Potential refund delay reason

[steveru621]

On 5/9/2020 at 8:37 AM, Ourusualbeach said:

I’m not sure if this could be a reason for a delay in some people’s refunds of port fees and taxes or not.

 

Royal processes everything back to the original card used for payment.  Many of us, myself included booked these cruises 2 or more years ago...if they had been moved a few times it could easily be 5 years.  If they automatically try to refund to the card on file then chances are the CC expiry date would be wrong.  I’m not sure if a refund needs to have a valid expiry date or not.  If it did that would then force Roysl into doing a manual search for the same credit card number but with an updated expiry date 

 

Just a theory.  I haven’t received mine back for March 15 but others on the sailing started getting theirs a week ago.  Mine was probably booked 4-5 years ago originally. 

 

Adding to my original post.  Most CC companies notify a recurring payment biller (not RCI) of an expiration date change.  RCI may be able to search through their newer reservations to find a change.  Most processors won't care what the date is, but there is no database other than their own they could search.

 

I order to do debits the merchant needs card number, expiration, and CVC (that 3 digit number on the back or 4 digit on the front) and your address (AVS).  Merchants pay a larger interchange for card not present without this data.

 

It would be unusual for a processor to reject a credit with a valid card number.  The reason is efficiency. Your card is still valid up until the last day of the expiration month.  So if I bought something on the 31st and returned it on the 1st.  That creates a problem with the billions of transactions processed during that crossover period.

 

Not all banks are the same.  To illustrate; the daily credit line hold placed on your CC during a cruise, is sometimes a day, 3 days, 7 days, or even as long as 90 days.  The reason for the wide range is how conservative a bank is for holds.  The reason is once that transaction is approved, RCI is guaranteed payment.

 

 

[steveru621]

17 minutes ago, Ourusualbeach said:

Thanks. Guess that shoots down ths theory.

 

Any delays that you know of processing refunds to foreign countries.I.e Canada. 

 

Shouldn't be.  It more efficient, doesn't matter which country.

[Ken at the beach]

18 hours ago, steveru621 said:

 

Shouldn't be.  It more efficient, doesn't matter which country.

Update.

 

Port fees and taxes as well as one cruise planner purchase showed up on my credit card today.

 

They were posted May 3 however they never showed until this morning (I check daily). Looks like the bank held the funds for 8 days until they posted them to my account.  They didn’t even appear in the pending as my purchases do. 
 

They showed up exactly as expected.  2 cabins so 2 refunds for port fees and taxes and 1 refund for the cruise planner purchase. 

[steveru621]

14 minutes ago, Ourusualbeach said:

Update.

 

Port fees and taxes as well as one cruise planner purchase showed up on my credit card today.

 

They were posted May 3 however they never showed until this morning (I check daily). Looks like the bank held the funds for 8 days until they posted them to my account.  They didn’t even appear in the pending as my purchases do. 
 

They showed up exactly as expected.  2 cabins so 2 refunds for port fees and taxes and 1 refund for the cruise planner purchase. 

 

I'll have to check into that date inconsistency.  The same thing happened to me.

 

I believe it has more to do with interest charges than any bank holding your funds.  Seems to follow what others have said about RCI issuing/sending the credits once per week.

 

For example, RCI issues a credit with a date of May 3rd, but doesn't actually send it until May 10th.  When your bank posts the credit it would use the issue date of May 3rd even though it's not actually posted until May 11th.  The reason would be that you would be charged less interest with the earlier date.  Also not all banks post 7 days-a-week which could delay posting by a couple of days and you could be charged more interest.

 

I can tell you with absolute certainty that my bank never held credit funds!  I can see no benefit to hold funds and then post them with the correct date.  If an issue generates a phone call to a bank call center, that is way more expensive than any interest they would earn.

 

 

[Ken at the beach]

6 minutes ago, steveru621 said:

 

I'll have to check into that date inconsistency.  The same thing happened to me.

 

I believe it has more to do with interest charges than any bank holding your funds.  Seems to follow what others have said about RCI issuing/sending the credits once per week.

 

For example, RCI issues a credit with a date of May 3rd, but doesn't actually send it until May 10th.  When your bank posts the credit it would use the issue date of May 3rd even though it's not actually posted until May 11th.  The reason would be that you would be charged less interest with the earlier date.  Also not all banks post 7 days-a-week which could delay posting by a couple of days and you could be charged more interest.

 

I can tell you with absolute certainty that my bank never held credit funds!  I can see no benefit to hold funds and then post them with the correct date.  If an issue generates a phone call to a bank call center, that is way more expensive than any interest they would earn.

 

 

Thanks Steve.  I'm just glad they have been refunded

[kands6191]

Royal cancelled my cruise on March 13.  I took the FCC but am still waiting on the port/taxes and Cruise Planner items.  On Monday, May 4, I received an email saying that my Cruise Planner items were cancelled and would be refunded to the original method of payment.  No indication of when that would actually happen. 

 

We paid with 3 separate credit card accounts at three different banks.  One account at Citibank had replaced the card over the past year so there were charges under two different card numbers.  I contacted Citibank to ask what would happen if they send the refund to the old card number and they said it would automatically go to the new card number.  Two of the banks have shown pending refunds on my account so I am expecting to see RC's refund show up as pending before it actually posts.  So far nothing from them.  

 

I guess the email was their way of saying "The check's in the mail!"  

[jp2746]

Our deposit was sent back to a canceled credit card.  I received a note from Chase stating that they will be sending me a check for the balance within 4 weeks.  But... they have not credited me for our drink, internet or picture package.