Not a fan of the automatic tip charging.

[BethA]

We tip extra when we get excellent service and twice out of15 cruises tipped less. Once we never saw the head waiter until time to collect the tip and the other was an asst server who was just not good. We assessed it right away but the server and head waiter picked up the slack. She never got better. I can see it being a problem if service is not good

 

[Floridagram]

I agree that service would decline if tips were included in the fare. On several previous cruises (on other lines) we would give out tips on the last night and then go to breakfast this last morning and the service was non existent. The servers acted as if they did not even know us. We always tip more than suggested and after that we wanted to take it back.

Interestingly enough we did not see the head server Saturday morning... maybe he had other duties to get ready for the next cruise but he sure made himself visible all week before he got the tip. (And he did assist at times to make our service better.)

I really don't get all the controversy over this. I was happy that it was added to my account and one less thing I had to worry about. We get reward points on our cc so it was a few more points we got. It was less cash I had to carry. I just added a bit more to the envelopes as I saw fit.

Main thing is you are going on a great vacation and we should not sweat the small stuff...

 

[Floridagram]

(Sorry, venturing off-topic for a moment just in reply to The Rainbow's post ...)

I can't speak for my millions of fellow Europeans (), but I certainly wasn't offended by your post! It did come across as a bit of a generalization that made me chuckle (thus my own reply to your post, about a page back), but I don't feel like you actually tread on any toes, so don't worry!

About your plans for a vacation in Europe: I would go ahead and do it, and I am sure you will have lots of fun. That said, I would indeed advise any American to expect less of the behavour that is considered polite where you come from, and not to be offended easily when encountering behaviour that you consider as rude - it is often just in the culture, and not meant to be rude at all!

Take the standing in line - you are completely correct, many mainland Europeans are no good at it, and I fear that we Germans (often to my shame) are the worst of them. It is honestly not meant to be rude - it is just that nobody ever actually expects anybody else to form a line, so everybody is trying to find a place near the front. I don't particularly like it myself, but there you go. A good way to go would be to not expect anybody else to line up, and just expect a general rush to the front. Just move forward firmly but without hurting anybody, and you will be fine .

(And once you've had enough of that kind of behavour, be sure to pop over to Great Britain - finally some people who know how to stand in line! )

I love your sense of humor! We lived in Germany in the 70's as part of the US military. We never felt as the people were rude and always were mindful that we were guests in their country.

While there we drove to Paris and had our car broken into and a policeman direct us in the wrong direction. (we were with someone who spoke French)
I did not have such a good impression of the French.

In 1998 I had the opportunity for a free trip to Paris so of course I went. I NEVER felt unwelcome and I actually felt like some people went out of their way to assist me.

I am in my late 50's now and life experience has taught me that there are all kinds of people in the world. You will find rude and unfriendly people in all races and nationalities. I say go to Europe if you have the chance. And don't waste your time at Disney. There are so many priceless treasures there to see and experience.

And if you go please remember you are their guest and should go to by their customs. And remember you are a representative of the US. So many foreigners have a bad impression of Americans and rightfully so. I have seen many people be obnoxious to and in front of foreigners in the Orlando area. I personally try to mind my P's and Q's and act better than normal in front of them.

 

[KSDisneyDad]

Main thing is you are going on a great vacation and we should not sweat the small stuff...

We tell ourselves each trip how fortunate we are to be able to enjoy such wonderful holidays!

 

[Melcatfish]

I apologize if I've offended someone, that was not my intention. But I have heard from friends that the visitors to Disneyland Paris are so different from the visitors to Disney World. They are impatient in the queues. They like to push their way in front and are rude towards other visitors. They told me this about people from France, Italy and Spain. Have you never experienced such behavior? I would be glad to hear so, because I am really interested in going on a vacation to Europe.

No offence taken. I have had similar experiences at Disneyland Paris and I would say that queuing or waiting in line is something that is very different in different places. As you may know we Brits are famed for our queuing and it is true to say that this is not something that everyone does.

To be honest I MUCH prefer WDW to Disneyland Paris and although there are many reasons one of them is that the queue\line management is definitely better in WDW. Having said that Disneyland Resort PAris is much imporved on it's opening seasons when characters turned up and there was a bundle to see them!

Equally queuing for the Vatican in Rome the queue was orderly and there was no pushing and shoving. So sometimes they do it well and other times not so much.

