One of the most iconic moments of Below Deck is when the captain calls a tip meeting with the crew and announces how much they received from previous charter guests, but is it split only between those on screen?
Each season the Below Deck crew is made up of deckies, stewardesses, chefs and the captain. However, Captain Kerry Titheradge told Chattr in an interview that there are more employees on board who aren’t filmed for the reality TV show.
“It’s very important that we have that,” he explained. “It’s very important for safety that we have people who know the boat better than those who are on TV.
However, he stressed that the Below Deck cast are actually doing their jobs, and said there are no extra employees in their department, but rather those who take care of how the yacht’s mechanics run.
“All the crew are doing their jobs. The only people you don’t see are those in different jobs. There’s no shadow captain, no shadow stew, no shadow mate, that doesn’t exist.
“There’ll be the first officer who knows the boat, which is very important to me, because they understand all the equipment and machinery. And, you know, some computers work differently than others, and then they’d be — depending on the size of the yacht — there’d be two engineers. So we don’t want to bring a Below Deck personality as the engineer on a yacht that he doesn’t know, it just wouldn’t be safe.”
Do those extra yacht employees share the tip that viewers see?
The much-anticipated tip meetings on Season 12 of Below Deck show Captain Kerry telling his crew how much the last guest tipped them for their services. During the interview with Chattr, he revealed that the amount isn’t just split between the on-screen crew, but all the employees who work on the boat.
“They’re part of the crew. So if you really analyse it, and you do the math, you’ll be like, ‘They should have got extra 800 bucks each?’. And then, ‘Ah, there are three more people behind the scenes!'” He explained.
“Every person who’s involved in the yacht deserves a tip, and it’s the same on a charter yacht. You might not see the engineer the whole season. The guest never saw the engineer, but he is still part of providing this experience.”
Mystery solved! One of Below Deck’s biggest burning questions, finally answered.
Season 12 of Below Deck is streaming now on Hayu, the same day as the USA. New episodes drop on Tuesdays.
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