What does a average room attendant make?

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G

Gingee

OBS Chief
Joined
Nov 21, 2004
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924
After reading the part about tipping and people saying the Amtrak people make decent salaries, what do they make? Any ideas? Is the kitchen/dining people your room attendants most of the time or what?
 
Gingee said:
After reading the part about tipping and people saying the Amtrak people make decent salaries, what do they make? Any ideas? Is the kitchen/dining people your room attendants most of the time or what?
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The kitchen/dining people are usually never your room attendant. With the reduced staffing levels in the diners (both front-of-the-house and kitchen) they have very little time for anything else.

Unless things have changed, Amtrak OBS are usually paid hourly. And certain runs or "bids" have X number of hours assigned to them, although you are paid what you actually work. If the train is late, you are paid, if you get sick, or "fall out" and have to go to the dorm car, you usually don't get paid for that time. You are typically "off the clock" at night, and when you reach your destination. (but your expenses are paid for by Amtrak)

It's a pretty good wage, if you work the hours, but trust me, from first-hand experience, it is NOT easy work. It is not back-breaking either, but the days can get very, very long when you must serve Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. And dealing with the public is always fun! It takes a lot of effort to keep a smile on your face, and the passengers needs at the forefront of your mind.

I worked as a SCA only twice. Hated it. Up and down all night, making beds, stowing luggage, cleaning toilets. But others loved it, as there is a lot of "down time" between stops on LD runs......or there "can" be.

Unless the employee is a slacker, and never there when you need them, they pretty much earn their pay.
 
My mom is a SCA and makes a good living. She makes a good percentage of her salary from tips and of course this is taxed only if reported which she obviously does. I think her hourly is about $25 and she has been there over 10 years. She probable makes about $10000 or more a year in tips. I'd say she averages about $60000 a year give or take a few thousand.
 
$60K may be a bit of an exaggeration, but it would probably be possible if some extra trips are made. I know a few people who have spent nearly a month on the road without seeing their homes. I never volunteered for that many extra trips myself. But it has happened for some people when we had a lag between retirements/resignations, and new-hire classes. The job generally involves a guarantee of 180 hours per month. However, it's very easy to "break guarantee" and forfeit the guarantee. You get the guaranteed hours if you are always available to work the hours expected. Get the flu and miss a trip, and you've broken your guarantee. Take a trip off for your sister's wedding or your favorite uncle's funeral, and you've broken your guarantee. There are things about the job that can be fun and rewarding, but the long hours and short sleep can really sap your strength.

One of my friends is fond of saying he just wished we could be paid for every hour we are on the train, no matter what we're doing. When we're sleeping, we're not sleeping with our spouses; when we're on our layover, we're not spending quality time with our kids. For a train that runs overnight in one direction, and returns overnight in the other direction, the employee is held away from home for around 48 hours continuously, but is only paid for about 24-30 hours. This is not intended as a gripe-fest. If I hadn't thought it was the job I wanted, I wouldn't have stayed all those years.

Tom
 
Reportedly, benefits are excellent; I'm sure FormerOBS could give more detail on that. So it's not like the no-benefits, no-insurance work you get in a lot of service jobs these days.
 
Can't complain about the hospitalization, which saw me through replacement of both hips. While workers in other businesses have been losing ground in terms of benefits, Amtrak workers have been holding their own. Impossible to predict whether Congress or the Management will try to take these things away in the future.

Tom
 
The trend in this country is to make employees so unhappy that they end up not only hating their employers, but have visions of inserting their bosses into Edgar Allen Poe's the Pit and the Pendulum, and then reviving them to play the Victim in The Cask of Amontillado.

This is how we get a well run company with customer service. Or Marx's predictions to run true.
 
Why doesnt Amtrak employ cruise ship workers? Those workers aboard cruise ships will gladly put up with conditions far more demanding than Amtrak, yet get less than min. wage.

If Amtrak used them, better customer service, and lower sleeper fares for us. I have never seen a grumpy cruise ship worker on all the cruises I've taken, they are just glad they have a job in America.

