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Onboard pricing on Australia - New Zealand cruises

Loritd

By Loritd,
in Princess Cruises

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Loritd

Loritd

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I know that on Australia and New Zealand cruises the currency onboard is AUD. Pre-purchasing water and soda must not be available on my cruise as the don't show on my cruise personalizer. What is the going rate for a bottle of water and cans of sodas? We have 300AUD onboard refundable credit and our tips are paid. Should I leave that as onboard credit and prepay any shore excursions on a credit card? We have two days post in Sydney. Can I pull out any leftover onboard credit in the casino? If I understand correctly Australia businesses charges the credit card fee to the consumer.  Is that correct? I don't want to have to pay fees I can avoid. I appreciate any help cruise critic members can give me. Lori

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leck57 Holiday Sharing Rare

leck57

Posted
Posted
5 hours ago, Loritd said:

I know that on Australia and New Zealand cruises the currency onboard is AUD. Pre-purchasing water and soda must not be available on my cruise as the don't show on my cruise personalizer. What is the going rate for a bottle of water and cans of sodas? We have 300AUD onboard refundable credit and our tips are paid. Should I leave that as onboard credit and prepay any shore excursions on a credit card? We have two days post in Sydney. Can I pull out any leftover onboard credit in the casino? If I understand correctly Australia businesses charges the credit card fee to the consumer.  Is that correct? I don't want to have to pay fees I can avoid. I appreciate any help cruise critic members can give me. Lori

 

Unless someone answers beforehand, I am on the Ruby ex Sydney tomorrow so i'll let you know what water and sodas (we call em soft drinks!) cost. I don't know why it is but I also couldn't pre purchase the water package yet I've done it every other Princess cruise.

Yes you can pull out your OBC in the casino but you'll need to have played slots or something to make it look like you are just cashing out. I always use my on board credit but if you think you will not, I'd use it to pay shore excursions and then you don't need to worry about the casino.

As for credit card fees most stores do not charge fees. When I pay bills such as car registration, water bills etc, they often attract a fee (usually around the 0.6% to 1.5%) but most shops don't on my Mastercard. However many do on Amex and often up o 2.5%. There are often marketing campaigns here to get people to take up an Amex card coupled with extra frequent flyer point rates etc, however these extra points don't cover the fees. I used to have an Amex but got rid of it years ago and know  very people here that have one these days. Anyway, I digress.

You'll love Sydney, my old home town. The best advice I can give is take a trip across the harbour on the Manly ferry, to Manly. Stroll up to the beach, have lunch and enjoy. The ferry trip over will take you past many landmarks and great photo opportunities. I used to travel to work this way for years. Can't wait to get back down there later today.

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Aus Traveller

Aus Traveller

Posted
Posted
6 hours ago, Loritd said:

I know that on Australia and New Zealand cruises the currency onboard is AUD. Pre-purchasing water and soda must not be available on my cruise as the don't show on my cruise personalizer. What is the going rate for a bottle of water and cans of sodas? We have 300AUD onboard refundable credit and our tips are paid. Should I leave that as onboard credit and prepay any shore excursions on a credit card? We have two days post in Sydney. Can I pull out any leftover onboard credit in the casino? If I understand correctly Australia businesses charges the credit card fee to the consumer.  Is that correct? I don't want to have to pay fees I can avoid. I appreciate any help cruise critic members can give me. Lori

Use your OBC to pay for your excursions. You might prefer bottled water, but we have always used the water from the ship's water supply. It is as pure as bottled water.

 

As Leck said, most businesses in Aust do NOT charge a fee when you use a credit card. The only ones I have come across are in the travel industry (travel agents, airlines and cruise companies).

 

Princess does charge a fee (1.5% or 1.6%) on the balance of your on-board account if it is charged to your credit card, but unless you have an enormous bill, the number of dollars is very small. You might have a higher amount charged by your bank for the currency conversion unless you use a card that allows for free international currency conversions.

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  • 2 weeks later...
MoJoJoNZ

MoJoJoNZ

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Hi there, I am recently off the Ruby. A bottle of water was $3.25 AUD for 500ml bottle, $6.50 for a litre.  Not sure how much the cans were, but the sofa package was just over $200 AUD per person (14 night cruise). You can get this on board the first day and comes with a drink bottle. No water packages that I could see, but you can order via a menu in your stateroom.

