It's not fair!

[Indignant]

Recently spoke to a bookshop manager with a certain large cruise line. Turns out he's considered equivalent to a 2.5 stripe officer. Anyone else think this is a little unfair, considering that with the same company a deck officer needs his/her Masters ticket to wear 2.5 stripes?

I know deck/engine vs hotel is a long-running and tiresome argument, but interested to hear what people with less experience of the industry think!

[ETwhat?]

It would be interesting in what way he is deemed equivalent, pay, level of managerial responsiblity, and for those that dont know where does a 2.5 stripe deck officer fit in between a captain the bottom?

From what ive seen the hotel side of it tends to have the same structure as most other departments in that you will have a head for each that holds a higher postion that then means everyone from of the same rank is the ships overall managers and simply to make everyone on your cruise ship think that its still the 1920's and that they are having a chuffing good time they slap some gold on the uniform. Managing a shop depending on the amount of actual managing is a reasonably decent job, you wouldnt compare the manager of waterstones to the guy at the till.

if the hang up is that is the same pay grade then surely your motivation is wrong,

Again it also relates to the shore side a good hotel mamanger can make a lot of money on land where there happen to be a lot of hotels, so they need an incentive to drag them to sea, where as the actual sailing staff are ****ed over as they have decided that they want to be at sea, and while there are shore jobs deck is apparantly the least benifical to go ashore and the electrotech side the most with engine somewhere in the middle but basically you main money maker the CoC is useless on land

[Dosedmonkey]

It depends on the cruise ship company you work on, it is only a uniform, some companies want anyone who is vaguely capable of talking to a passenger sensibly to wear a uniform, if anything it means the deck and engine officers are less likely to get hassled in public areas, as they aren't so rare.

On the vessel I (And Alistair from the forums) worked on only Deck/Engine Officers, a Marine Officer (office staff) and a couple of accountants wear uniform with stripes.

At the end of the day though, the rank system of the vessel goes, Deck & Engine Officers first, its not the military, rank only matters when it comes to safety, the safe navigation & seaworthiness of the vessel is the highest priorities, and also in an emergency only the deck and engine officers have advanced training, as such, not only are you paid more, you are in fact a higher rank then someone who is two and a half stripes in a different department. ISM & SOLAS & STCW states Deck & Engine Officers responsibilities in safety for the crew and passengers, I am not saying you can go bossing people around, but at the end of the day, if you notice something dangerous or something that could effect the ship it is the real officers responsibility to sort it out. My current ships ISM has some very good lines saying if a member of crew disobeys an Officers order in reference to something that could constitute safety they can either be formally warned or instantly dismissed depending on the Captains discretion, after catching an able seamen crashing a container into the dockside whilst drunk/hungover and then being abusive to me when I told him to get his head down in his cabin, after myself and the second engineer giving him a joint bollocking I hesitantly let it slide that time.

They should not be allowed to have the Merchant Navy diamond on their epaulettes a less they are a qualified CoC Merchant Navy Officer in my opinion. Saying this dress code is up to the individual company at the end of the day.

[alistairuk]

I don't see what all the fuss is about - that's what you get when you work for a particular large corporation who have decided that passengers like seeing 'officers' out and about and as Dosedmonkey has said it saves the deckies and engineers having to go socialise with the pax every day.

At end of the day "Hotel officers or 'Managers' as we call them" are a separate department which deck and engine do not get involved in. I have never had any issues with any of the hotel crew / staff / managers on any of the ships or companies I have worked on/with - and they have always done whatever is asked.

In an emergency, or if it is relating to safety or security the hotel department will obey you - which is all that matters.