Bringing Drinks Onboard

[jandst]

Are you allowed to bring anything onboard?   Wine? Water? Anything?   If so how much is allowed?    

Edited October 4, 2019 by jandst

[lisa928]

Best to read the FAQs

 

https://www.ncl.com/faq#!#can-i-bring-water-or-soda-board

https://www.ncl.com/faq#!#can-i-bring-alcohol-board

 

[tallnthensome]

As you can see, not much and with a wine corkage fee .

[jandst]

Cork fee (even if you drink it in your room) is ridiculous!  

[ColeThornton]

12 minutes ago, jandst said:

Cork fee (even if you drink it in your room) is ridiculous!  

 

Would you take a bottle of wine to a land restaurant and expect not to be charged a corkage fee?

[lucksak]

3 minutes ago, ColeThornton said:

 

Would you take a bottle of wine to a land restaurant and expect not to be charged a corkage fee?

 

Taking a bottle to your room is not the same as paying a corkage fee at a land restaurant.

 

[ColeThornton]

19 minutes ago, lucksak said:

 

Taking a bottle to your room is not the same as paying a corkage fee at a land restaurant.

 

Sure it is.  You are taking wine to a place that makes money from selling alcohol.  You bring your own, you pay corkage.

[PoofCat99]

Corkage is a misnomer. It covers providing you glasses to drink from, washing, & potential breakage whether you drink it in your room or not.

[BirdTravels]

2 hours ago, jandst said:

Cork fee (even if you drink it in your room) is ridiculous!  

Why?  Makes sense to me. 

[jandst]

$15.00 when no one helps or serves you?  

[DinaS]

17 minutes ago, jandst said:

$15.00 when no one helps or serves you?  

 

It doesn't matter if anyone "serves" you.  You are still bringing wine to a place that makes their money by SELLING wine.

 

If you want wine to drink in your cabin, paying the corkage fee allows you to bring the wine YOU enjoy and at a substantially lower price (if they even have it at all).

[mjkacmom]

11 hours ago, jandst said:

Cork fee (even if you drink it in your room) is ridiculous!  

It is a service charge, who would buy wine onboard if you could bring all you want for free? 

[lucksak]

17 minutes ago, mjkacmom said:

It is a service charge, who would buy wine onboard if you could bring all you want for free? 

 

We are talking about 1 bottle of wine each. No one expects all you want to bring. Corkage is for opening the bottle and the use of glasses.

 

[DinaS]

13 minutes ago, lucksak said:

 

We are talking about 1 bottle of wine each. No one expects all you want to bring. Corkage is for opening the bottle and the use of glasses.

 

 

If people were allowed to bring wine on board with no fee, I bet you would see people boarding with a lot more than just one bottle each.

 

Would you prefer they didn't allow people to bring any wine at all?   It's easy enough to do that.  

 

If we didn't have the drink package, we would bring a couple of bottles of wine for our room and pay the corkage fee just to have the wine we like.

[ColeThornton]

20 minutes ago, lucksak said:

 

We are talking about 1 bottle of wine each. No one expects all you want to bring. Corkage is for opening the bottle and the use of glasses.

 

 

Again, no.  A corkage fee is for bringing bottles of wine to a venue.  A venue being a restaurant on land and on an NCL vessel the corkage fee applies in.....(from the FAQ's):

 

Wine & Champagne Policy

Guests may bring bottles of wine and champagne on board. When bottles are brought on board and served or consumed in any restaurant, public room area or in their stateroom, a corkage fee will be charged according to bottle sizes noted below.
750 ml Bottle: $15.00 USD
1,500 ml Magnum: $30.00 USD

Wine or champagne sent directly to the ship by travel agents, friends, family, etc. or from another retail source, are subject to the same fees. Box wines are not allowed on board.

Edited October 4, 2019 by ColeThornton

[tomk3212]

@jandstWhy not just bring an extra suitcase with you and pack an entire bar inside?  This way you save $$ by not buying your drinks at the bars on board.  You can also offer drinks to other pax in adjacent cabins on your deck, maybe even charge them!  That'll help defray the cost of YOUR cruise!  😂

 

All kidding aside, as other posters have stated,  you're sailing on a ship whose primary source of revenue is selling alcoholic and other beverages to its passengers.  Every bottle of wine brought on board is one less bottle they'll be able to sell.  If you have an issue with that then maybe cruising isn't for you...

 

@lucksak "1 bottle of wine each"...?  What if someone wants to bring TWO bottles?  Each. With 3 or more adults in the cabin?  Now you're up to SIX bottles...see where this is going?  "Give an inch, they'll take a mile...", as the old saying goes.  If cruise lines allow ONE bottle someone will try & sneak TWO bottles...or more.  It's a slippery slope you're entering onto!

[Love.NCL]

Any recent experience on getting the corkage fee refund at the end for unopened bottles?  We usually only bring couple so never had to deal with a possible refund. We're bringing at least 7 on our next cruise.  

