Working Cruise Estimates

[Ephemerum@aol.com]

Thank you for the replies to my question about what to charge when on a 
"working" cruise. (March 5th "What to charge a cruise ship")

I submitted my estimates last week, and here's what I based them on:

No way will I consider this a vacation, although my husband and I will 
welcome a break from living with his aged father.  We're not really cruisers. 
 When it comes to foreign countries, we're more of your backpacking on trains 
types.

I know it costs the ship virtually nothing for me to bring my husband, as 
he'll be sharing the cabin they'd have to set aside for me, anyway.  And they 
always have enough food!  I should even charge extra to cover the exorbitant 
costs of his beers and my umbrella drinks and tequila shots.  It will make 
things easier to have an extra pair of hands.

The Music Department on the ship will get back to me after meeting.  I know 
the cruise line has tons of money, but how much of it they give to the music 
department for maintenance is the unknown factor.  If they decide to bid it 
out, I'll see if I can post the bid here so some of you snowbirds can vie for 
it.  I hope they'd demand RPT's.  If some low bidder were to mangle my 
pianos... Hell hath no fury like a woman technican whose stable has been 
@#$%ed with.

By the way, the parts estimate really held me up because the Yamahas were't 
purchased in the USA, so the USA Service Department had to jump through a 
bunch of hoops for Japan to get clearance to deal with me.  It took two 
weeks.  Cruise ship tuners take heed!

I sent three estimates with progessively more extensive work to be done in 
the five days I'd be aboard.  
The easiest (rebushing six front and two balance rails) would almost be a 
vacation, so I charged by the day away from my business, including the one 
flying back from Texas (their ticket).
The medium estimate involves adding repairs for a fruit drink spill:  
Cleaning bass strings, replacing the dampers and damper rail cloth.  I 
estimated that one by the hour.
The heavy one substitutes replacement of the bass strings for bass string 
cleaning in the spill piano.  Some of you may work faster, but I'd be working 
like a DOG getting all that done in five days (I do fastidious work), and I 
gave myself enough paid hours to make it worth the trouble.  Probably wouln't 
see any ports or drink too many umbrellas, there.

Thank you to Marcel for reminding me to request/demand a workspace, 
especially if my cabin is one of those dinky ones.  I also have to get 
clearance for all my solvents and adhesives.  Since I service these pianos at 
a port of call, not the home port, I do have to work around the performance 
schedule, and often have passengers (mostly Texans, some pesky or drunk) 
observing (and commenting).

Karin Schmitt