How much should I tip in Roatán?

Nobody wants to be the person who under-tipped, and nobody wants to overpay because they had no idea what normal looked like. Here are the actual numbers.

Tour guides

Ten to twenty dollars per person for a half day tour. Fifteen to twenty five for a full day. Give it to the guide at the end, in cash, in dollars.

If you were a family of four on a six hour tour, that is somewhere between sixty and a hundred dollars for the guide. If that sounds like a lot, it is worth knowing that a guide runs one or two groups on a port day and none at all on days with no ship, so tips are a real part of what the work pays.

Tip more when the guide did something that was not in the job description. Waited while your group took longer than planned, carried someone's bag up the hill, changed the route because the sea was rough, found a pharmacy for a passenger who forgot their medication.

Tip less, or not at all, when the service was genuinely poor. Nobody here expects a tip for a bad day and pretending otherwise helps nobody.

Drivers

If the driver is a separate person from the guide, five to ten dollars per group is normal. On our tours the driver is usually part of the same team, so one tip to the guide covers it and gets shared.

Restaurants and beach clubs

Most restaurants in West Bay and West End add 10% service to the bill. Check before you add more. If service was good, rounding up or adding another 5% is common and appreciated, not expected.

At a beach club with a day pass, tipping the server who has been bringing drinks to your chair all afternoon is normal. Five dollars for the afternoon is a reasonable figure.

Other people you will meet

Someone who carries your bags at the terminal: one to two dollars per bag.

A taxi driver: not customary. Agree the fare before you get in and pay that.

A vendor at a market stall: no. Negotiate the price, pay it, done.

The practical part

Bring small bills. Fives and tens. Nobody on a beach in West Bay can break a fifty, and the awkward moment at the end of a good tour is entirely avoidable.

Dollars are fine everywhere and are usually preferred over lempiras for tips.

Tip in cash rather than adding it to a card payment. Card tips take longer to reach the person and sometimes do not reach them at all.

What we tell our own guides

Tips are not part of the price you paid us and they are not expected. The tour is complete and paid for whether you tip or not, and no guide of ours will make you feel otherwise. What we ask of them is that the day goes well regardless.

So treat these numbers as what people usually do, not as a bill. If your guide made your day in Roatán better than it would have been, they will appreciate it, and if they did not, keep your money.