larsnyz

Tonight I talked to a couple of different people at NCL, and they said that there was a mistake in the cancellation penalty applied to my reservation. They are refunding all of the prepaid service charges and port fees/taxes. (In response to MoCruiseFan: The prepaid service fees were for drinks, dining, and daily service charges/gratuities. Those were not covered by the FCC.) In the end, they did the right thing. My takeaway is to be careful about prepaid gratuities, and know what should be refunded.

Here's the copied/pasted text from the email: "I do not see any refunds on your reservation that you cancelled. I believe you used a coupon off the voyage fare, so the actually cancellation fee was higher than the amount of voyage fare, so in this case, nothing was refunded back to you." First, they applied the 15% coupon that took a few hundred off the cruise fare, which simply reduced the amount of FCC used. In any case, even with the coupon, the cruise was paid for in FCC. I don't see why the confiscated my entire gratuity and taxes/fees payment. The whole thing is super confusing and shady.

You want more detail? Sure. BOOKING COMPONENTS PER GUEST IN USD Guest Fare 860.00 Gov Tax/Port Exp/Fees 405.80 Travel Protection 199.00 Savings -861.00 * Bev Srv Charge 196.20 Din Srv Charge 19.80 Prepaid Service Charges 180.00 Gross Total 999.80 ** One guest, so this was the total. They did apply a coupon, which deducted off an original cruise fare total of something like $1100. * The $-861 was the FCC. I forfeited the rest of the $3062. ** This was my out-of-pocket (CASH) cost for insurance, gratuities, and Fees. What I should get back from NCL is $800.80.

They also need to refund the taxes and fees, as stated. I will wait a couple of days for a follow up response, and then plan to do exactly that. I don't understand companies that are willing to burn customers like this.

I have a receipt showing what was paid, and their website states that service charges are refundable.

It was obviously a mistake to pre-pay for the gratuities, and I will never do that again. I'll update this post if they provide a better explanation or change their decision.

Last year I went on a Panama Canal cruise and due to changes in cruise fares, I got a Future Cruise Credit, which needed to be used within a year. I was running out of time, so recently booked an Alaska cruise that was way cheaper than my FCC ($3000+ FCC, $900- cruise fare), and understood that I would forfeit the unused FCC. I prepaid gratuities and the port fees/taxes and purchased insurance for medical reasons, so the out of pocket cost ended up being about $1000. As I mentioned, the cruise fare was completely paid for by the FCC. I was told that if I cancelled, the prepaid gratuities and fees would be refunded. A week before the cruise my dad had a stroke. He is home now, but needs lots of care. So I cancelled the cruise two days before departure. Today I was told that since my cruise fair was more than what I paid, there would be no refund of gratuities and fees. WHAT?!?! I was told to submit an $800 claim to insurance. While I understand that I CAN do this, it seems completely wrong to me, and not what I was told. I have responded to my NCL contacts, but how can this be the policy? Any advice for how to get NCL to honor what they originally told me about refunds? After my last two experiences with NCL (the Panama Canal cruise had many, many sick people and it's the one where the gangway collapsed and injured several passengers) I am not so keen on doing business with them anymore.