Best Of

I appreciate all the hard thought and effort people have made to address this issue, but it still seems to me such a silly first world problem…how about a little change of perspective? Just think about how fortunate we are to be able to travel with Tauck or, for that matter, to be able to travel at all. Tis the season to be especially grateful. Wishing everyone happy holidays and stress free tipping.

Sealord - In any case the cash requirements for a Tauck trip are less than the daily tour charge for one person.

It's not that the amount is too much to give in a tip, it is that it is too much for some people to feel comfortable carrying around.

You apparently are comfortable carrying $600 - $700 in cash. Lots of people aren't.

The thread is just discussing if there is a way to provide an optional (that wouldn't preclude you tipping in cash) web-based system for the people that don't feel comfortable carrying the amounts of cash that you feel comfortable carrying but still want to provide a generous tip.

This optional system would not impact your preferred method at all.

This is a really interesting discussion…. We don’t fill out the evaluation forms anymore. We bring them home and formulate a letter a week after when we have fully thought about everything and then mail it. Given the fact that we complained in a big way about a tour director in Ireland in 2012 and Mike H had the same guy and was also complaining about him at least 10 years later, it is pretty obvious that they read them, may or may not call and act concerned, and then don’t do much. They may change hotels or itineraries ( eg Scandinavia), but about certain things, complaints fall on deaf ears. As for tips- we write checks for american dollars. We don’t care if we are luddites. It is the most convenient way to tip in American dollars and we don’t want to carry a lot of cash🤷🏻‍♀️. I was recently called by customer service about an unrelated issue , and expressed dissatisfaction about the tipping mechanism in place. My suggestions were either include it in the price ( like the cruises) or let us do it through the Tauck website. I assume they don’t want to deal with tips because then the income will have to be “ claimed” and taxed. Personally, I think the tip should be included in the price. I also think tours should be advertised by number of full days…. A welcome dinner and a breakfast on the way to the airport are not 2 tour days. Just a pet peeve….

Chris Morrison is the one of the best TDs Tauck has. They should all be up to his standards.

mil - It surprises me ...

Totally missed the point of the discussion. It's not about paying a tip, it's about carrying the cash all through the tour in order to pay the tip.

Not all people feel as secure in doing this as others, why not provide a method that allows people that don't feel comfortable carrying that amount of cash to safely tip, and still allow others to pay in cash. It really isn't that complicated!!

Maybe a solution would be that we could go to the Tauck website at the end of the tour, sign on so they know who we are, and leave the tip at that time with a credit card.

We could also do the evaluation at that time - on line. It would be easier for everyone to read the evaluations if they were done on line, in any case. Easier to route the evaluations to whoever needs to read them, and it would solve the problem of unreadable handwriting.
Additionally, the paper evaluation form does not give you enough room to do a very extensive evaluation.

socalduo
If they raise the cost of tours instead of suggesting tips, what happens when they implement "no tax on tips"?

Not sure how this is relevant.
First, I suspect many cash tips are not reported as income.
Second, a good number of TDs aren't American, so their tax laws are different than ours.
Third, the promise of no tax on tips was made by a pathological liar, so it may or may not happen. Don't count your chickens before they hatch.

All this is ridiculous, just put the prices up and truly make it all inclusive as advertised.
Remember the discussions from people here who have only taken river cruises and are surprised about tipping on land tours. I’ve said it a millions times, not everyone tips. Let’s make it fair and everyone pay the same price upfront. And don’t tell me tour directors will not give their best knowing they won’t be getting tips. What is this world coming to that we have to reward certain jobs with tips in this country. Pay the people a decent wage.