To tip or not to tip is the big question!?
To tip or not to tip! This must be one of the most common questions we are asked. Are tips included? Do we need to tip? How much are tips? And I with good reason. A family of four on a 14 night cruise with say Royal Caribbean can set you back over £600.00 for the room which is a lot of extra cost.
I generally remove the tips on booking, I want to tip those that help me personally and I believe the service I receive from the members that I tip is better for it, say tip your cabin steward on day 1 – They then know if they look after you they are going potentially going to get another tip.
Cruise lines handle tips in different ways, some can only be pre-paid when you get on board on a per day basis, others allow both pre-paid or tips on board, of course in both these tips you can remove the tips completely and opt to pay what you want.
Marella (Thompson) Include the tips in the price which gives them ultimate value for money, and then the likes of Silversea, Regent, Seaborn also include them but when you are paying the prices they charge you do expect that.
Norwegian Cruise lines did at one point go All Inclusive and included tips, but this has recently been scraped giving people the option to remove them before or whilst on board.
Well the next cruise line to jump on the Bandwagon is MSC Cruises, They did at one point say that tips would be compulsory but now the news on the block is that MSC are including the tips in the price and they have said that the prices of the cruises will not shoot up in price so win-win for everyone.
This is across all sailings and all ships for UK and Ireland Passengers! Meaning a family of four on a seven-night cruise can expect to save 210 euros just on tips and when you have kids that money is much better elsewhere.
What do you do about tips? Do you choose to tip who you want or are you someone who just adds them to the bill and forget about them?
7 Comments on “To tip or not to tip is the big question!?”
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About Me
Hello there, I'm Tom Harding and I have been in the Cruise and Travel industry for about 10 years. Cruising has always been a passion of mine ever since I was little. I love the elegance and sophistication that comes with cruising and to be able to see lots of places…
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Gratuities should be voluntary. As such, they should definitely not be added to the price of the cruise. That’s tantamount to stealing. I don’t know how they get away with it. MSC’s new policy is disgusting in my view. In any event, the money goes into the company coffers- not to the people who work on the ship. In my view it’s a racket.
I dont usually mind tipping. There are a lot of staff who are not seen, i.e. kitchen and laundry staff, and therefore are never tipped directly, no matter how well they do their jobs. What i did object to was on a recent MSC cruise where as well as gratuities , 15% service charge was included on all drinks. For the first time ever we did not pay gratuities, but tipped individually. Of course if cruise lines paid their crew a decent wage, tipping would not be necessary.
We always remove tips on our cruise BUT it is not an excuse to not tip the people who serve you well . I divide what would have been the gratuity amount to the ones who look after me ………I am sure they prefer it too as the amount can add up to another salary to them
The email that brought me to this page asked, “Should You Avoid Tipping/Paying Gratuities On Your Cruise?”. The answer is very simple. Tipping and Gratuities are an essential part of the crew’s remuneration, so it is morally wrong for passengers to evade all tipping. However, that leads to an equally important question, “Should cruise lines pay minimal wages – and expect their passengers to subsidise the crew’s remuneration?”. That is a cultural issue, and the answer depends largely upon where you live. Many passengers from Australia and New Zealand have a strong belief in fair wages, and refuse to tip under any circumstances. Cruise lines have recognised this cultural difference on ships that are based in Australasian waters, so local residents pay higher fares. At the other end of the scale, North American passengers love to leave generous tips as a token of appreciation and will continue to do so (even if they receive substandard service). So American passengers tip cabin stewards, waiters and bartenders, regardless of whether their fare includes service charges. So where does that leave British passengers? Although we dislike the concept of tipping, we should accept that gratuities are a fact of life, particularly on ships that cater for the American market. We are not going to change that system so when in Rome, do as the Romans do – and pay reluctantly. From a personal viewpoint, I am not keen on automated gratuities, but I would not opt out, unless the service was unacceptable. (During many years of cruising, I have done that on two occasions only.) Even so, I prefer automated gratuities to any other method, because I dislike leaving envelopes full of cash. I find that demeaning, because the expectation of a fat envelope smacks of a master / servant relationship.
Tipping is always a minefield! My husband and I went on a celebrity cruise last year which was wonderful. However, we prepaid the tips as the thought that everyone could have a share appealed to us. All went well until the last day, our steward wanted to know if everything had been alright, no smile upon asking and our main waiter gave us a cool reception when he realised we weren’t tipping (I’m sure the staff must know we prepaid tips) It tends to be a bit embarrassing when you know they are looking for an extra tip. I must add that on a previous cruise with Silversea the staff did not change their demeanour on the last day or night as they would have known all gratuities were included in the fare.
Tips should never be compulsory!
A tip is a payment which is given as an extra to those who you feel have given good service. Whilst we are told that service on most cruise lines is second to none we have at times witnessed the not so good attitude from staff members. We have tips removed but always reward those staff members that go the extra mile for you. If tips are compulsory they should be included in the price of the trip, but who benefits the most?