We’re riding #4 from Los Angeles to Galesburg tomorrow. Any suggestions on an amount to tip the sleeping car attendant?
Thanks
For two of you, I would suggest ten dollars each night as the minimum, especially if you are given extraordinary service.
There is the story of the man taking his first trip by Pullman who asked the porter what his average tip was. The porter told him a certain amount, and the traveler tipped him in accord. Later, the porter commented that this traveler was the first pasenger who had come up to his average.
Early in my travel by sleeper, I asked a Pullman conductor what the usual tip for a night in a roomette was, and he gave me an amount (six months earlier, I had tipped twice that amount for a night in an upper berth).
How much is a personal choice. However, here is some information to keep in mind. Although Amtrak does not publish the average compensation package for its sleeping car attendants, the BLS has a category that appears to cover it. If the BLS category is accurate, i.e. includes Amtrak’s sleeping car attendants, the average compensation package for an attendant is $54,236 per year.
The notion that the compensation package of today’s sleeping car attendants is akin to that of the underpaid porters of yesterday probably is not correct. Accordingly, unless I receive unusually good service, I don’t tip at all.
Of the three sleeping car trips that I have made this year, only one attendant warranted a tip. I rode the Silver Meteor from Jacksonville to Miami in July. The attendant was helpful, but he did not have to do anything to my room since I did not use the bed. I gave him $5.
Heaps of workers with average compensation packages below those paid to Amtrak’s sleeping car attendants don’t come in for tips. What justifies tipping a sleeping car attendant when they get a decent wage for doing their job?
Thats being unusually cheap, IMHO. I could make a similar argument that Amtrak would establish a “no tips” policy if they felt the way you do. However, I’ll turn it around and ask what $55k a year customer facing job demands as much from an employee as sleeping car attendant? Customer service 24 by 7 and the attendant cannot go to bed until the last Sleeping Car passenger does? I am hard pressed to think of anything similar.
I tip $10 a night per compartment on average for average service more for above average service. Highest tip was $20 a night. It’s hard to see who tips and who does not. I tip on final exit from the car but I have seen others tip in their compartment towards the trip end. So hard to tell what % tips and what does not.
Note the term used is compensation package, not salary. The way these things usually are, the so-called benefits value is usually about 1/3 of the salary, so that means these attendants are actually being paid about $40K. To not tip if service is adequate is certainly frugal at best, miserly at worst.
The normal burdens for Amtrak are in the neighborhood of 40 per cent. People are paid a compensation package that includes wages and benefits. That is the value package.
I guess you just cannot help yourself. Throwing in a derogatory comment appears to be baked into your DNA.
On a recent trip from Jacksonville to Miami, I was the only person getting off of the car that I was in who gave a tip. I was the first off the car, and I watched the others get off to see if any money parted hands. Of course, I did not see what those who got off between Jacksonville and Miami did, but my impression is that most of today’s riders, who don’t remember the so-called good old days, don’t tip.
Don’t you think you are over reacting to Schlimm with your “derogatory comment” remark? After all, you do tip Amtrak employees where tips have traditionally been given to the comment could not possibly apply to you. As far as other people who decline to leave a tip for service perhaps they can be entrusted to defend their own behavior.
You were the one who said you don’t tip unless you receive unusually good service. To call that frugal or miserly is not derogatory. It is simply an accurate and rather understated description of what occurred. Were you of limited means, that would be understood, but you have informed us many times of your executive status in a Fortune 500 corporation, so that is not the case. CMStPnP’s use of the term “cheap” was more to the point of rudeness, but I notice you said nothing. You say “I was the only person getting off of the car that I was in who gave a tip” but in reality, you have no idea if they gave the attendant a tip earlier or not. To tip or not tip is your choice, but the opinion others may draw is the natural consequence of your action.
According to Webster’s New College Dictionary, miserly is an adjective relating to or characteristic of a miser, which is defined as person who hoards and spends as little money as possible. It also means pitiably small or inadequate. Its associative noun is miserliness, which means excessive desire to save money; extreme meanness. It is derogatory. So too is cheap.