I was being tongue in cheek with my reply - there are an awful lot Europeans and some will be better travelling companions than others and the same applies to Americans!

I am sure you will have a wonderful time vacationing in Europe, read lots, take the advice but don't feel that everything you read is gospel truth. For example I am always amazed by the number of Americans posting about their fear of pick pockets in Barcelona when they live their day to day lives in a country with high gun and knife crime stats - it pays to be alert to danger when in unfamiliar settings but you don't want to spend your trip in fear that is disproportionate to the threat!

Lastly if you remember that different isn't wrong, it is just different then you will enjoy all that Europe has to offer. Once again, I hope you understood my post was meant to highlight that there are masses of people who are all individuals and it is impossible to make sweeping statements that are really accurate, it was tongue in cheek and I wouldn't want you to think I was really offended!

Mel
x

 

[tinkerone]

I have been on quite a few cruises (not with Disney) but have always done the envelope thing with cash. (My last cruise was in 2006, so obviously things have changed!) I stated how I feel, and do not feel the need to justify myself. In the end... unless the service was absolutely horrible... my servers/team will get at least the recommended amount (quite possibly more thanks to great service and my young kids) as your team will. Your way/my way... truly doesn't matter. I prefer cash in envelopes (partly because it is cheaper due to the higher exchange rate on my Canadian credit cards). I will not need to go to guest services twice. I will simply go on the first day, remove my tips, and hopefully book tea with the princesses.

don't know if this will ever help you but BMO offers a U.S. credit card that works amazingly for us. we pay for our trip with it, our flights (we fly out of the u.s. as its much much cheaper) anything we charge on board. well, for us its the answer. we pay the cc bill using the u.s. money we have in our u.s. acct.
don't know if you are interested but thought i would let you know about it.

 

[jeffann6]

My feeling to why DCL is making this change is for the people that don't tip at all, there are those that do exist. And then I'm sure there are those that feel if they don't eat in the dining room(s) they don't need to tip. On my last cruise I did notice on on the first three nights the dining room was full and on the last night (tip night) there were quite a few empty chairs including my table.
So what would that tell ya
At first when I heard about the change I was a little offended but after thinking about it for awhile I do agree the the new policy. I would not have problem going to quest services to adjust the tip.

Sorry I don't mean to offend the non tippers out there

 

[disney1990]

I agree that service would decline if tips were included in the fare. On several previous cruises (on other lines) we would give out tips on the last night and then go to breakfast this last morning and the service was non existent. The servers acted as if they did not even know us. We always tip more than suggested and after that we wanted to take it back.

Interestingly enough we did not see the head server Saturday morning... maybe he had other duties to get ready for the next cruise but he sure made himself visible all week before he got the tip. (And he did assist at times to make our service better.)

I really don't get all the controversy over this. I was happy that it was added to my account and one less thing I had to worry about. We get reward points on our cc so it was a few more points we got. It was less cash I had to carry. I just added a bit more to the envelopes as I saw fit.

Main thing is you are going on a great vacation and we should not sweat the small stuff...

This has been discussed so many times here on the DIS board. The servers are exceedingly busy on the last morning. They are multiple groups of people to serve breakfast and to then get ready for the next shipful of cruisers. They don't have time to chit chat on that last morning.

 

[SweetSpot]

I haven't gone back to read the last couple pages but just got my docs for June and it still says that gratuity can be added on the ship if you choose. Nothing about auto gratuity. Also the space with gratuity recommendations was left empty this time. When does this go into effect?

 

[PrincessShmoo]

This has been discussed so many times here on the DIS board. The servers are exceedingly busy on the last morning. They are multiple groups of people to serve breakfast and to then get ready for the next shipful of cruisers. They don't have time to chit chat on that last morning.

And a good number of them were up at 5 am to clear customs/immigration before reporting for work, after, probably, being up really late the night before finishing up dinner service.

 

[jilljill]

I haven't gone back to read the last couple pages but just got my docs for June and it still says that gratuity can be added on the ship if you choose. Nothing about auto gratuity. Also the space with gratuity recommendations was left empty this time. When does this go into effect?

What ship are you sailing on? The Magic started this last summer. The Wonder/Fantasy started this towards the end of April. It hasn't been started on the Dream as of yet.

