Aus Traveller

It is possible that they ran out of tissues. We have one person who reported that they didn't have tissues on their P&O cruise and a few people who reported they did. I said we did, but I didn't say that this was on three separate cruises.

Enjoy your cruise on the Grand.🙂 t has been ten years since we were on that ship.

That doesn't make the fare $85 to $90. We have done that trip many times and the fare has been less than $60, even paying the airport fee.

The prices sound high for a taxi. I think he was conning you.☹️ I would have expected the fare from the OPT to Central to be less than $30. A website I looked at quotes the fare from the OPT to the airport as $45 - $50. I think that is a bit low. We have paid $55 to $58. You could research shuttle buses but we have found them less than reliable. I would much rather get a taxi. There are plenty of them.

When a cruise line charges gratuities on board (such as HAL and Cunard), it is obvious that they have not included this in the basic fare. We could argue that they should, but they don't. Gratuities are charged on board. Here is an explanation by Graham (Sinbad). If the pre-selected fee is avoidable, e.g. voluntary gratuities, then it doesn't need to be shown as part of the advertised total cost. So the only legally permissible gratuities in Australia are those folded into the total cruise cost, or those that can be removed at the discretion of the customer. Mandatory gratuities not shown as part of the total cruise cost at the time of purchase are not allowed. The companies that charge gratuities could argue that it is possible to remove these from the on-board account so they are not mandatory.

As a couple of other people explained, Holland America and Cunard do not include gratuities in the fare. It doesn't matter if they are purchased through an Australian TA or website. Gratuities are charged on board. I can't see what you mean about paying it twice. If it isn't in the fare, then the cruiseline can charge it on board. When the fare is structured that way, it isn't fair to the staff if passengers to take the gratuities off. The crew are paid reasonably, much better than a professional would be paid in their home country. Many of the stewards have university degrees, but they either can't get a job in their home country, or the pay isn't as good as they get working on a ship as a steward.

I am puzzled by the comment "I only saw that post that you made". My post said "we received an email asking for our bank account details for the money to be paid into". This wording was there and I didn't alter it. 🙂 BTW, the email was from the bank that was going to be transferring the money to our bank. I felt quite comfortable in giving the requested information.

With the Celebrity cruise I mentioned, I don't believe we could have had the gratuities refunded. We had to pay them up-front - the fare was quoted as 'X' plus gratuities of 'Y'. I don't think we could have asked for a refund when we were on board. The cruise was in 2013 and it was advertised and booked in Australia. As you say, it appears that it could have been contrary to the Act.

Why ask me if I am sure that this is the way Princess is doing it now (in Australia)? In my previous post, I said that we have received two refunds this way. BTW, by giving someone your BSB and your bank account number they do not have the ability to withdraw funds from your account. It would be more risky to quote your your credit card number for an on-line purchase.

Pre-COVID we received a cheque for refundable OBC, but after our recent cruises, we received an email asking for our bank account details for the money to be paid into. This is in Australia, but I don't know if this system is now working in the US.

I am sorry, but the reason you give is wrong. On some cruises operating out of Australia, auto gratuities are added to the passenger's on-board account. Our consumer laws don't have anything to do with it. On goods sold in Australia, any sales taxes etc have to be included in the advertised sale price, but the gratuity is not a tax. The vast majority of Australian-based cruises have an international port to enable the ship to sell duty free. This also means that GST does not have to be added to the cruise fare. Another point is that GST was introduced in July 2000 but for years after that all the cruise lines charged an auto-gratuity. P&O were the first to combine it in the fare (2009) followed by Princess in May 2011. They were followed years later by RCL. These companies were NOT operating in breach of Australian laws for all those years. P&O and Princess both announced they were incorporating the gratuity in the base fare because tipping is not part of the Australian culture. If it was the law, they would have said so and they would have done it many years earlier. When we booked a Celebrity cruise, we had to pay the gratuities up front, but not as part of the fare. It was a separate amount. We were told that it was because Australians don't tip.

