted or able to be removed until the last night. What if I tip extra on day 2? They hang on to it just in case I remove my auto grats on the last night? Don’t make sense blerk. 

[BlerkOne]

1 hour ago, mz-s said:

grats are are not posted or able to be removed until the last night. What if I tip extra on day 2? They hang on to it just in case I remove my auto grats on the last night? Don’t make sense blerk. 

The crew isn't supposed to find out until the following cruise, but on at least one occasion the information was posted for the crew on the current cruise.

[Illbcruzn4life]

5 minutes ago, BlerkOne said:

The crew isn't supposed to find out until the following cruise, but on at least one occasion the information was posted for the crew on the current cruise.

Wasn't that way back on a swine flu cruise on the Splendor out on the west coast?

 

I believe Wennfred snapped a pic of the list.

[BoozinCroozin]

I loved our room steward on Carnival, not NCL so much. My question on tipping is whether it is the same now that they only do half the work? Our first cruise they were there 2x a day. Now it is 1. We are not messy or make a dirty room. Maybe some chaotic counter space with everything that needs charging, but the room is usually well kept. 

 

I know tipping is always a touchy subject and I wish Carnival would let me choose who my daily service fee tips go to. I tip my bartenders directly. We do not do the MDR. I should be able to choose that a much larger portion of the ~$100pp goes to the room stewards. 

[mz-s]

3 hours ago, BoozinCroozin said:

I loved our room steward on Carnival, not NCL so much. My question on tipping is whether it is the same now that they only do half the work? Our first cruise they were there 2x a day. Now it is 1. We are not messy or make a dirty room. Maybe some chaotic counter space with everything that needs charging, but the room is usually well kept. 

 

I know tipping is always a touchy subject and I wish Carnival would let me choose who my daily service fee tips go to. I tip my bartenders directly. We do not do the MDR. I should be able to choose that a much larger portion of the ~$100pp goes to the room stewards. 

you can go to guest services after your gratuities post to your account and ask them to decrease the share that goes to dining/entertainment and increase the share that goes to housekeeping. 

[Joebucks]

On 3/3/2023 at 5:58 AM, audcc77 said:

That’s speaking on behalf of a lot of people.  Not sure this is true.  
 

The cabins are definitely not as clean now.  

 

What part of the cabin is no longer being cleaned with the removal of the second turndown?

 

On 3/3/2023 at 7:01 AM, Carnival Cheerleader said:

Royal is doing a test on ONE ship (I have kept up with the news. And their loyalty program blows Carnival (and just about every other cruise line) out of the water. AS Diamond on Royal, I get 4 free drinks every single day and 24 hours of wifi per cruise completely free (no gratuities) and once I hit Diamond+ that goes to 5 and 48 hours.

 

Try again: https://www.cruisehive.com/royal-caribbean-cuts-back-on-housekeeping-service/95567

 

I agree that Royal has a much better loyalty program. The free drinks is definitely one of the best perks IMO. Still, Royal Caribbean is generally more expensive than Carnival if you want to compare apples to apples.

[audcc77]

19 minutes ago, Joebucks said:

What part of the cabin is no longer being cleaned with the removal of the second turndown?

The second “turndown” as you say is not just that. They’d clean the bathroom, wipe down shelves in the cabin, remove fingerprints off the drawer fronts and I’m sure a lot of other things.  
 

As I stated on another thread, we were on the MG only 6 months after the restart and I could tell there was no deep cleaning.  The ship wasn’t even sailing for that long.  If the cabins were cleaned 2 x / day, then there would be less need for deep cleaning.  
 

The next time this  happens, I will post photos instead of looking the other way.   
 

In the meantime, this is what I’m talking about. 

 

They don’t spend enough time in the cabins to actually focus on deep cleaning.