The great cruise gratuities ‘scam’

(One can’t write about politics, economics, immigration and the destruction of Britain every day. So today I’d like to introduce you to the great cruise gratuities ‘scam’)

I don’t know if any readers ever go on cruises. But if you do, you’ll have noticed how eagerly and effectively the cruise companies extract money from passengers, supposedly for gratuities. And if you’ve never been on a cruise and never intend to, you might still find this little tale of fleecing customers mildly amusing.

Large cruise ships – here’s how it works on many large cruise ships:

1. When booking you get a choice – either pre-pay your gratuities at typically about £7 a day per person or else the cruise company will add a higher sum – perhaps £10 a day – to your bill at the end of the cruise. This pressures you to pay upfront.

2. When you get on the ship, you then discover that these pre-paid gratuities don’t include things like the bar. So another 10% to 15% is automatically added to any drinks you buy

3. Supposing there are 3,000 passengers on a 2-week cruise, then that’s £21,000 a day – £294,000 for the two weeks – that the cruise company is getting in pre-paid gratuities. Does anyone really believe the cruise company is distributing absolutely all of this £21,000 a day (£294,000 for two weeks) to their staff?

River cruises – things are reportedly much worse with a company called Viking which specialises in river cruises. According to a report in the Torygraph:

1. On its two-week Yangtse River cruise Viking ‘recommends’ that each passenger pays $15 a day in gratuities for the crew, $10 a day for the tour guides, $2 a day for local guides and $1 a day for drivers. This all adds up to $28 (£18) per day per passenger

2. There are 170 passengers on the Yangtse River cruise. If these 170 passengers pay their £18 per day, then that’s £3,060 per day – £42,840 for the two weeks

3. There are about 80 crew on the boat. Of course, officers will get a bigger share of the tip money and toilet cleaners rather less. But on average Viking are taking £535 in tips per crew member for the two weeks – £267 per week. That may not seem a lot, but…

4. The average wage in China is $4,755 per year – about £3,067 – equivalent to about £60 per week

5. So Viking would have us believe that, in addition to their salaries, its staff are each getting around four times the average wage in tips! Does anyone really believe that Viking actually distributes all the £42,840 per two-week trip to its 80 staff? Or are there some cynics who are tempted to suspect that Viking pockets a goodly proportion of the gratuity money to help boost company profits?

If it looks like a scam, smells like a scam, feels like a scam and seems like a scam, then it’s probably a scam.

I have the impression that the way cruise companies extract gratuities from passengers is a massive and massively profitable scam.

The ‘Spit List’ – You could, of course, refuse to pre-pay your gratuities and give very little during your journey. But it’s rumoured that on some boats the crew keep a list of passengers who don’t pay gratuities – the so-called “Spit List”. I probably don’t need to explain why, if one wants an enjoyable holiday, one wouldn’t want one’s name on the “Spit List”.