Pre paid gratuities conversion rate

[gogo65]

This is not a thread about the practice of tipping!

 

I'm looking to book a RCCL cruise and just discovered a huge discrepancy in the prepaid tips. RCCL website states $9.75 USD/pp/day. Ok no problem with that. With the exchange rate today that is about $13.50. However RCCL Australia generously calculate this at $18.22/day. Nearly $5/day/pp extra. :eek:

I'm more than happy to pre pay my grats but come on looks like I'll be adding them to my account when I get on.

[mr walker]

Not sure where you are getting the US$9.75 from. Since we started in 2011, it was never that low.

 

Currently it is I think something like US$12.50. I see for our upcoming EX cruise, booked in Aug, the T&G's are A$16.54, so an exchange rate of around 75c. I recently did a mock booking for the same cruise and the T&G's were a bit higher in $A terms, as the Fx rate has worsened in that time.

 

It may or may not cost you a bit more onboard, depending on the Fx rate at the time.

[gogo65]

Fair enough, this is from the RCCL site this morning but understand if it's not up to date!

[gogo65]

[mr walker]

Well, that's weird. When I look I see US$12. That would come out to A$16.54 at an Fx of 0.7255, which was reasonable back in Aug.

 

The A$18.22 is consistent with what I saw on my recent mock booking, as it was about A$20 more for the total for the 13N & I put that down to RC adjusting for Fx change in the interim.

 

I don't know the answer - perhaps call RC.

[goodycruising]

The website is playing up a lot. The charges, as has been said by Mr Walker, have not been that cheap per day on the 12 cruises we have done with RCI/Celebrity in the last five years for us. The gratuities have been 18% on drinks for a while also, not 15%.

 

I think they are, as was said to me by a rep from RCI yesterday, "doing a 24 hour maintenance". Yep, been doing that for days this time, and for years the website plays up continually.

 

You can take that price as correct, it is up to you, but I personally like to lock in the gratuitues on booking, and with the AUD rate falling, it has saved us a bit the last year or two.

 

Also then I have the full price of the cruise set, and I don't have to spend a cent on board if I don't want to. (Never works out like that!)

[Brisbane41]

Whats the difference?

 

You are still going to be stung by a conversion fee. If the slightest difference in what you pay is going to break the bank then perhaps you should reconsider travel altogether if you cant afford it!

 

Look regardless of what is fair or not fair and how these companies charge for things, you are going to be stung with these charges either way. The cruise line has no interest in doing things in favour of the passenger. All they want is your money.

 

The only thing you can do is choose between the options and leave it as that. Price differences are the risk you take when dealing with these money hungry companies.

[gogo65]

I'm sorry Brisbane41 but when I originally posted this the savings was $80. ($5pp/day) Therefore if it meant that if I paid on board and saved the money it would be worth it to me.

I acknowledge now the RCCL website was incorrect therefore the $ amount is neglible.

[MicCanberra]

I am glad you have sorted it out but I can imagine your confusion as the website displayed the wrong info. These issues with the websites continue to plague us and provide misinformation, hopefully they can fix this issues from become a regular occurrence.:D

[OzKiwiJJ]

Here's what someone posted on the RCI forum recently:

 

"Effective June 1, 2015 The automatic gratuity is $12.95 USD, or $15.95 USD for suite guests, applied to each guest's SeaPass® account on a daily basis."

[GUT2407]

Here's what someone posted on the RCI forum recently:

 

"Effective June 1, 2015 The automatic gratuity is $12.95 USD, or $15.95 USD for suite guests, applied to each guest's SeaPass® account on a daily basis."

 

That's what my friend said she paid recently.

[gogo65]

Here's what someone posted on the RCI forum recently:

 

"Effective June 1, 2015 The automatic gratuity is $12.95 USD, or $15.95 USD for suite guests, applied to each guest's SeaPass® account on a daily basis."

 

Thanks!

[Brisbane41]

The sooner it is included in the fare the better for everyone.

 

Price increases in gratuities are normally capital raising exercises by the cruise line. They announce an increase in gratuities at a specified date in the future and come up with a PR campaign to get people to prepay them on the cruise pesonaliser. What then happens is that the cruise line earns interest on all this cash in their accounts and they don't have to use the cash until the cruise it relates to.

 

You can bet that any scheme a cruise line comes up with benefits them and not the passengers.

[MicCanberra]

The sooner it is included in the fare the better for everyone.

 

Price increases in gratuities are normally capital raising exercises by the cruise line. They announce an increase in gratuities at a specified date in the future and come up with a PR campaign to get people to prepay them on the cruise pesonaliser. What then happens is that the cruise line earns interest on all this cash in their accounts and they don't have to use the cash until the cruise it relates to.

 

You can bet that any scheme a cruise line comes up with benefits them and not the passengers.

 

Yep, They have repeatedly taken advantage of me with their drink packages.:p

[OzKiwiJJ]

The sooner it is included in the fare the better for everyone.

 

Price increases in gratuities are normally capital raising exercises by the cruise line. They announce an increase in gratuities at a specified date in the future and come up with a PR campaign to get people to prepay them on the cruise pesonaliser. What then happens is that the cruise line earns interest on all this cash in their accounts and they don't have to use the cash until the cruise it relates to.

 

You can bet that any scheme a cruise line comes up with benefits them and not the passengers.

 

We checked the box to prepay our grats for our upcoming Celebrity Cruise way back when we booked (April, I think). That was before the grats went up, and the AUD was a bit higher, so we actually saved heaps. We didn't actually pay the money until final payment date. I doubt Celebrity earned enough in interest to cover the difference. :D

[MicCanberra]

We had paid off all the cruises we had booked that have USD so that the falling dollar wouldn't hurt as much, also bought OBC at the great rates before they dropped.:D