Leading cruise line to scrap tips!!!

Yes you heard it from sailings in MAY 2019 P&O cruises are stopping adding tips, gratuities onto your on board accounts!!

However crew on board do depend on these tips to buffer their low basic wage so I do hope P&O will be upping the crews wages to allow for this.  Now what impact will this have on the clients? At the moment we have not seen a dramatic increase in the fares from MAY 2019 however we (cruise.co.uk) cannot keep an eye on all P&O’s cruises fares.  So I guess we will have to wait and see.

Here in the UK we do have a very different tipping culture to our American cousins so I am not surprised that a British company (owned by the Americans i may say) have started this.  The gratuities on Royal Caribbean, Holland America Celebrity etc have gradually increased over the years so I wonder what their chief executives think of what P&O have announced?

What are your thoughts?  Do you tip before a cruise even starts (within your cruise fare) or take them off and then tip once on board?  Us British normally like to see the service first before we tip.  Anyway from MAY 2019 on P&O this dilemma is not needed.

Is this a good thing for cruising?  Will other cruise lines follow suit?