Best conversion rate for Australian cruise obc and onboard folio?

[gottagocit]

I’ve searched the board and haven’t found a clear answer so here goes. 

 

We will soon be making final payment for a couple Princess voyages that will utilize Australian $’s for onboard charges. Since we booked the the voyage from the USA the price was shown (and continues to be shown) in USD. That’s a non issue. 

 

While onboard all onboard charges will be in AUD. From everything I’ve read when using our US credit card to settle our onboard account at the end of our voyage Princess will add 1.1% processing fee to the actual total charges to our room. It appears they would actually charge the card in AUD and our car would covert it to USD at a decent conversion rate, correct?

 

Initially we considered pre purchasing OBC before departing the USA to avoid the fee because our credit card provides currency conversion at no charge and a good exchange rate however our Cruise Personalizer doesn’t specify the currency the OBC would be in. It simply indicates it would be in “$”.  I suspect the prepurchased OBC would be charged in USD and Princess will convert it to AUD and their conversion rate will probably lose >1.1%.

 

While the 1.1% isn’t that significant, I’d rather not pay it if possible so I’m writing to see how others have dealt with this situation. 

 

 

 

Edited November 12, 2018 by gottagocit

[partybarbie]

We pre-paid our gratuities in US dollars.  We had booked under the "Sip and Sail", so we did not incur any beverage charges.  We used our on-board credits (past passenger, stock share-holder, military, etc.) to pay for our tours.  I think our final bill was maybe $50.00 USD.  We did not pre-purchase any on-board credit as there was no need to. 

[dstables]

1 hour ago, gottagocit said:

I’ve searched the board and haven’t found a clear answer so here goes. 

 

We will soon be making final payment for a couple Princess voyages that will utilize Australian $’s for onboard charges. Since we booked the the voyage from the USA the price was shown (and continues to be shown) in USD. That’s a non issue. 

 

While onboard all onboard charges will be in AUD. From everything I’ve read when using our US credit card to settle our onboard account at the end of our voyage Princess will add 1.1% processing fee to the actual total charges to our room. It appears they would actually charge the card in AUD and our car would covert it to USD at a decent conversion rate, correct?

 

Initially we considered pre purchasing OBC before departing the USA to avoid the fee because our credit card provides currency conversion at no charge and a good exchange rate however our Cruise Personalizer doesn’t specify the currency the OBC would be in. It simply indicates it would be in “$”.  I suspect the prepurchased OBC would be charged in USD and Princess will convert it to AUD and their conversion rate will probably lose >1.1%.

 

While the 1.1% isn’t that significant, I’d rather not pay it if possible so I’m writing to see how others have dealt with this situation. 

 

 

 

Yes if you prepurchase OBC or casino credits you are purchasing in American funds. With the OBC the ship will convert your OBC that is in American funds to Australian funds at whatever conversion rate the ship is using. This rate will be less than the bank rate and Princess can not tell you ahead of time what the conversion rate is that the ship will be using as it changes daily. If you purchase casino credit again they are in American funds and you take them to the casino cage to cash in and they are converted then into Australian funds with the conversion rate the ship is using. Any OBC’s that you get from a FCD or as a perk is straight 1 to 1. No conversion. 

Edited November 12, 2018 by dstables
Spelling

[gottagocit]

5 hours ago, dstables said:

Yes if you prepurchase OBC or casino credits you are purchasing in American funds. With the OBC the ship will convert your OBC that is in American funds to Australian funds at whatever conversion rate the ship is using. This rate will be less than the bank rate and Princess can not tell you ahead of time what the conversion rate is that the ship will be using as it changes daily. If you purchase casino credit again they are in American funds and you take them to the casino cage to cash in and they are converted then into Australian funds with the conversion rate the ship is using. Any OBC’s that you get from a FCD or as a perk is straight 1 to 1. No conversion. 

 

That is what I suspected. Thanks for helping clarifying it. Looks like it’ll be far simpler and cost effective to just use our cc to pay the tab at the end and pay the fee while getting the better exchange rate through our cc company. 

[joybook]

Please note that the 1.1% charge for credit cards has nothing to do at all with the currency conversion rate. It is purely a fee for using your credit card to make a payment.

[Aus Traveller]

If you use a debit card, rather than a credit card to pay your on-board account, Princess do not charge the 1.1%. If you wish, you can quote the credit card number before the cruise, then go to the Passenger Services desk during the cruise and change the details of the card registered for your account.

 

Another way to avoid the 1.1% fee is to obtain AUD at your bank, or locally n Australia, and use that to pay your on-board account.

Edited November 12, 2018 by Aus Traveller
More information added.