Daily Service Charge Increase - effective April 1st 2018

Norwegian Cruise Line is making a nominal adjustment to its daily service charges, effective April 1, 2018. Norwegian's discretionary daily service charges make it easy for guests to provide gratuities to the onboard staff dedicated to delivering superior guest service throughout the cruise.

The new rates are:

• $14.50 per person per day for any category up to a mini-suite stateroom
  
• $17.50 per person per day for any suite or The Haven category
  

Any guest that has made a booking by March 31, 2018 will have the option of prepaying their service charges at the current rate if done prior to sail date. Guests with existing cruise reservations who have already pre-paid their service charges at the current rate are not affected.

Service charges can be prepaid in the Vacation Summary section on My NCL.

Sincerely,

Norwegian Cruise Line®

Wow! Here they go again.

We received an email for our three upcoming sailings. Went from $13.50 to $13.99 on 4-1-17 and now up to $14.50 one year later. Poor decision by NCL, in my opinion.

Do we have the option of adjusting down to $13.50 onboard? This is getting ridiculous unless there is an increased level of service onboard.

Wow! Here they go again.

We received an email for our three upcoming sailings. Went from $13.50 to $13.99 on 4-1-17 and now up to $14.50 one year later. Poor decision by NCL, in my opinion.

 

Do we have the option of adjusting down to $13.50 onboard? This is getting ridiculous unless there is an increased level of service onboard.

From what I understand you can adjust however you would like onboard. Totally up to you.

Wow! Here they go again.

We received an email for our three upcoming sailings. Went from $13.50 to $13.99 on 4-1-17 and now up to $14.50 one year later. Poor decision by NCL, in my opinion.

 

Do we have the option of adjusting down to $13.50 onboard? This is getting ridiculous unless there is an increased level of service onboard.

The announcement states that if the booking was made prior to 3/31/18 you could pre-pay the DSC at the current rate, no need to adjust down onboard.

Just wondering if this is inline with other cruise lines DSC?

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Norwegian Cruise Line is making a nominal adjustment to its daily service charges, effective April 1, 2018. Norwegian's discretionary daily service charges make it easy for guests to provide gratuities to the onboard staff dedicated to delivering superior guest service throughout the cruise.

To better address the demands of the enormously successful and the industry's only all-inclusive cruise experience offered on Norwegian Sky and Norwegian Sun, those ships' daily service charges will be:

• $19.99 per person per day for inside, oceanview and balcony staterooms
  
• $22.99 per person per day for suites
  

Any guest that has made a booking by March 31, 2018 will have the option of prepaying their service charges at the current rate if done prior to sail date. Guests with existing cruise reservations who have already pre-paid their service charges at the current rate are not affected.

Service charges can be prepaid in the Vacation Summary section on My NCL.

Sincerely,

Norwegian Cruise Line®

OK, so if I sail on March 25 and the cruise doesn't end until the 1st, if I don't prepay then I will pay the increased rate?

So you should not get an increase of 4% annually at YOUR job unless you an increased level of output at work? I bet if what you got was a $5 increase you would be complaining about how small it was. :rolleyes:

Good thing we don't get raises where I work... Actually, the first contract I was given had a 2000 GBP higher salary listed than what I actually got paid when I started. So if I were to get a 5$ raise I would be highly impressed. Because that would mean that they were actually giving employees some kind of raise.

OK, so if I sail on March 25 and the cruise doesn't end until the 1st, if I don't prepay then I will pay the increased rate?

I would prepay it.

Wow 2 increases since I booked my cruise. How much of the increase gets allocated to the workers vs. corporate revenue?

The rising cruise fares year-over-year of $100 or more concern me more than a rise equal to about one drink per week for the crew.

.50 per day for 2 people is a buck a day, $7 a week. hardly worth fronting the money now to pre-pay.

soo glad i booked my future cruise for 2019 to lock in at the old price.They raised the rates LAST YEAR and now this..why so sudden?

soo glad i booked my future cruise for 2019 to lock in at the old price.They raised the rates LAST YEAR and now this..why so sudden?

It seems to be a yearly thing for NCL.

So you should not get an increase of 4% annually at YOUR job unless you an increased level of output at work? I bet if what you got was a $5 increase you would be complaining about how small it was. :rolleyes:

I am currently unemployed, but you may be comparing apples to oranges. I would encourage Norwegian to increase their employee salaries annually to adjust for cost of living. That cost could be passed along to consumers in the form of higher cruise fares. However, I am questioning an annual increase to a service charge, which, by definition is tied to service and is left to the discretion of the customer being served.

Yes here we go again - on top of the 18 -> 20% gratuity increase.

Hopefully there is a point where they realise the market won't withstand much more.

For my present Haven booking, the fee is $16.99 pp/pd. It will be raised to $17.50. For my family of 5 it comes out to an extra $17.85 for the week. I don't know if they are offering the "lower" fee in effort to get people to pre-pay thus squelching thoughts of deducting the fee once on board or what the heck NCL is thinking. We have not received this notification for June on the Epic. It certainly isn't a lot of money, but is irksome nonetheless.

For anyone with active NCL booking, check your email - should be inbound shortly, if not already. We got robo-mailing about 2 hours ago for our upcoming cruise, less than 2 months to go. Reasonable to assume that their mail server is pushing hard to get them out ASAP.

After NCL raised the DSC on Specialty Dining from 18% to 20% around last December, one had to conclude this was coming & around the corner, beginning of April seemed to be a ritual in the last several years for NCL to rollout their "enhanced" products and making the announcements. Compared to the 20% gratuity for mostly specialty dining & beverages, this is "small" but across the board. Not sure if we are in a hurry to save a few bucks and prepaid the entire amount in advance. It is what IT IS ...

Email header from NCL -

Important Information for reservation 3xxxxxxx sailing on Norwegian YYY on 00/00/2018, Guest Name: ZZZZZZ BBBBBB

The other cruiselines will shortly follow NCL.

It seems to be a yearly thing for NCL.

Most things inflate yearly. Perfectly reasonable for DSC to go up.

Yes here we go again - on top of the 18 -> 20% gratuity increase.

 

 

 

Hopefully there is a point where they realise the market won't withstand much more.

I said that years ago about DisneyWorld. They never realized it, the increases kept coming, and guess what, the hordes keep trekking to WDW.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

While I have always thought that the lines should just increase fares to cover these fees, I'm not sure why folks are so upset. Is it the principle? This is a $36 increase for our party of 10 to AK that is costing us well over $25k. It's insignificant. If there was a $50 increase to port fees we'd all just gladly pay it. I don't get what the big deal is.

While I have always thought that the lines should just increase fares to cover these fees, I'm not sure why folks are so upset. Is it the principle? This is a $36 increase for our party of 10 to AK that is costing us well over $25k. It's insignificant. If there was a $50 increase to port fees we'd all just gladly pay it. I don't get what the big deal is.

Agree. All cruises are going up in cost every year. Bury in DSC in the fare, discontinue the DSC, and everyone will be happy because they’ll think they’re getting something over on the cruise line.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Most things inflate yearly. Perfectly reasonable for DSC to go up.

Amen. If this nominal raise for these hard working crew is too much there are other options besides cruising.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

OK, so if I sail on March 25 and the cruise doesn't end until the 1st, if I don't prepay then I will pay the increased rate?

Your are right. In my case, I did my booking 3 months ago for a departure of June 10. So I have the option of prepaying the service charges at the current rate prior to sail date.