Ha Giang
Hanoi
Ho Chi Minh City
Ha Long
Sapa
Mekong Delta
Da Nang
Hue
Hoi An
Ninh Binh
Da Lat
Nha Trang
Phan Thiet
Phu Quoc
Quang Binh
Quy Nhon
Vung Tau
Thai Nguyen
Something about this particular tour, compared to all other boat excursions, has been bothering me… This seems to be the only instance where tipping is solicited and where there’s an unusual refund mechanism for remunerating the boat operator upon boarding. I paid roughly 500,000 VND for three individuals, and the ticket counter returned about 40,000 VND for me to ‘pay the boat man’. Past the entrance, and without identifying who the boat operator was, the person showing me to my boat (not the rower) immediately took the 40,000 VND. I’m unclear if that procedure was correct. Ultimately, I felt quite uncomfortable at the finish because I was unsure if that initial sum was meant as a mandatory pre-tip, so I had not planned to leave an additional gratuity. Given that none of the five other boat tours I took required this, how was I expected to know?
It truly is a very peculiar system.
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We did Trang An on our own…hubby and myself… The tour guide told us to give her 50,000-100,000 she wasn’t happy with that, asked for 200,000..
Tam coc we shared a boat with another Aussie couple, and we gave her 100,000 per couple
Annie
My wife and I will be doing this excursion next month and the whole tipping question in Vietnam appears to be quite a touchy subject.
We travel on a budget (because we have to) and research has indicated that the minimum wage in Vietnam is approx. 25k/hour,
Rightly or wrongly we use this for estimating what we think is a fair and reasonable tip for services provided.
Does any one know if the ‘rowers’ rely solely on tips or if they are also paid a wage?
Thanks for your replies.
They are paid a flat 30k per job even though they are required to stay the entire time with uniform on. So if it’s a slow day, they may make $1 for the day. They rely on tips so he generous. 100k dong I would say is the minimum, that is about $3.5 cent.