Why do taxes vary so widely?

[mrc1961]

Taxes/fees on my 7 night AOS cruise out of San Juan are only 97$ for two people. The taxes on my 6 night Radiance cruise are a whopping $235 for two. Does anyone know how these are determined? It isn't based on cruise cost, because the AOS cruise is more expensive. Port of Embarcation maybe?

 

Thanks

[wrp96]

Ports you visit.

[torpeedo]

Definitely. The Panama canal trip we took has the highest taxes.

[seamama1]

Each port the ship visits charges the cruiseline for services and parking. Fees are set by the country visited. As you can imagine, these vary widely. The fees are then split up among the passengers to help defray cost. Just part of cruising.

 

I understand that the Panama and Suez Canals have the highest fees - which makes sense.

[shipshape sam]

I have seen the taxes/fees vary between TA's. I will now do some more checking to make sure there is not some padding involved. Thanks.:)

[Hflors]

I will tell you my Panama canal was the cheapest cruise I ever booked. Per person cost $724 including all taxes and port charges for a twelve night cruise in an outside cabin. (the price was originally $799, but I had a certificate from C&A which brought the price down further) Last minute and the cruise was in Janurary. Wish I could find another like it. Oh yea I booked right through the cruise line RCCL. Go figure!

 

Right now I'm looking to book a cruise for Jan and the prices are rather high, I've been checking prices and at this point the cruise line is beating the on- line discount agencies by at least $100 and sometimes more.

The cruise I'm looking at the taxes are $120.00 per person! I work for a non-profit do you thing the cruise line would give me a tax exempt statis because of it? (Ha, Ha That was a joke)

[mrc1961]

Hi,

I'm the OP and appreciate all the responses. Yes, I do see some difference based on the ports visited.

 

I also just realized something else (I guess I was having a bit of a DUH moment.) My cruise that shows $235 taxes also includes

RCL airfare. The air taxes are just lumped together in the tax line on RCI's website rather than showing up in the airfare totals.

 

I feel a little silly, but that at least explains why the discrepancy was so big!

 

Thanks