hawkeyetlse

One story on the Breakaway was that the unusual restrictions in Livorno (only wine and beer, no spirits) were motivated by the local government hoping to make staying on board less enjoyable, thereby encouraging people to get off the ship and spend money on land. But this was complete speculation, and not at all believable to me. For one thing, lots of people can enjoy themselves just fine with wine and beer all day long. And above all, why continue to “punish” cruise ship guests long after sailaway, when spending money ashore is no longer an option for them? It makes more sense to me that liquor is simply in a higher tax category, and it costs less to get authorization to serve just wine and beer. And NCL is all about paying less.

I mean, I am prepared to accept that every country has changed its rules since 2017 about how tax should be calculated on drinks served for no charge when cruise ships are in port. But have they actually changed their rules, or is NCL (and no other cruise lines, to my knowledge) collecting this money and pocketing it as additional revenue?

There is zero relevance in the fact that drinks are available on land. So the UK isn't Saudi Arabia, what's your point? There are also grocery stores and restaurants on land, so the ship could shut down the buffet while in port, and that would be no problem, right? You can also get a day room at a hotel with a pool on land, so they can go ahead and drain the pools and hot tubs and lock everyone out of their staterooms for the whole day, yes? There are toilets available right in the terminal building, so… guess what? It wouldn't be the end of the world, and unless it's the end of the world, we have no right to complain, right?

It was more than a passing comment to one passenger. According to ziggyuk, it was the explanation provided at the meet & greet that he organized on the Star. It probably sounded plausible enough in the room, but fell apart as soon as it was posted to the Internet (which the ship's officers should have known would happen pretty much immediately, after all they were talking to a room full of people active on Internet cruising forums…)

I really would not waste time asking low-level customer service agents about this issue. Anyone following this thread now knows more than 99% of the people at NCL. And the other 1% are not talking. It’s already surprising enough that someone at the dinner with officers admitted that NCL “bungled” (then again we only have a second-hand account, we don’t know what words were actually used) but don’t expect them to put that in writing for you in an e-mail. You may have better luck writing to customer relations after your cruise is over. During the cruise, I think the best you can do is try to squeeze value from the package when you can.

The Chef’s Table was discontinued several years ago.

It's not the same situation in Italy (and Greece), because people with beverage packages are being served (but limited to beer and wine specifically in and around Livorno). Consequently, as far as I know, passengers on those ships have not pressed the officers on board for specific explanations. If you don't do that, then you don't force them into making dubious statements in an attempt to appease dissatisfied guests and deflect blame from themselves. The kinds of bogus statements we have been seeing for the UK cruises: the port didn't tell us the rules in time, we can't know what the current rules are until the ship actually arrives in port each day, etc. etc. And then finally: OK OK, maybe NCL messed up and we're working on it. Of course, we know this comes too late for passengers who have already been affected, and for them we will just pre-emptively say: no compensation will be offered.

The Starbucks package is only available to guests 18 and over (but then all guests 18 and over in the same cabin must have it).

Breakaway started stopping in Greek ports more than a week ago. You can see the relevant rule (no alcohol sales in or near Greek ports, but beverage packages do work) at the bottom of the Dailies that Happycrafter123 posted in their live report. For example:

The left side of each coupon says "ANY SPECIALTY RESTAURANT". That includes Cagney's, Onda, and Le Bistro. Did you try to use the coupons at those restaurants and get turned away? It's a shame you didn't manage to claim your dinners!

To claim tax back on items you are exporting from the EU, you have to be able to show them the items, still new and unopened/unused. That is not possible for food and drink that you have already consumed before leaving the EU. And what a strange thing to do! If he wasn't even trying to get his money back, the person he inconvenienced most of all was himself. I hope he at least submitted an actual question/complaint that would make its way to anyone beyond the poor guest services person who had to deal with him.

OK, I also received a response saying the same thing and offering me compensation. Although it took 3 months and a couple of back and forth exchanges for them to understand that I wasn't just complaining about the concept of taxation in general. This was from the Guest Relations Supervisor for the NCL CE (continental Europe) office in February 2017: I'm also sorry to read that you have been charged VAT while in Spanish waters at the beginning of your cruise and while in US waters at the end of the cruise. Honestly we are quite surprised that this happened to your bookings as indeed such VAT should only been charged based on the drinks prices but bookings with complimentary drinks packages like in your two bookings, should have been excluded. This was for a westbound transatlantic on the Jade, from Barcelona to Tampa, in October/November 2016. So the policy at the time was evidently the same for both intra-EU cruises (as reported in the previous post) and for cruises with stops outside of the EU (like mine). And the policy was the same for both Spanish VAT and for Florida sales tax, i.e. that these taxes should not be collected on $0 drink orders.