Thank you,

[dolita22]

4 minutes ago, Love.NCL said:

Any recent experience on getting the corkage fee refund at the end for unopened bottles?  We usually only bring couple so never had to deal with a possible refund. We're bringing at least 7 on our next cruise.  

Thank you,

 

From a few years ago, I think we were on the Escape with the drink package but brought along a couple bottles of our favorite sparkling wine and didn't drink one. On the last night, we just took the unopened bottle to Guest Services and said we'd paid the corkage (they saw the sticker that NCL attaches), and there was a $15 credit to our onboard account the morning we disembarked.

[Love.NCL]

1 minute ago, dolita22 said:

 

From a few years ago, I think we were on the Escape with the drink package but brought along a couple bottles of our favorite sparkling wine and didn't drink one. On the last night, we just took the unopened bottle to Guest Services and said we'd paid the corkage (they saw the sticker that NCL attaches), and there was a $15 credit to our onboard account the morning we disembarked.

Thank you very much!

[doverboy]

Look up the "Gifts" section on NCL with your reservation and find the wine list.  A bottle is marked up a bit but you can order and it will be waiting in your cabin. Be careful of trying to get a corkscrew through TSA.  I traveled with one so often I forgot it was in my toiletries bag.  New Orleans TSA confiscated my $3.00 corkscrew and broke up the set because of the 1/2 inch blade and the screw itself.

I have purchased wine and liquor in this manner and always felt that I was ahead on the deal

[sanger727]

3 hours ago, DinaS said:

 

If people were allowed to bring wine on board with no fee, I bet you would see people boarding with a lot more than just one bottle each.

 

Would you prefer they didn't allow people to bring any wine at all?   It's easy enough to do that.  

 

If we didn't have the drink package, we would bring a couple of bottles of wine for our room and pay the corkage fee just to have the wine we like.

 

Many cruise lines, Carnival and Celebrity specifically (that I've done this on), do allow each adult passenger to bring on one bottle of wine per person free, up to two per cabin. If you bring one more than one then the extra wine is confiscated the way liquor would be and held until the end of the cruise. They don't allow you to bring one more than one for an extra fee. I do think that if you bring that bottle to the main dining room your server will charge a corkage fee but will serve the wine to you and store it if you don't finish it. You can however, drink the bottles in your room for free and your room steward will supply a wine opener and wine glasses upon request.

[Named-Tawny]

29 minutes ago, sanger727 said:

 

Many cruise lines, Carnival and Celebrity specifically (that I've done this on), do allow each adult passenger to bring on one bottle of wine per person free, up to two per cabin. If you bring one more than one then the extra wine is confiscated the way liquor would be and held until the end of the cruise. They don't allow you to bring one more than one for an extra fee.

See, personally, I vastly prefer NCL's policy to these policies - why should I be limited to how many of my own bottles I want to bring with me?

I suppose different strokes for different folks, but it's not like one way is objectively better than the other.

[Vyhanek]

15 hours ago, ColeThornton said:

Sure it is.  You are taking wine to a place that makes money from selling alcohol.  You bring your own, you pay corkage.

She's not talking about bringing drinks to the restaurants onboard!   what about that don't you understand.   She's talking about bringing drinks to her cabin.   When she checks in, having drinks in her room.   What don't you get about that?

 

Just like in a hotel, where drinks to your own hotel room are not confiscated.    

Hotels don't regulate food or drink you bring to your room.    How can cruise ships.   That's her point......which is clear.

 

  

[DinaS]

5 minutes ago, Vyhanek said:

She's not talking about bringing drinks to the restaurants onboard!   what about that don't you understand.   She's talking about bringing drinks to her cabin.   When she checks in, having drinks in her room.   What don't you get about that?

 

Just like in a hotel, where drinks to your own hotel room are not confiscated.    

Hotels don't regulate food or drink you bring to your room.    How can cruise ships.   That's her point......which is clear.

 

  

 

You are missing a huge point here.   A hotel room is not the same as a cabin on a cruise ship.   That's the only thing that's clear.

 

On the ship, if you want to drink, you have to buy it from the SHIP.   You can't go to your local liquor store and pick up a few things.  

 

In a hotel, if you want to drink, you can go out and buy it ANYWHERE.  Once you leave your hotel room, you are free to do as you wish.  

 

On a ship, once you leave your cabin, you are certainly NOT free to do as you wish... unless you'd like to jump.  Even then, you would likely be rescued and forced to rejoin the ship.

[mjkacmom]

49 minutes ago, Vyhanek said:

She's not talking about bringing drinks to the restaurants onboard!   what about that don't you understand.   She's talking about bringing drinks to her cabin.   When she checks in, having drinks in her room.   What don't you get about that?

 

Just like in a hotel, where drinks to your own hotel room are not confiscated.    

Hotels don't regulate food or drink you bring to your room.    How can cruise ships.   That's her point......which is clear.

 

  

Hotels make their profits from the cost of the room, cruise ships make their profits for items such as alcohol sales and casino profits, they are different business models. Since they make most from alcohol sales, it would be like going into a bar, which also makes most profit on alcohol, with your own alcohol.