Dive boat etiquette - list

[QLittlestar]

CBM, I understand that!!! If I were living the dream on a tropical island, no tips necessary. Actually diving in Thailand, there was no tipping really, but it was not that kind of party! We got our own tanks and swapped them out ourselves, so being back i the states, it is a bit confusing.

 

[Nemrod]

What does this entire thread have to do with --

Renting a boat? Own your own or perhaps you're considering purchasing a new toy? Talk about it here!

​

Just wondering. Rhetorical only.

N

 

[buddhasummer]

You stink! Do you know what the crew makes just so they can dive for free and help your butt back onto the boat, take your fins off and KEEP YOU ALIVE?? I guess you are Mr Pink from "Reservoir Dogs". How could you argue against $5 per tank? I put this up mostly for Nj diving where the crew usually has other jobs but if you goto the islands you better be tipping because like bartenders they depend on that as 50-60% of their income. If they suck $5 per tank is the MINIMUM. If you can't afford it than don't dive.

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Make sure you brief PUKING and use of the head! Some people don't even know what the term "head" is on a boat. Haha! Hope to get on the GB one of these days. Been using the John Jack and Dina Dee.

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Laurie...Where else would we put TP especially if it has **** on it? eww.

Huh??

 

[blue steal]

Keep your gear out of others space.
Don't sit in my space when it is time to gear up.
Don't pile your wet stuff on top of my bag.
Be ready to go in when you are at the gate.
Don't be sitting in my space when I return to remove my tank.

 

[Mikko Ilari Laakkonen]

Are all the yankees here actually saying that a charter business that employs a crew shouldn't do bookkeeping, count payrolls and pay taxes, wages? Here in the old civilized world we tend to call that money laundering and if done in significant value and regularly it's considered a felony. Sometimes tipping for exceptional service is OK but as a common habit this is unacceptable.

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[Tigerman]

I suspect tipping in restaurants is pretty common practice in Finland as it is in the rest of Europe. I also suspect that tips above a certain ammount is SUPPOSED to be declared, but usually are not as well..
I know thats definetly the case here..

 

[Mantra]

Perhaps we all should start asking if the boat crew is paid prior to booking, and if the answer is no, book someplace else. If everyone did this, I suspect it wouldn't be long before boat crews were paid by the people that should be paying them. Would the up front cost to divers go up? Of course it would. But then the TOTAL cost is a known factor when booking and the ones that were tipping don't have to carry the load for those that were not tipping.

This is probably a cultural thing. I'm Australian, and we don't have the same kind of tipping culture here. Rather, I believe an employee should be paid a fair wage for their work and not left by their employer to the whims of people tipping or not tipping. It disgusts me that some employers exploit their workers to the extent that the workers NEED tips to survive. I would much rather pay for the $150 trip where workers are getting fairly paid, have health insurance and so on, than $100 for a trip with the expectation that I then must do the employer's job in taking good care of their staff. It is also, IMO, the employer's job to ensure that standards of good service are met, not mine.

 

[jaycanwk]

We all understand, you don't like tipping. But do you really want/need a listing of all the ways that working on a dive boat is different than pumping gas?

Here in NJ dive boats are essentially run as hobbies by guys who love diving and own a boat. They are not a business like a full-service gas station. They do not have bookkeepers or accountants or a payroll system. Point of fact, they do not have employees. If the boat needed to pay the crew, the boat would need a bookkeeper, a payroll service, they would have to withhold income and payroll taxes, disability, unemployment insurance, make quarterly filings, etc, etc. All that stuff would add incremental costs to the price of the charter that would FAR exceed the extra $5-$10 a tank that comprises the customary tip.

I'll never for the life of me understand why some people get so blinded by their own biases that they will strongly advocate for things that are so obviously contrary to their own financial best interests. So keep pushing for the boat to pay the crew directly, and then instead of paying $100 for the charter plus $10-$20 in tips you'll be able to take your share of the credit for cutting the tips to zero and driving the charter cost to $130-$140.

I would gladly pay that because that would be the true cost of the charter wouldn't it?? Who is the one being cheap here?? I would say it is the charter owner or the restaurant owner or who ever, because if you are having to pay a tip to subsidize a sh***y wage then that is truly a broken system and business model.

A tip is for EXTRAordinary service, period. So unless the captain/DM is going to massage my shoulders on the way to the dive site, I'm having a hard time seeing taxiing me to the site, giving me a briefing and returning me to shore as something that is that extraordinary.

 

[Mikko Ilari Laakkonen]

In Finland tipping is sometimes ok but never ever required. Of course it's sometimes too easy to judge others here from the happiest, best country in the world

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[buddhasummer]

deleted.