I am pretty sure that the auto gratuities will apply to your cruise. As far as I know, HAL also charges gratuities on cruises out of Australian ports. Princess, P&O and Carnival (part of the same group) have gratuities included on cruises from Australian ports that also return to Aussie ports. You might also find that a gratuity is added to the cost of drinks purchased on your cruise.

We had tissues on the Pacific Encounter in January. I can't remember if we had face washers.

Julie's post that mentioned 'free internet minutes as Elites' was in 2019.🙂

I don't know for sure, but my guess is that yours would be OK. We have kits with different brand names on them and the kits given to us on a Princess cruise were different again. I have not seen anywhere that we have to use a particular one.

We find that having a general light makes scanning or photographing something easier. That way there isn't a flare on the document (or maybe photograph) being copied.

The age limit for travel insurance (whether credit card insurance or the sort you pay for) varies. With ANZ Platinum Visa insurance (through Allianz), the cut-off is for trips booked before the person's 81st birthday.

Of course. You may not realise that late last year I researched this matter and produced a spread sheet comparing all the credit card insurance policies.🙂 My previous post was in response to your comment that people should be 'wary of credit card insurance'. With any insurance, a person definitely should read the pds explaining the terms and conditions - asking for trouble if they don't. On the Sea Princess we met a man whose wife was medivaced by helicopter and their travel insurance had fine print that said it didn't apply to travel on cruise ships. It wasn't free credit card insurance. 🙂

Yes, don't I know it! We are self-funded retirees with income, but even so it wasn't easy. Copies of the relevant documents proving assets/income had to be sent a few times before the correct department in the bank had them. After that happened, the card was approved but it took around two months.

I have to repeat what Barry said earlier - that terms and conditions that apply in the USA are not relevant here. This thread was initiated by John who lives in Australia and who was enquiring about insurance for an Australian-based cruise. Please don't throw in restrictions that apply in another country, restrictions that might make someone who reads this unnecessarily concerned. The factors that you mention don't apply here. All the best. 🙂

Because of the distances involved, I suggest you forget cruising. You could fly into Sydney, stay a few days, fly to Cairns (to see the Great Barrier Reef) and stay a few days. Then fly to Uluru for a couple of days. On this plan, you could fly to Hobart and stay a few days. In Tasmania the distances aren't great so you could see a fair bit in a few days. The drawback with flying is that you do spend time in airports and in the air, but it enables you to get from one part of this vast country to another in a few hours.

I don't know why you warned that people should be wary of credit card insurance. As with any travel insurance, you should check the terms and conditions. The main difference between credit card insurance and a policy you purchase, is the cost of it. No initial cost (except a small credit card fee), but there is an excess to pay when you claim. There are variations between different cards such as the amount to be paid for on the card and the age limit. We have relied on the credit card for decades and have saved countless thousands of dollars by not paying premiums. I have the impression from some people that they feel the credit card insurance is 'too good to be true' so they think there has to be a catch to it. If there is, we haven't encountered in in the several decades we have relied on it. Once when we had to make a sizeable claim, there was no problem getting our claim paid. Our son had a claim for $9,000 for hospitalization in Germany paid with no problems whatsoever.

Our last P&O cruise pre-COVID was January 2020 and the first one post-COVID was August 2022. We both felt that P&O has moved a bit up-market since they re-started cruising.

The buffet is open for dinner. From memory it closes at 11pm. In the Pacific Encounter balcony cabins, there is one 240 volt Aussie socket. We use a double adaptor to give us two points. We had bookings for the Waterfront Restaurant as well as Angelos and Dragon Lady. Food in the MDR is quite good. Angelos was superb both in decor and food/service, but the menu doesn't change every night. It changes half-way through a seven night cruise. We didn't go to Dragon Lady as we aren't very fond of Asian food. I have heard the comment that it is very dark and when people can't read the menu, they are given a torch! We bought a bottle of wine every evening and were pleased that it was more than $10 a bottle cheaper than a similar wine on Princess. Of course, you probably know that you can't take your own wine onto P&O ships.

The title of each document still has the word 'Unavailable' underneath. ☹️