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Does Princess enforce the 6 month passport rule?

shof515

By shof515,
in Princess Cruises

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shof515 "Live from...." Rare

shof515

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Next month, i am going on the Regal Princess to Canada/New England. It is a round trip cruise to/from NYC. My passport expires in March 2019. Will there any issues using my passport on the cruise?

According to the State Department website, passport needs to be valid at time of entry.

On princess website, i only see this:

Passport validity: Many countries require passports be valid for six months after the completion of your travel. Check your passport to verify it will be valid for this period of time.

I should be good using my passport without a problem. Does princess enforce the 6 month rule/passport validity?

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hpeabody

hpeabody

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It seems your scenario is OK, For the benefit of others, To answer your question in the title ....

Does Princess enforce the 6 month passport rule?

 

It has been my experience that YES, they do!. Princess has built it into their Cruise Personalizer program. If your itinerary includes a country that enforces a 6 month passport validity you WILL NOT be allowed to complete the required "guest information" portion until you have renewed your passport and have a new expiration date. Meaning no ability to print your boarding pass for the cruise unless it is rectified. This happened to me on a multiple country cruise and the "culprit" was French Polynesia. I had no choice but to renew my passport about 8 months prior to expiration.

 

BOTTOM LINE: If the Princess website Cruise Personalizer will not allow you to complete it, there is potentially an issue with the 6 month validity rule. Beware, you will likely NOT be told that is the issue. I learned it was my issue when I called Princess.

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shof515 "Live from...." Rare

shof515

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The six month validity does not apply for travel between Canada and the US as long as you are citizen of Canada or the US. Therefore Princess should be okay, but sometimes they make their own rules!

 

 

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that is what i worry about. Everything i am reading says i should be good since i am us citizen but i dont know how strict princess is.

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gottagocit Holiday Sharing Rare

gottagocit

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You should also consider what the airline requires.

Recently I tried to enter the required preboarding info into my international American Airlines booking to Australia on the airlines website and it rejected it due to my passport exp date being less than 6 months from the flight date.

 

It wasn’t a large deal as our flights are several months away so there’s time to get new ones but we were going to wait until we were a bit closer to traveling before this occurred.

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chrysalis

chrysalis

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You should also consider what the airline requires.

Recently I tried to enter the required preboarding info into my international American Airlines booking to Australia on the airlines website and it rejected it due to my passport exp date being less than 6 months from the flight date.

 

It wasn’t a large deal as our flights are several months away so there’s time to get new ones but we were going to wait until we were a bit closer to traveling before this occurred.

 

As I said earlier.....the cruise ship and airline requirement relates to the county/countries that you are visiting.

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Thrak

Thrak

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We have two cruises booked for late next year where I'm unable to complete the info on the personalizer because my passport won't be valid long enough to satisfy the requirements. It won't have expired but they insist it be valid for a certain length of time after the last day of the cruise. It's on my calendars (phone, laptop, tablet) to renew when it gets closer to the date. I'll leave myself plenty of time to make sure there's no problem.

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famski740

famski740

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My understanding is that they require the six month rule in case something happens and you get stuck (miss the boat; get injured and are hospitalized) in a country. Your passport must be valid for you to return when you are able to.

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geocruiser

geocruiser

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We have four one week cruises booked over the winter. Dec., Jan., Feb., & March. I was worried about our March cruise because our passports expire the end 8/19.We are going to renew on Monday. We can't wait closer to Aug. because we need our passport to cruise. My TA said "GET IT DONE NOW".

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Charles4515

Charles4515

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Why would you want to take a chance. Renew the passport

 

 

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They would not be taking a chance. Their passport is good for the cruise they are taking. They don't even need a passport. A birth certificate and DL would be good for their round trip closed loop cruise.

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thinfool

thinfool

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They would not be taking a chance. Their passport is good for the cruise they are taking. They don't even need a passport. A birth certificate and DL would be good for their round trip closed loop cruise.

This^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

In addition....Canada does not require US citizens to have a passport for entry into Canada....however, in a catch22 situation, Canada requires that US citizens have correct documents to reenter the US after a visit to Canada.

 

I guess they don't want any US citizens stranded within their borders.

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c r u i s e

c r u i s e

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What NEVER ceases to amaze me is this:

 

There are rules and there are rules. People are aware of the rules pertaining to their situation.

Why then are SOME people hellbent on KNOWINGLY IGNORING or attempting to circumvent those rules???

 

Shaking my head!

Edited by c r u i s e
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Aus Traveller

Aus Traveller

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What NEVER ceases to amaze me is this:

 

There are rules and there are rules. People are aware of the rules pertaining to their situation.

Why then are SOME people hellbent on KNOWINGLY IGNORING or attempting to circumvent those rules???

 

Shaking my head!

I don't see anyone knowingly ignoring or attempting to circumvent rules. If a period of six months' before a passport expiration is NOT required when travelling to a particular destination, then there is no need for a person to do so if they have a reason why they prefer not to renew their passport early.

An example - My daughter (Aust passport) booked to travel to New Zealand. NZ requires Aussies to have one month left on the passport, and for re-entry to Aust the passport would be valid until the day of expiration. My daughter had two months remaining on her passport, but her travel agent insisted she had to have six months. This was laziness on the part of the travel agent who was simply using the rule that applies in some other countries. My daughter travelled on her old passport and of course, everything was fine. Because she doesn't plan to travel overseas in the foreseeable future, she didn't want to pay to renew the passport early when it was not required.

The same probably applies to the OP. If six months' validity is not required for their trip, it is reasonable for them not to get a new passport ahead of time.

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