On September 17th,we left Southampton for a Scandinavian cruise of 2 weeks. The 2nd port of call was Belfast, cancelled however due to strong winds. These things can happen but…….when a company can not provide a prepaid service or material good, there must be a refund. That happened to us with a well known cruise company and the amount was on our account the next day! NCL refuses to pay back.This matter has nothing to do with under-or overestimated fees for ports and pilots. Being a pilot myself I know very well that these fees do not change every month. When a cruise company is setting a voyage on the market and fixing prices, they know exactly what the costs will be according to length and/or draught of the vessel.
Most passengers on board however do not know how the system works and the company takes advantage of that.With a very careful estimation of 15 $ per person with 3000 passengers on board makes about 45000 $. It can be more or it can be less. My point is the principle that every $ paid for these fees is one too much. This way of doing business is not fair nor decent.