 

Agree with Aus Traveller about the credit card fee.

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Loritd

Loritd

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Posted (edited)

Thanks for responding. Pricing for water is almost double what we have paid on cruises in the past but probably won't bankrupt us. My husband will not drink water out of a bathroom sink. 🙄 I usually buy a couple of bottles and refill them on the sly.  What he doesn't know won't hurt him. The cost of cans of diet coke is roughly 30 cents more than we usually pay. Is a 18% automatic gratuity added on or is that already figured in the cost of drinks?

Edited by Loritd
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SinbadThePorter

SinbadThePorter

Posted
Posted (edited)
3 hours ago, patch nine said:

Loritd  - there are no additional gratuities on sailings out of Australia.  They are included in the fare/drinks prices

 

Isn't that only only on cruises from Australian/NZ ports which are purchased in Australia/NZ?

Edited by SinbadThePorter
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Thrak

Thrak

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Posted (edited)
14 minutes ago, SinbadThePorter said:

 

Isn't that only only on cruises from Australian/NZ ports which are purchased in Australia/NZ?

 

Not sure how it works for drinks. For cruises themselves we have to pay gratuities when booking from the US. Since the drinks are an onboard expense they "may" be different. We're booked for a 33 day B2B2B out of Melbourne next fall but booked with gratuities and drinks included. However, the gratuities do show in the personalizer. (Hmmm... Australian cruise. Guess maybe it should be personaliser in that case. 😋)

Edited by Thrak
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Thrak

Thrak

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6 hours ago, lynelz1 said:

If I buy OBC to apply to my cruise account in the US and the cruise is in Australia, will the funds convert to AUS currency?  I bought the $500 gift card so that I could apply it to my cruise account on my Australia cruise.

 

The funds will convert. Since you actually purchased the OBC it "should" convert at the proper rate. (If not I would raise a holy stink until it did.) Other OBC such as Shareholder OBC and FCD OBC becomes AUD and doesn't get the going rate. It transfers dollar for dollar. $100 USD becomes $100 AUD rather than becoming $148 AUD which is the current rate.

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lacy20

lacy20

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Regarding gratuities on the Australian cruises...we have booked in the US and have the option of prepaying $14.50 per person per day for our 19-day cruise. My question is, what is our best plan, prepay in USD or use OBC credit onboard, which I assume is in AUD?  I am so confused because I’ve never been on a cruise anywhere in the world where the currency onboard was in anything other than USD. My OBC of $200 USD from AMEX Platinum is listed as $200 AUD in my account. This is clearly a bad deal. So if all purchases onboard are in AUD, does that mean that the gratuities will be $14.50 AUD or will they convert and charge us in USD if we wait to pay gratuities onboard?

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Motorcyclemomma

Motorcyclemomma

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Just came home from a b/2/b/2/b Australia and New Zealand. The first part was gratuities paid promotion. The last part I thought we would have to pay but never came on our account so I wouldn't pay ahead. We are Canadians. Drinks were more expensive but with the gratuities included it works out. Excursions seemed really expensive so ended up cancelling some and using hop on hop off buses on our own. Loved the once in a life time cruise. 

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asdf1245

asdf1245

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On 11/21/2019 at 8:54 AM, Aus Traveller said:

Use your OBC to pay for your excursions. You might prefer bottled water, but we have always used the water from the ship's water supply. It is as pure as bottled water.

 

As Leck said, most businesses in Aust do NOT charge a fee when you use a credit card. The only ones I have come across are in the travel industry (travel agents, airlines and cruise companies).

 

Princess does charge a fee (1.5% or 1.6%) on the balance of your on-board account if it is charged to your credit card, but unless you have an enormous bill, the number of dollars is very small. You might have a higher amount charged by your bank for the currency conversion unless you use a card that allows for free international currency conversions.

 

Could you post the Ruby Princess drinks list if at all possible, that would be very handy for everyone especially those considering the $87 a day drink package (which seems to be the only drinks package Princess are offering).

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