Carnival Cruise Lines

Anyone who has been on a cruise is delighted with the service they got from their waiters at mealtimes and the cabin steward with his towel animals etc. Carnival and their little network of other lines (cunard, ocean village to name a couple) decided a couple of years back that instead of giving you an envelope to hand to the little team of people who serve you that they will debit a suggested gratuity from your onboard account on the very first night onboard. This is a crafty little trick and of course makes the whole tip thing very impersonal. Might i suggest that anyone who takes a cruise with them state on embarkation that they prefer to tip their staff in person and not via the card system. I worked for both of the big two over a period of seven years and can also recommend the following if you just fancy a cheap cruise. Book yourself a flight to Miami and turn up on the dockside and offer $100 for the cruise of your choice, tell them you dont mind if you dont cruise as with 3 or 4 hours before sailing there are usually 20 or 30 cabins unused which means a waste of space to them entirely... I have known hundreds of people do this without a problem and when they let you have your cruise but ask you to keep quiet about what you paid tell them that will of course which wine they are going to throw in....