More importantly, references to my behavior or that of anyone else are inappropriate. The question relates to an appropriate amount to tip. Commenting on another poster’s preferences are out of bounds. If you believe it is appropriate to tip $5 or $10 or whatever, you can say so without any comments regarding others.
I was a senior manager. Not an executive! You have no idea of my means. None!
As I noted in my comment, I did not observe what people who got off the train before Miami tipped if anything. Moreover, it is possible that someone gave the car attendant a tip before stepping down to the platform, which should have been clear. I take five to six trips a year on Amtrak sleepers. My observations suggest that tipping is not widespread today.
Schlimm is not empowered to use any term to describe my behavior. Neither are you. The purposes of these forums is to discuss issues without personalizing them. This is especially true for emotionally charged or potentially charged words.
When you ring the bell of describing your personal behavior, you open the way for anyone and everyone to comment about that behavior. Sorry!
Cheap is offensive. According to Webster’s New College Dictionary, it means informally miserly; stingy. If you think my tipping or not tipping is too low or too high, you can say so without making a derogatory comment, i.e. cheap, etc.
Amtrak’s sleeping car attendants have a competitive compensation package. The total package is important because of the value of the benefits, which are real dollars. For example, to buy health insurance in the open market would cost in the neighborhood of $3,500 to nearly $15,000, depending on the coverage and the number of insures. Just focusing on wages understates the value of the package.
American Airlines cabin attendants, according to several recent stories in the Dallas Morning News, get paid an average of $40,000 to $45,000 per year, although some senior attendants can earn considerably more. This puts them in the same compensation package range as Amtrak’s sleeping car attendants. Should airlines passengers tip the attendants when they get off the airplane?
Oh no, say some, I suspect, they don’t do nearly as much as an Amt
What behavior does this refer to? That I gave an attendant on the Silver Meteor a fiver? If this is your reference, it does not entitle anyone to call me cheap or miserly. None!!!
The remark that several of us commented upon was, in your words, “unless I receive unusually good service, I don’t tip at all.” I was being quite mild when I said that was at best “frugal” which is not derogatory at all, merely descriptive. If you choose to not tip, that’s your business, but don’t be surprised at the reaction it elicits and then try to claim no one is allowed to say that. Sorry, but as they say, ‘if the shoe fits…’
And BTW, you demurred at my use of the term “executive” in reference to your experience. You used the term “senior management positions.” A glance at a Wiki article suggests they are largely equivalent: "Senior management, executive management, or management team is generally a team of individuals at the highest level of organizational management who have the day-to-day responsibilities of managing a company or corporation, they hold specific executive powers conferred onto them with and by authority of the board of directors and/or the shareholders." (taken from http://jom.sagepub.com/content/38/1/45.abstract)
Your left out your term miserly. You also left out my view that you have no call to comment on my behaviors or those of anyone else. If you think a larger or smaller tip is appropriate, say so, but there is no need to call the person frugal, miserly or use any other potentially inflammatory term.
In my company a senior manager is not part of the executive team. A Wiki definition applied to my former employer, without knowing anything about the organization, is incorrect.
People who don’t work in Fortune 500 corporations, for example, don’t know anything about how they function. By the same token people who work in Fortune 500 corporations don’t know how universities, hospitals, small businesses, government age
Maybe in your former world that isn’t OK, but in this one we do have rights of free speech. Not tipping is your choice, but most folks (excluding teenagers) would regard that behavior as inappropriate in general and quite cheap specifically. But then again, you are always right, so I will defer to your wisdom.
You are entitled to free speech. And your are entitled to any opinion you want to express. But you are not entitled to your own facts, which is a line that I stole from the Vice President of the United States. The fact of the matter is you don’t have a clue about the Fortune 250 corporation that I worked for. You don’t know how it was organized, how it functioned, and what role(s) that I played in it.
How do you know what most folks would conclude regarding cheap? How do you know what teenagers think or don’t think. Have you taken a statistically valid survey of their views? If so I would be keen to learn of the methodology. Have you restricted your survey to Amtrak passengers or have you included airline, bus, etc. passengers? Please, no references to blogs or other secondary data sources. Gotta be the primary stuff.
Most of the comments including yours are in reference to what I said about not tipping. To assume that Schlimm was not making a reference to me is over the top.