I understand the "flagging of the vessels" (usually Liberia or Panama) is why they can be paid less, but none the less, something to think about.

And I know this won't ever happen, but still, just sayin'
 
rms492 said:
Why doesnt Amtrak employ cruise ship workers? Those workers aboard cruise ships will gladly put up with conditions far more demanding than Amtrak, yet get less than min. wage.

If Amtrak used them, better customer service, and lower sleeper fares for us. I have never seen a grumpy cruise ship worker on all the cruises I've taken, they are just glad they have a job in America.

I understand the "flagging of the vessels" (usually Liberia or Panama) is why they can be paid less, but none the less, something to think about.

And I know this won't ever happen, but still, just sayin'
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There are former cruise ship workers working for Amtrak. They don't perform any different then any other employee.
 
The best way to get good employees is to not only cut there salaries, eliminate their benefits, and force them to do unpaid overtime, but to also regularly lash them with a cat of nine tails.

I swear to god this country is filled with people whose understanding of employees is at an intellectually disabled level.
 
rms492 said:
Why doesnt Amtrak employ cruise ship workers? Those workers aboard cruise ships will gladly put up with conditions far more demanding than Amtrak, yet get less than min. wage.

If Amtrak used them, better customer service, and lower sleeper fares for us. I have never seen a grumpy cruise ship worker on all the cruises I've taken, they are just glad they have a job in America.

I understand the "flagging of the vessels" (usually Liberia or Panama) is why they can be paid less, but none the less, something to think about.

And I know this won't ever happen, but still, just sayin'
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Why? Those employees on the cruise ship who tend your room, wait your table, etc. and don't complain are not USA citizens. NCL discovered that when they tried the NCL Hawaii experiment with three ships built exclusively for Hawaii inter island cruising. Without making a non-USA port of call, NCL was required to hire only USA citizens, and failed miserably. USA citizens don't want to work that type of job even on a cruise ship. After only one or two years, two of the Hawaii ships were retrofitted and now cruise in the Mediterranean Sea. Only one remains in Hawaii and now make a non-USA cruise stop on every trip so they can now hire non-USA citizens and also have a casino which was not allowed when they sailed exclusively in Hawaii state waters. I know because I cruised on one of those ship in Hawaii in April 2007 on one of the brand new ship which moved to the Mediterranean in 2008.
 
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Green Maned Lion said:
The best way to get good employees is to not only cut there salaries, eliminate their benefits, and force them to do unpaid overtime, but to also regularly lash them with a cat of nine tails.

I swear to god this country is filled with people whose understanding of employees is at an intellectually disabled level.
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GML for Sec. Of Labor!!! Your best post yet!
 
Green Maned Lion said:
The best way to get good employees is to not only cut there salaries, eliminate their benefits, and force them to do unpaid overtime, but to also regularly lash them with a cat of nine tails.

I swear to god this country is filled with people whose understanding of employees is at an intellectually disabled level.
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Seriously. I didn't even know where to begin with that post.
 
rms492 said:
Why doesnt Amtrak employ cruise ship workers? Those workers aboard cruise ships will gladly put up with conditions far more demanding than Amtrak, yet get less than min. wage.

If Amtrak used them, better customer service, and lower sleeper fares for us. I have never seen a grumpy cruise ship worker on all the cruises I've taken, they are just glad they have a job in America.

I understand the "flagging of the vessels" (usually Liberia or Panama) is why they can be paid less, but none the less, something to think about.

And I know this won't ever happen, but still, just sayin'
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Most of the employees on cruise ships are third world residents who spend the entire year far away from their families and homelands. They work these jobs because they are make more money (even though they are paid relatively low wages) on the ships than they can at home. It is one step away from indentured servitude. I think we can do a lot better here in the land of the free.
 
MikefromCrete said:
rms492 said:
Why doesnt Amtrak employ cruise ship workers? Those workers aboard cruise ships will gladly put up with conditions far more demanding than Amtrak, yet get less than min. wage.

