Another internet question for recent cruisers please

[Moriah]

For my upcoming 14 day cruise on Amsterdam, the price to pre-purchase internet for the entire cruise is $179.  However, that is for "premium", and I know I don't need that, and "surf" will be less.  I'm assuming $149 reported by others. 

So my question(s): Assuming I will use "free" internet or my own data plan when we are in American ports, and will only need to use the ship's on sea days, would it be cheaper to just purchase single day access to the ship's internet? Is this possible? How much is a 24 hour period? 

Thanks in advance for any answers.  I love the idea of "unlimited", but if I only need it for sea days, and it's possible to do it that way, perhaps I'll save a little money.

[CruiserBruce]

We just got off Amsterdam yesterday after a 14 days Alaska. I will be writing a review soon.

 

We have no idea what your internet needs are, so hard to advise you. The plan for 14 days is about $160. If you look around the board, there are several threads with the pricing charts...I think daily is about $17 per day.

 

Yes, you will be in ports frequently with US cell coverage, but, for example, I get a newspaper everyday on my tablet, so we liked the daily access from the "Surf" package (the mid range package), and were very happy with that. We also used our phones in each port.

[Moriah]

2 minutes ago, CruiserBruce said:

 

We have no idea what your internet needs are, so hard to advise you. The plan for 14 days is about $160. If you look around the board, there are several threads with the pricing charts...I think daily is about $17 per day.

 

 

Thank you! I have seen those charts but didn't think I saw a daily rate.  $17 per day if I only get it on sea days will save me quite a bit over the unlimited.

[Moriah]

Does the daily rate start when you buy it or is it always from midnight to midnight?

[CruiserBruce]

49 minutes ago, Moriah said:

Does the daily rate start when you buy it or is it always from midnight to midnight?

Don't know the answer to that question.

[catl331]

1 hour ago, Moriah said:

 

deleted

Edited June 18, 2019 by catl331

[Alberta Quilter]

Going by memory but I think the daily rate (for a single day) is $24.99. Can't answer the question about if it's a 24 hour period or midnight to midnight since I usually purchase the Surf package.

[catl331]

12 minutes ago, Alberta Quilter said:

I think the daily rate (for a single day) is $24.99.

Correct for Surf:

[VMax1700]

Also remember that once you leave port you will lose connectivity to land based cell towers until you are in port again.

[swin26]

Do you know if you need the premium plan to make Skype for Business calls, or will the surf level work?

[CruiserBruce]

45 minutes ago, swin26 said:

Do you know if you need the premium plan to make Skype for Business calls, or will the surf level work?

I seriously doubt it will work on the Surf level. I think the info you get on board says only the premium will work for Skype.

[cowmilker]

I have used a social media plan on NCL but never on HAL.  On NCL, I was able (to my astonishment) to get Whatsapp to work in my cabin during a transatlantic using that plan. I actually didn't do it. A friend called me on it during that trip and when my phone rang, I almost had a heart attack.  🙂 

Has anyone used Whatsapp with the social media plan on HAL?

[Moriah]

2 hours ago, catl331 said:

Correct for Surf:

 

 

Yes, I've seen this chart before, but I assumed the calculations were how much you are paying per day if you buy a plan.  My question is what do they charge if you only buy an isolated day (I'm assuming it's more?) and if they even offer that (I assume they would have to?)

[catl331]

7 minutes ago, Moriah said:

 

 

Yes, I've seen this chart before, but I assumed the calculations were how much you are paying per day if you buy a plan.  My question is what do they charge if you only buy an isolated day (I'm assuming it's more?) and if they even offer that (I assume they would have to?)

I'm pretty sure that an "isolated day" is the same price as a "one day cruise" plan: 14.99/24.99/29.99 

But I wouldn't buy just 1 day, since 2 days is just $5 more (for Surf) giving you an average price $15 per day. 

Edited June 18, 2019 by catl331

[kazu]

9 minutes ago, Moriah said:

 

 

Yes, I've seen this chart before, but I assumed the calculations were how much you are paying per day if you buy a plan.  My question is what do they charge if you only buy an isolated day (I'm assuming it's more?) and if they even offer that (I assume they would have to?)

 

On my cruise, the surf plan was $24.99 for an isolated day.  Yes, it is more costly by the day than buying a package.

 

From my cruise this April/May:

 

[Moriah]

6 minutes ago, catl331 said:

I'm pretty sure that an "isolated day" is the same price as a "one day cruise" plan: 14.99/24.99/29.99 

But I wouldn't buy just 1 day, since 2 days is just $5 more (for Surf) giving you an average price $15 per day. 

