Receipt Confusion

[old nutter]

Just back from a cruise on the Jade - superb as usual. We had both the Dining and Beverage packages from the recent offer and enjoyed both. The biggest issue we had was the confusion created by the way the computer produced the receipts at the end of meals. The speciality up-charge was shown together with the new auto-tip and there was then a balancing credit showing no final charge, so it was easy to understand.

 

Although the final dining charge was shown as zero, the separate beverage receipt did not show any corresponding balancing credit and so it looked like the charge was heading for our final bill. The staff were handwriting the letters UDP and UBP on the top of the pair of receipts and that seemed to indicate that all of these items should be charge-free. What made things more confusing was that there was no information either before we cruised or on the ship apart from a brief reference to the beverage $10, then $11 item max. Fortunately, thanks to CC we knew most of the answers to what was and what was not covered by the package, but those who have not had the benefit of this aggregate intelligence would be presumably be totally confused.

 

The whole thing with these various packages seems to have been handled in a very amateurish, almost "seems-like-a-good-idea" fashion. Surely NCL could produce a simple briefing sheet to explain what is and what is not covered and how it will be billed on the receipts. This briefing would at least make it easy to see what is being done and could be provided as part of the e-docs. This would work even if they cannot fathom how to get the billing software to work in an understandable and consistent fashion.

 

It all worked out in the end and there were no wrong charges. At least somebody on the ship knew what was happening - just a shame most of the the passengers didn't! I dread to think what kind of a queue there would be on the final morning after the bills are given out if it went wrong.

Edited March 30, 2015 by old nutter
minor spelling issue plus added last para