I started looking for older discussions. So far this is the only report I have dug up, but it includes a very clear statement of NCL's position (at the time, late 2016) about taxes on drinks served as part of a beverage package. I also wrote to NCL at around the same time about another sailing, but so far I can't tell if I ever received a response. But I think it would be worth it for people who have been affected on recent cruises to contact them again to find out how and why their thinking has evolved since 2016…

In the (now distant) past I was able to get the taxes charged on beverage package drinks refunded after the cruise, but it's clear that NCL really, really wants to collect this tax. They may stop for a while but it always seems to come back sooner or later. What the actual legal basis is and whether the money is actually reported and passed along to the relevant port/country, I doubt any of us will ever know for sure. But the fact is that they benefit from charging the tax (because it discourages people from using their packages as much as they otherwise would), so they really have no incentive to stop doing it. If anyone has recent experience with contacting NCL about these taxes, whether in the US or Europe or somewhere else, I'd love to hear about it (preferably in a new thread, since it's a distinct issue).

Who said anything about a boycott? Maybe there are some people posting here because they hate NCL and just want to bash it, but I think most of us really like NCL and have every intention of continuing to cruise with NCL. And that is precisely why this persistent issue is so disappointing, because NCL gets so many things right, why do they keep having problems with this one thing, in country after country, season after season? But again, it is just this one thing. You can be unhappy about one thing that a company does, it doesn't mean you have to hate the company and boycott it. And conversely, loving a company doesn't mean that you bend over backwards to defend them in every situation and shield them from all blame. But if somebody did happen to do that, and posted in this thread more than anyone else, saying the same thing over and over again, I wouldn't tell that person "why do you keep posting?" and mock them with pictures of dead horses. Because that would make me a jerk.

You can't cancel on-line, but it doesn't have to be in writing, either. Call them, they will do it immediately, but it can take a few minutes (or more) for the stateroom to pop up again as available. Or you may never see it because someone else snaps it up first. If you are hoping to rebook the same cabin, tell the agent you talk to and see if they can hang on to it for you somehow.

According to your invoice, Guest 3 is paying £0 cruise fare. It would be pretty amazing if that also came with unlimited drinks, or any additional perks. It doesn't. The line "2 × Service Charge - Premium Beverage Package" in the Add-ons section makes it clear that only guests 1 and 2 have drinks included, in accordance with the terms of Free At Sea in the UK. I think you'll have very little problems sneaking free drinks for your daughter using your cards (especially since they will be Haven cards). But when she's out and about the ship without you, she'll have to pay for anything she orders.

OK, but if your resort was charging you specific fees per day for the gym, spa, etc., then it would not be unreasonable to expect those to be removed/refunded for however many days those facilities were unavailable to you. In the case at hand, people with beverage packages paid (at least service charges) for each day of the cruise, and for let’s say half a day, NCL was unable to provide that service. It seems appropriate to refund that amount.

Thanks for the update, ziggy. I'm glad it was addressed at the M&M, although (at the risk of being confrontational) I would have pushed a bit harder. For example, if they were happy to pay the fee but just didn't have time to do it, then why not distribute some of that money to everyone on board now as compensation for Day 1? Also, you will see for yourself if the problem is resolved when you return to Southampton on disembarkation morning.

It doesn’t make sense to cut costs if it also causes you to lose revenue (depending on the relative numbers, obviously), but in this case, they’re not losing much revenue. Since most drinkers on NCL have a pre-paid, non-refundable beverage package, the ship loses money throughout the cruise every time they order anything. So this situation is a win-win for NCL (as long as they don’t care too much about their guests’ on-board experience): they save money by not giving away any “free” booze, and if anyone complains, they can shift the blame to “local regulations”. NCL charges tax whether you have a package or not. If you have a package, you don’t pay for the drink but they still charge tax based on the menu price of what you ordered.

The main shows on BA in September should still be Six and Burn the Floor in the main theater, with Howl at the Moon, comedians, and Syd Norman's band in the smaller venues. And some other bands, piano/singers, etc. around the ship (but those are never listed on the website).

They used to say explicitly in the Free at Sea terms that they would do it in the "bad" order (–$50 first, then Latitudes percentage discount), but that statement seems to have disappeared. And this post from a year ago suggests that they apply the discounts in the "good" order if you wait to book on board, but I don't know how accurate that is. Personally, I wouldn't count on it, and just feel pleasantly surprised if it happens that way.

Which ship, which dates? If you're on a smaller ship, there usually aren't a lot of entertainment options listed, because the shows on those ships do not require reservations. They don't have the big expensive Broadway productions that NCL likes to promote ahead of time.

I had a closer look at my folio from last week. My Latitudes discount didn’t get applied automatically, so I waited until all my excursions were done, all the $50 credits were applied, and then I went to the shorex desk to request the discount. It turns out that if you do it this way, you might get lucky and they apply the Latitudes discount to the full price of each excursion (while also leaving all the $50 credits in place)… 🤞

Everyone is correct. NCL is applying a full $50 credit, but if you also qualify for a Latitudes discount, you won’t actually save $50 compared to what you would otherwise have paid. But that’s just how it is. NCL isn’t doing anything wrong, they just didn’t choose to do things in the most generous way. Oh well.