"Screw the Crew" Video: Banned By Royal Caribbean & YouTube!
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A former Royal Caribbean crew member recently posted a short video explaining, in his view, how the cruise line steals a portion of the tips intended for stateroom attendants. We posted the video in an article Are Crew Members Receiving the Tips You Pay?
Recently this cruise line announced that it was switching to a new system where it will automatically take money from its guests' accounts purportedly for the purpose of being distributed to crew members as tips. But many crew members have contacted us or posted comments to our blog stating that this is just another scheme to take money from the crew's pockets.
We posted another article earlier this week addressing the new policy and the issue of tips: Royal Caribbean's New Tipping Policy: A Money Grab to Increase Profits?
We also have a active discussion of the issue on our Facebook page.
But Royal Caribbean does not like its crew members revealing what is happening on its cruise ships. We learned that the cruise line threatened the former crew member and objected to the video. Today YouTube took the video down. Take a look below.
This is how foreign incorporated cruise lines (Royal Caribbean is incorporated in Liberia) view the First Amendment guarantees of free speech.
So this cruise line silenced one critic. But its hard to hide the truth. If you are a crew member, leave a comment below and tell us about the new tipping policy.
Jim Walker is a maritime lawyer who has attended seven Congressional hearing on issues of cruise ship crime, passenger disappearances,
Not only this company
They are many company doing this
Just like in the bar dept. of princess cruises. They've change the tipping & bonus system where the staff loses not less than a thousand dollars a month. When it began last year, if we didn't reach the OBE (onboard evaluation score) we will not get any bonus, so where does the money go? Just recently they've changed the system a bit, where the staff can still get bonus regardless of the OBE score but based on revenue, but still there's a big difference in amount . Another issue is that they don't show you the breakdown or record of how much tip or pulling each individual should get. The company has two bigger ships coming, which I think is why they're screwing the crew.
It's not only the tipping policies that rob employees of their hard earned money. New employees, after traveling halfway around the world to join a ship and start a new job, are given their work uniforms. Only to find out on the first pay day that they are required to pay for these uniforms. Worse yet, over half their pay is taken as a "flight deposit" just in case they want to quit before their contract is over. Crew members, thousands of miles from home, are stuck on the ship unless they want to go home with less money than they started.
I dont have a problem with them changing their tipping policy.....BUT......I booked my cruise FEB 6th....and was TOLD when i booked i could pay tips directly to the crew....it is now MARH 10th and i recieve an email from RCCL telling me they will as of March 1st be changing their policy.....??.....they have as far as i am concerned changed the rules mid game .....they are trying to retroactively charge me automatically for some thing not agreed upon in the initial purchase......I believe this a breech of contract.....?????
Agree with Robert. Policy says can go to purser and have tip removed "in the unlikely event" service is unsatisfactory. But can I have it removed in the likely event that I disagree with the policy and prefer to tip my servers directly? My cruise in April will let me know.
It's shame for Royal Caribbean!! They were my best option in cruises vacations by giveing the freedom of tipping. NOT ANY MORE! Now they want to substract ILLEGALLY, like the other ones, from my account a tip for a service that I don't even been agree of?!! Sorry ROYAL!
I will be attempting to remove it so we can tip as we feel. Then it is still a tip and not a charge