The response from the airline says even more than anything.
Give a good tip to Miami skycap or get a surprise in your luggage
I arrived at the Miami airport and decided to check my luggage with a skycap. Instead of saying “hello” or “how can I help you,” he said, “Are you aware that there is a $2 per bag charge, not including gratuity?”
I checked one bag with him, and, after giving him $2 plus $1 tip, he said my tip wasn’t enough. I thought he was joking. He said $2 went to American Airlines, and he needed more than a dollar tip per bag to make a living. I said I thought the gratuity was up to my discretion. He said not if I wanted my bag intact when it arrived in Chicago – and suggested I take my bag inside if I didn’t give him a better tip.
I was stunned and asked the skycap next to him if harassing customers for tips was part of American’s policy. He said yes, with a smug look.
[…]
[W]hen I got home, I found bags of messy garbage in my luggage! I had to dry-clean some clothing and am considering throwing away the suitcase.
Don’t you guys support a higher minimum wage? Would you rather they have illegals working the airports? At least they weren’t violent like some of the unions are with scabs.
One man’s bag of messy garbage is another man’s treasure…
The person doesn’t really come out and say it was someone else’s garbage…
I would’ve imagined the harrassing is provided even if no gratuities were involved…
– Kidding. –
/got nuthin’
an example of why I never use skycaps
Yes, AA gets the $2.
Yes, his remarks were improper, and so was the addition of the garbage. He’ll likely get sacked for it if you follow through.
Yes, you’re a cheapskate. Next time, wait in line with the other civilians. Either that, or open up your moth-eaten wallet and give a real tip for services rendered, then you have complaining rights to the airlines to hire more personnel to take care of their horrid baggage problems. And your complaints won’t work. Why? Because you shopped the price of the ticket at an aggregator site and raped what little profit they have left. And for this, you’ve decided to complain.
I am having a hard time feeling sorry for this rube.
#1 – this person needs to be personally responsible for what he said and did to this customers. Don’t blame his lack of professional skills on minimum wage. He can work at Taco Bell if he does not make enough in tips.
How many bags do you think they handle each day? I’d say one bag a minute is reasonable. Isn’t $60/hour enough to make for moving a bag 8 feet onto a cart!!! Even if they make half that, it’s a damn good wage for someone who has zero skills. They should be grateful for the job, the losers. I’d complain to the airline and get the a-hole fired (just for the complaining part).
Even a bag every 5 minutes is $12 an hour at $1 each. That’s more than a lot of people make who work for minimum wage or not much more. Anybody know if these guys get minimum wage on top of the gratuities?
I’d say publicizing this all over the place, complete with the airline’s name prominently featured, might get some response. Or at least underscore how little American Airlines cares about its passengers.
That said, since the guy brought it up in advance, it would have been sensible to ask him what a “normal” gratuity is before engaging him.
Anyone know how much those skycaps make? When I’ve used them, it seems like they are totally raking-in the dough. I mean like ten or twenty bucks in five minutes.
Are the skycaps not on at least minimum wage too?
I tip my bartenders because tips are all they get and I get a free beer for my trouble. I’ll tip a cabbie for a quick ride. But the main difference is that it is understood that tips are a significant part of their income.
In theory the $2 that AA takes in some small way contributes to the wages of the skycap, right? This skycap bugging for a tip even in the face of poor service is the worst kind of entitlement.
The traveler should have gotten that plebes name on the spot and if anything happened to her back she would have had some real recourse…
Ain’t free enterprise grand?
Whaa!? How are there this many people standing up for what these workers did?! Whether or not you are cheap, when someone gives you a price, thats what you expect to pay! If I go to Circuit City and buy a TV, I don’t give the person at the register a tip for handling my money, nor do I give the person who helped me pick out the TV a tip. Expecting good tips from everyone is insane! How should the person know what to tip, by percentage? (cuz thats what I do at a restraunt) If thats true, then a $1 tip on a $2 service is 50%! Thats way more than I’ve ever given a waiter. How else then?! Should people read minds?!
There is no excuses for things like this, If you want to get paid a certain amount of tip, make it explicit, If you want to leave it open for people to make up their own minds, then don’t expect high tips from everyone.
AND
If you can’t live off the money in that job, GET A NEW JOB! Work at UPS if you want to handle packages, you get better pay and benefits; the only difference is that you don’t get times where you just stand around doing nothing.
Leaving things up to social etiquette (probably not spelled right) is especially insane and dumb at an airport.
Hey don’t piss off a waiter or you will be eating garbage.
A co-worker of mine handed a skycap a handful of change. The skycap looked at the change and handed it back. This was 15 or 20 years ago.
Never tip anyone who demands a tip. Tipping is a gratuity, based on quality of service. If the service sucks, my tip will reflect that. I know bartenders who make 60 – 75K a year (unreportable income) because they are good at what they do.
Skycaps do indeed make good money, as calculated above. 60 Minutes did the math on this years ago. One dollar on a $2 charge is a 50% tip, and there is no reason for this jerk of a Skycap to complain (unless he needs large sums of money for a drug/gambling habit or something). Win some, lose some. The whole process is a bit of a scam, with the airlines making a cut as well. This is why I never use skycaps unless I have a broken leg or something. That said, I think $5 a bag is customary. Anyone placing food garbage in my luggage would get hit with charges of placing possibly hazardous biological waste in my private property. I would be so pissed off that no extreme of theatrical overreaction would be too much trouble.
I hate tipping culture in the US. If someone deserves a tip then great, but institutionalised tipping is just wrong!
” thought the gratuity was up to my discretion. He said not if I wanted my bag intact when it arrived in Chicago ”
Sure sounds like extortion to me.
#10 “I tip my bartenders because tips are all they get…”
Not legally anywhere in the US.
#19 – You know of any bar/pub owners who actually obey the law? I sure as hell dont.
I too hate the tipping culture of America. I took a cab in Australia once. The meter read 10.85, the cabbie charged me 10, I gave him a tip and he didn’t want to accept it. That made me want to give it to him even more.
When tips are expected, then it’s not really a tip now is it?
Wow. I am amazed that the guy even got his luggage back. I’ve always suspected that the skycaps switch the destination tag of your bag to some backwater airport if you don’t give them enough money. In short, they hold your luggage hostage.
The fact that his luggage was opened by someone other than security is a very serious problem. What if the skycap decided to drop some narcotics or weapons in there?
Ah, the Skycap. Last time I flew NorthWest out of Tampa I decided to check in at the curb and check in my bags cause I saw a loooooong line inside. I happily tipped the guy $10 and he took care of it all. Spent all of 2 minutes to check in and check my bags. Then walked in and went to the terminal.
I know it’s extortion but I am aware of it and the $10 was well spent to not stand in line for a half hour. Instead I could get to the terminal and relax. Now if there is not much of a line inside then I won’t bother with curb checkin. But I hate to fly and less stress is worth $10.