If Amtrak used them, better customer service, and lower sleeper fares for us. I have never seen a grumpy cruise ship worker on all the cruises I've taken, they are just glad they have a job in America.

I understand the "flagging of the vessels" (usually Liberia or Panama) is why they can be paid less, but none the less, something to think about.

And I know this won't ever happen, but still, just sayin'
Click to expand...
Most of the employees on cruise ships are third world residents who spend the entire year far away from their families and homelands. They work these jobs because they are make more money (even though they are paid relatively low wages) on the ships than they can at home. It is one step away from indentured servitude. I think we can do a lot better here in the land of the free.
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I wouldn't say third world. But I can tell you from talking to employees on a cruise I was on a few years ago were from almost any country you can name. They work up to 9 months on the ship and then get 3 off. This was NCL. But the employees were superb!
 
Cruise ship employees make as little as $1.25 an hour. They survive largely on tips. This works because they're from countries where that's actually a good salary, so they work hard to keep it. In the US, $1.25 per hour is NOT a good salary.

And in order to survive this brutal industry with such low wages, the cruise line industry needs billions of dollars in federal subsidies - several times more than Amtrak receives. Oh, and they also need the US Navy and Coast Guard to help them out when they have problems, and US taxpayers foot those bills too. And they can do all this because, despite the fact that 80% of cruise line passengers around the world are US citizens, almost all cruise ships are flagged in foreign ports, so they pay no US taxes.

I'm not sure that the cruise industry is a model that Amtrak should follow in any manner whatsoever.
 
MS492:

Let me know when you can prove to me that you'd be happy making your suggested "less than minimum wage". That's when I'll start to think about taking your proposal seriously. Yes, conditions in many foreign countries are so desperate that the citizens are willing to accept insulting wages, because it's better than the even more insulting wages they would get at home. If this country can't treat employees --- citizens as well as foreign nationals --- like human beings, then the country forfeits its right to survive. If we have to sink that low, then we've betrayed everything that previous generations have fought and died for. Maybe you should run for Congress. Unfortunately, you might have a bright future there.

Tom
 
Mrs. 492, let me know when you want to work for $1.25 / hour.

I can line plenty up for you.

It is despicable the way cruise ships hire / treat their staff, one of the reasons I will never return to cruising. My one time convinced me that the greed of the owners outweighed any sense of civility. I was so ashamed I tipped so heavily my wife thought I was nuts. We need to provide good work for good people, and sure there are those who don't live up to expectations, but I would hire at least 80% of the Amtrak staff I have met in a heartbeat. Every barrel has a few bad apples, but the rest deserve a decent living wage and working conditions.
 
To the foreigners who work on cruise ships, they make an excellent wage. And the tips are wonderful. They are probably among the best paid people on their block back home. Which is how the system works, and there's nothing wrong with it.

But that's a totally different world, and their country of origin has totally different economies with totally different references for money.

Paying Americans who have to live in America with American consumer prices is a totally different thing.
 
Interesting. I've known several Canadians who have made a decent wage on the cruise lines and didn't complain any more than an average employee at a top tier US corporation. I guess Canada is third world?
 
MikefromCrete said:
rms492 said:
Why doesnt Amtrak employ cruise ship workers? Those workers aboard cruise ships will gladly put up with conditions far more demanding than Amtrak, yet get less than min. wage.

If Amtrak used them, better customer service, and lower sleeper fares for us. I have never seen a grumpy cruise ship worker on all the cruises I've taken, they are just glad they have a job in America.

I understand the "flagging of the vessels" (usually Liberia or Panama) is why they can be paid less, but none the less, something to think about.

And I know this won't ever happen, but still, just sayin'
Click to expand...
Most of the employees on cruise ships are third world residents who spend the entire year far away from their families and homelands. They work these jobs because they are make more money (even though they are paid relatively low wages) on the ships than they can at home. It is one step away from indentured servitude. I think we can do a lot better here in the land of the free.
Click to expand...
The fact that you know some Canadian folks that get paid well does approximately nothing to disprove the statement.
 
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