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On Board Credit - booking excursions in advance


JPH814
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I recall in prior Seabourn cruises, I was able to book excursions in advance and pay with my credit card. Then once on board I would rebook the excursion, crediting my credit card and using my on board credit to pay for the excursion, Is this still possible on Seabourn?

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This an excerpt from an email I received today from SB Reservations answering the very same question: "for guests that do have shipboard credit and want to pre-purchase shore excursions you may have the amount credited to your onboard account and any onboard credit will be used for the shore excursions. If at the end of the cruise there is any money remaining from the pre-purchased shore excursions it will be refunded back to the credit card used to purchase them."

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This an excerpt from an email I received today from SB Reservations answering the very same question: "for guests that do have shipboard credit and want to pre-purchase shore excursions you may have the amount credited to your onboard account and any onboard credit will be used for the shore excursions. If at the end of the cruise there is any money remaining from the pre-purchased shore excursions it will be refunded back to the credit card used to purchase them."

 

 

 

Perfect. Thanks!.

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

This is a bit confusing to me. I just talked to Seabourn Excursions and she told me that there is no way that you can use shipboard credits in advance to buy excursions online. You can use SBC once on board, of course, but then there is the chance that what you want would already be sold out. I asked about purchasing ahead of time, then cancelling once on board to get my original money back, then using the SBC to repurchase. She said you can do that but there would be a 10% cancellation fee for doing that.

 

I even said that I had read on Cruise Critic that is was possible to purchase in advance with SBC and she swore to me that it was just not possible.

 

So, were you actually able to do this? And how exactly did you get the SBC credited to your account in advance? I read the words on the excerpt of the email that you cited, but it just didn't seem to go far enough to say how exactly it worked.

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Oh, now I am rereading the excerpt (and I still say that the wording could be better) and see that it is talking about the scenario I mentioned where you book in advance, then cancel and rebook. But your excerpt doesn't mention the 10% cancellation fee. Did they say anything about that?

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In october of 2016 I bought excursions using credit card in advance. I then boarded, went to Seabourne Square and had them “repurchased” with my OBC. No 10% fee. Exactly as describes in the email.

 

 

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I called Seabourn this past week and asked about buying shore excursions in advance and then using our shipboard credits once on the ship. I was told that we didn't need to cancel once on the cruise just to go to the Square and let them know that I wanted my OBC to be used. The agent I spoke with said that would be done and the original charge would be credited to my credit card. She didn't indicate there would be any cancellation charge which made sense because the tours weren't be cancelled.

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Well, that sounds great - thanks! Appreciate the follow-up. Too bad they don't have a consistent message. I like it much better when I do excursions on Silversea and Crystal and are not charged until on board. (Regent charges if you select excursions before the cruise, but allows you to cancel and rebook and get the charges credited (although they give you cash - which is kind of weird) and then charge the "new" booking to to SBC.) Clearly, each line can do what they choose - and they do!

 

Anyway, I am going to book the ones that we "must" have in advance and then if I have to pay a 10% cancellation charge on them (since the information above is almost 18 months after when I will be doing this, so maybe they have changed their policy) then it is a small price to pay to get what we don't want to miss.

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I called Seabourn this past week and asked about buying shore excursions in advance and then using our shipboard credits once on the ship. I was told that we didn't need to cancel once on the cruise just to go to the Square and let them know that I wanted my OBC to be used. The agent I spoke with said that would be done and the original charge would be credited to my credit card. She didn't indicate there would be any cancellation charge which made sense because the tours weren't be cancelled.

 

What happens is that that Seabourn Square will make your non refundable OBCs into refundable OBCs, thereby obviating then the need to do a switcheroo. This worked fine on every Seabourn cruise I’ve the taken.

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Sunviking is right (Hi, Ann!) we did the same. Booked excursions in advance, paid by credit card and once onboard, asked them to take the charges from our OBC. They did this, but it took months and several phone calls to Seabourn to get the initial credit card charges re-imbursed.

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Thanks again for all the input/reassurances. We have done one SB cruise before (last February) but didn't really have any SBC to worry about. This time around we have a LOT of SBC and so I want to make sure I spend it on the excursions (that I would have paid for anyway). I know I can spend it on the spa, wine, etc. but we don't usually spend much in those departments and I definitely don't care about spending it in the shops!

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  • 9 months later...