 

Deleted! Sorry!

Edited June 18, 2019 by Moriah

[Moriah]

1 minute ago, kazu said:

 

On my cruise, the surf plan was $24.99 for an isolated day.  Yes, it is more costly by the day than buying a package.

 

From my cruise this April/May:

 

 

 

THANK YOU!!!!!! kazu, do you remember if the 24 hours is from midnight to midnight, or can it start whenever you buy the plan, making it possible to get part of two days, if you know what I mean?

 

Edited June 18, 2019 by Moriah

[rafinmd]

I can't guarantee this but the wording leads me to believe that 24 hours means a full 24 hour period from sign on to the same time the next day.  I would think they would say "1 day" if it ended at midnight.

 

Also, IIRC, you cannot buy a random number of days.  I'm pretty sure it's only 24 hours or the remaining length of the cruise.

 

Roy

[Moriah]

16 minutes ago, rafinmd said:

I can't guarantee this but the wording leads me to believe that 24 hours means a full 24 hour period from sign on to the same time the next day.  I would think they would say "1 day" if it ended at midnight.

 

Also, IIRC, you cannot buy a random number of days.  I'm pretty sure it's only 24 hours or the remaining length of the cruise.

 

Roy

 

So, do you mean that my plan to just buy single days on sea days would not be allowed?

[catl331]

24 minutes ago, Moriah said:

So, do you mean that my plan to just buy single days on sea days would not be allowed?

I think he's saying that my idea of buying 2 consecutive days for 29.99 would not be allowed, unless it happened to be the last two days of the cruise. You can buy as many single days at 24.99 as you like.

[rafinmd]

20 minutes ago, Moriah said:

 

So, do you mean that my plan to just buy single days on sea days would not be allowed?

No, but Kazu pointed out that a 2-day plan was only $5 more than a single day.  It would be a bargain if you could buy 2 days at a time, but there are limited options when you enroll.  The only time you can buy 2 days is the penultimate day of the cruise but you can buy one day at a time as often as necessary. 

 

Roy

[Moriah]

1 minute ago, catl331 said:

I think he's saying that my idea of buying 2 consecutive days for 29.99 would not be allowed, unless it happened to be the last two days of the cruise. You can buy as many single days at 24.99 as you like.

 

Ah, I see, thank you. Okay, so it's sounding like I can buy just the sea days for $25 each... and if I did it on all the sea days plus Victoria day, I'd be spending $150 anyway... so might as well just buy the unlimited package...  Thanks everyone for your participation in this thread.  Things have certainly improved over the days when I spent almost $500 per cruise on internet (necessary for work, more so in the past than now).  Then I just happened to be on the Westerdam cruise about 4 years ago where they implemented a "test" of the unlimited service and it was AMAZING and freeing not to have to worry about wasting minutes, logging out, etc.! Now that it's the new normal, I guess even though $160 for a 2 week cruise sounds like a lot, it's really SO much better than in the past.. so...

[cruzingnut]

36 minutes ago, Moriah said:

 

 was AMAZING and freeing not to have to worry about wasting minutes, logging out, etc.!

 

Please, please log out when you are done!  I ask that people either do this or be sure that their phone isn't set to automatically update ANYthing.  Not only do I log out but I also put my phone back into "airplane" mode.  I have nothing updating automatically on my phone but if you do or don't know if you do, please be sure to log out so that your phone isn't continuing to use the internet.  This will happen; you won't know it's doing it but if everyone lets this happen, it will bog down the whole system. 

 

Just think of how many apps you have on your phone.  I don't have a lot but if you do and they are all set to automatically update....yikes.  I like to know what's going on in my phone so I always manually update (that's just me though).  But, on the cruise I only update what is necessary and then I try to do it onshore on free wifi.   If everyone on the ship just lets the phone do all that updating, it will eat up data and as I said, bog the system down but will also run through your limit for the day.  Yes, there are limits too....such as about 250 (ish) mb on the middle package (surf).  I'm not sure that they actually cut you off or if you get "throttled" after that amount is used.

 

Linda R.

[SJSULIBRARIAN]

You can buy a plan along the way and the cost is pro-rated to the number of days left of the cruise. So if one is port intensive early , the ship plan will be less at the end.

[WeRockChalkKU]

Hi, saw this thread and thought I would ask a question as all of this is new to me. Is this way of having the different plans on all HAL ships now? Once someone books, will they be offered a chance to purchase a package in advance and at a reduced rate? I assume the posting of the prices chart is if you wait til you are onboard to purchase?  Thanks for any clarification.