Uncomfortable w/MSC retaining my passport

[surgtek8]

Does anyone know if MSC really does retain your passports for the Baltic Cruise? What do we do if we are going off ship, shouldn't we have our passports in hand always? We are doing a private excursion in St. Petersburg and I don't feel comfortable not having my passport with me in any of the ports for that matter. I was on a Costa cruise in 2008 and they said they retained your passport but we got them back that night. Is this just an MSC rule? Any thoughts?

Thank you in advance :p

[R&V]

Does anyone know if MSC really does retain your passports for the Baltic Cruise? What do we do if we are going off ship, shouldn't we have our passports in hand always? We are doing a private excursion in St. Petersburg and I don't feel comfortable not having my passport with me in any of the ports for that matter. I was on a Costa cruise in 2008 and they said they retained your passport but we got them back that night. Is this just an MSC rule? Any thoughts?

Thank you in advance :p

 

We make copies of our passports and carry the copies with us when going ashore, we leave the originals in the cabin safe. Not sure about the MSC rules but will find out in Oct.

[AmoMondo]

They do retain passports so that immigration can inspect them without having to get every passengerbto presentbthem. There are any ports wherebyou actually need them to gomashore, they'll return them. Most ports you just need your cruise card.

[mydreamvacation]

Holland America retained our passports until we cleared Turkey on one cruise. I think it is fairly standard for countries that require a visa for over 24 stay.

[surgtek8]

Thanks to all, we will have copies with us but I still feel weird about them having it the whole trip. When do they return them?:p

[Norwegian Cruiser 73]

This is industry standard. On our cruise with RCCL out of Dubai they took our passports during check-in and kept them until the last evening onboard. This because of the Muscat, Oman port of call.

[alexkrn46]

They returned our passports until the last day, we made copies of our passports.

[TAFFY99]

hi msc do not keep passports and u do need passport for st petersburg as u go through passport control. :) enjoy st petersburg it lovely a must see.:) hope u have as good a time as we did.:D