Hi don't know if anyone else is still following this. I am having same trouble getting my money refunded to my credit card. I called Seabourn before doing it and they assured me I could prepay with credit card, just go to Seabourn Square once onboard and they would transfer the shipboard credit and there would be no issue. This was when they were offering $1000 shipboard credit for booking penthouse suites on the New England sailing. What can I do to get this money back???  Thank you.  I was told to email customer relations but it has been a few days with no response.

 

 

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Little bit different but when a port was cancelled, earthquake, on our up coming cruise I clicked "the cancel tour" on the site and my credit card was reimbursed the next day

Last cruise we also had a port canceled weather related and once again that tour was reimbursed the next day while on the ship without me having to do anything

Have found Seabourn has been very good for things like this in the past

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Thank you Cat.  I made sure this was covered before I did it. Customer service at Seabourn assured me that I could prepay for the excursions then go to the Square and tell them to apply my $1000 shipboard credit.  I was told that it had been done, but during the cruise I kept seeing there was nonrefundable shipboard credit so again I went and again I was assured that it would all be cleared at the end.   Also on the last day I again went to the Square and was assured that the credit card would be refunded.   Yet the cruise ended on November 4th and when I call now they act like they had no idea and I had to email guest relations.  I will give it a few days but am very upset about this. Obviously I would not have let a $1000 shipboard credit go to waste. I would at least have bought something in the gift shop! LOL

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Thanks for this info.  I was searching threads for this topic myself.  I have just booked excursions on a Seabourn cruise next year and have over $1,000 in OBC and was told the same thing, that it would be credited back to my credit card once on board.  I would be very interested to hear your outcome kkmaiusa.  Please post updates.

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  • 1 year later...

I spoke to Seabourn yesterday about this and the procedure has not changed. If you pre book you have to pay and then when on board if you go to the square they will reimburse your card and debit your account therefore using the on board credit. Most of the time there is no need to pre book tours , unless they  are very popular and have a restricted number you can usually book easily if you  book early on the cruise .

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Mostly correct and I did this exact same thing a year ago.  Went to the Square and the price of the excursion was converted from my credit card payment into refundable OBC which I could use for other on board purchases or get refunded in cash at the end of the cruise..  Much prefer refund in cash so I can keep the points earned on my credit card and be even upen disembarkation.  Always better to get refund in cash and not put on credit card.

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This issue has been big for us with our forthcoming Caribbean cruise in Feb 2020.

 

Due to the suite we have booked, and the promotion at the time of booking, we will have $2,000 of OBC available.

I have it in writing from the Seabourn UK office that the procedure outlined here is correct ie pay for the excursions on a credit card then get this charge refunded when you convert the payment to OBC when onboard.  I am however alarmed by the comments on here about problem with the refund being processed. My TA with be the one to forcefully fight our corner if this happens to us.

 

As important is the issue this policy causes us non US guests. There is a difference between the 'buy' £v$ exchange rate, and the refund rate. The impact of this, not to mention any negative exchange rate movements, is that we expect to receive a £ refund that is less than we paid - probably something like £100 less. Hardly a fair policy.

 

Of course we keep our fingers crossed that the £ continues to strengthen as a result of some certainty being brought to Brexit. Who knows, by next February I may even make a (tiny) profit on the deal !    

 

 

 

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We're on Sojourn now, and nothing has changed from past policy: I went to Seabourn Square to ask about changing my pre-booked/pre-paid excursions to use up my OBC, and they said it would be done. Overnight, I got an account statement at my room showing the conversion of the OBC to pay for the pre-booked cruises (essentially turning the OBC from a non-refundable to  refundable credit). Couldn't have been done more smoothly. (Well, unless they let you pre-book excursions with your OBC!)

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12 hours ago, cruiseej said:

We're on Sojourn now, and nothing has changed from past policy: I went to Seabourn Square to ask about changing my pre-booked/pre-paid excursions to use up my OBC, and they said it would be done. Overnight, I got an account statement at my room showing the conversion of the OBC to pay for the pre-booked cruises (essentially turning the OBC from a non-refundable to  refundable credit). Couldn't have been done more smoothly. (Well, unless they let you pre-book excursions with your OBC!)

 

We found exactly the same.  I'm sure, with exchange rate from £ to $ and then on board back from $ to £, we lose out somewhere along the line, but I barely had to explain it to Guest Services and they did it.  

 

Whatever is left is then credited to your card post-cruise.  It happened within a day or two with us... all $2.60 !!  

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