Are crew members required to pool their tips?

When a crew member receives a tip from a passenger- is he or she
required to pool the tip or keep it?

Which crew members get to keep their tips and on what ships?

Which crew members are required to pool them and again, on what
ships?

On the same ship- are certain crew members required to pool and
others don't have to?

I think passengers deserve this information before tipping anyone! In
many cases,I don't think they are given this information.

"misterfact" wrote in message ...
When a crew member receives a tip from a passenger- is he or she
required to pool the tip or keep it? snip

The short answer is... it depends. On ships where gratuities are charged to
onboard accounts, the tip pools usually include one for food servers (wait
staff) and one for room stewards (housekeeping). Bar waiters and bartenders
still get a share of the % automatically added to bar purchases.

Will individuals keep to keep cash you give them "under the table" or will
they have to add it to their respective "pool"? It varies. Ask them... they
will usually tell you.

Linda
CruiseDiva.com
http://cruisediva.com

I think pooling is the only practical way to handle graturities on NCL and
Princess where they use freestyle and personal choice since usually will have a
different waitstaff every night. Hopefully, on Royal Caribbean and Celebrity
the tips you give are kept by those servers.

If you really want to know how the tips are handled on a particular ship,
talk to your cabin steward and serving staff. I have never found one that
will not talk to you earnestly, and truthfully about this. All they need is
for you to enquire, they have always been glad to talk to you.

They are MOST interested in learning what you would like to know about their
working conditions. Most of them just LOVE their jobs. The only negative
thing I mostly hear in talking to them is that they miss their families.
Occasionally you will meet a waiter, or other staff person, whose other half
also works on the ship. They are especially pleased when this arrangement
can be made.

Tobieon an Island in the Pacific

"misterfact" wrote in message
om...
When a crew member receives a tip from a passenger- is he or she
required to pool the tip or keep it?

Which crew members get to keep their tips and on what ships?

Which crew members are required to pool them and again, on what
ships?

On the same ship- are certain crew members required to pool and
others don't have to?

I think passengers deserve this information before tipping anyone! In
many cases,I don't think they are given this information.