Work on a cruise line?

Question

I would love to work on a cruise line, sometime in the near future. How can i go about searching for job opporotunites, and how do i qualify?

Answer 1

Best and easier way to get a job on cruise ships is trhu the concessions which run the various services onboard (Shops, Spas, Casinos, Photo dept)

As an employee of the concessions some advantages are:

you are staff, not crew, hence better deck privileges, better cabins, better status onboard.

Since you are employed by a third company, you get to go to all sorts of different cruise lines, smaller ships, giant ones, etc.

You answer mainly to the department manager who is your onboard boss, off course the higher authority is always the Captain, Staff Captain, Hotel Director etc... but they pretty much leave you alone. (sometimes your department manager can be an a*****e, but mostly they are ok)

and finally... the shops and casino cannot open while on port, at least on 90% of the cruises which are duty free...

So you get your port days off.

there are 2 major concessions for the shops

www.hardingbros.co.uk

easy to get in, interviews usually over the phone, they have the shops on some 50 ships, the top of the industry like Crystal and Silverseas and Cunnard and the other end with Island Cruises and some other "poor" ships (which are not necessarily bad to work, sometimes you make more $$ on them).

Also, they pay 160pounds a week, plus commission, commission is based on hitting sales targets, but they are set by cruise and by the group, there are no individual targets.

So the team really works as a team.

and

www.starboardcruise.com/

bigger, some 90 ships including the big companies like Carnival, Costa, Royal, Celebrity.

pays less, 500USD a month, plus commission.

there are individual targets, which make the team very competitive and a bit unfriendly.

they have incentives for people to rat on each other for stealing, its a S****y company.

As for qualifying, you need some retail experience and good english... good maners and good looks dont hurt either.

If you dont have retail experience, lie, everybody does and they dont check.

Most of the shop staff are British, Brazilian, Croatian, Romanian, South African.

Be careful with agencies, there are some good ones, but the vast majority are scams.

Going directly to the cruise line is better, just take a LONG time.

Concessions are quicker.