 

[KSDisneyDad]

My feeling to why DCL is making this change is for the people that don't tip at all, there are those that do exist. And then I'm sure there are those that feel if they don't eat in the dining room(s) they don't need to tip. On my last cruise I did notice on on the first three nights the dining room was full and on the last night (tip night) there were quite a few empty chairs including my table.
So what would that tell ya
At first when I heard about the change I was a little offended but after thinking about it for awhile I do agree the the new policy. I would not have problem going to quest services to adjust the tip.

Sorry I don't mean to offend the non tippers out there

I agree. I also wouldn't worry about stepping on the toes of non-tippers (I'm referring to true non-tippers, not those that adjust their tips for poor service).

 

[FINNZUP]

What ship are you sailing on? The Magic started this last summer. The Wonder/Fantasy started this towards the end of April. It hasn't been started on the Dream as of yet.

Actually, my Dream cruise documents (the spiral booklet) states that you can "pre-pay gratuities for your party up to three days before your vacation begins. Please contact your travel agent to make payment arrangements. If you do not choose to pre-pay your gratuities, for your convenience, the standard gratuity amounts, based on the length of your voyage, will be added to your on board account as shown in the table below" It goes on to state gratuity suggestions and notes that you can modify, or make changes to stop at GS.

We leave next Sunday...The Dream IS auto billing for tipping.

 

[dvcdisney]

This has been discussed so many times here on the DIS board. The servers are exceedingly busy on the last morning. They are multiple groups of people to serve breakfast and to then get ready for the next shipful of cruisers. They don't have time to chit chat on that last morning.

I guess we were lucky because when we went to our early breakfast on the last morning our servers (both main and assistant) were very excited to see us and had lots of time to speak to us and even take some photos. They even walked us out. The kids loved them. Now this could be that it was only us and one other family that came.

Also, I only gave a few dollars extra in tip and just to the main server. Our assistant server was having so much trouble but he was trying so hard so I just gave him the standard amount. I have a feeling that the other families didn't tip him very well. I think the difference in the enthusiasm and care by the servers are all in their personality.

Our Head server didn't come over. I didn't expect him to because we only saw him for 5 secs at the beginning of the cruise and then a few mins during the last dinner. I know they do things behind the scenes but honestly, Ididn't particularly think he did anything for us because our Main server handled any issues with the assistant. She would emphasize that if we had any problems to please, please speak to her, she didn't want him to get in trouble. She spent a lot of time running around doing part of his job in the beginning, but by the end, he was getting better. And as I said, he was trying. He wasn't the quickest person, but he did try. So we were more patient with him.

I didn't name the assistant server in the survey at the end, but I definitely named our Main server as well as a few others that seemed to go above and beyond.

 

[SweetSpot]

Actually, my Dream cruise documents (the spiral booklet) states that you can "pre-pay gratuities for your party up to three days before your vacation begins. Please contact your travel agent to make payment arrangements. If you do not choose to pre-pay your gratuities, for your convenience, the standard gratuity amounts, based on the length of your voyage, will be added to your on board account as shown in the table below" It goes on to state gratuity suggestions and notes that you can modify, or make changes to stop at GS.

We leave next Sunday...The Dream IS auto billing for tipping.

Mine says the same thing. We are sailing on the Magic in June.

 

[LuAnimal]

I'm curious how they handle a party like us, there are 8 of us, 4 adults and 4 children in 2 staterooms. One adult has no children, one has 2 in 2 different staterooms and the last 2 adults have children in their own stateroom. Not all children have onboard charging benefits, so how do they know whom to charge the tips to??

 

[trimix]

Tipping will be done by cabin, not by person. If there are four people in each stateroom, the first person in each stateroom reservation will have all tips applied to their account.

When my cruise sails, tips for all four people in my cabin will be applied to my account.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

I'm curious how they handle a party like us, there are 8 of us, 4 adults and 4 children in 2 staterooms. One adult has no children, one has 2 in 2 different staterooms and the last 2 adults have children in their own stateroom. Not all children have onboard charging benefits, so how do they know whom to charge the tips to??

The tips are added to the account for each room, by guest. So, however each person has their account set up on their KTTW card, that's where the tip goes for each person.

 

[LuAnimal]

The tips are added to the account for each room, by guest. So, however each person has their account set up on their KTTW card, that's where the tip goes for each person.

But most of the kids have no charging priviledges, how do they know which child belongs to who?

 

[PrincessShmoo]

But most of the kids have no charging priviledges, how do they know which child belongs to who?

When you do your checkin you specify which people are being covered by what type of payment (credit card, cash, etc).