Premium Beverage Package (formerly known as Ultimate Beverage Package

[ginawech]

Has anyone who is the process of booking a Norwegian Cruise in the near future

noticed that the Premium Beverage Package (formerly known as Ultimate Beverage Package)

has increased in price to $99 per day. I already have a nice suite so will not be 

upgrading and I do not drink enough to pay this much. I have traveled with my cousin

in the past and she paid the Beverage Package but it was not this expensive. 

I believe my cruise consultant told me that NCL has changed their policy.

 

GL

[KeithJenner]

I believe it has been $99 per day for a while.

 

Very few people pay the full price for it. If anyone wants the beverage package then they pick it as a perk and get it for free (or just the $20 gratuity if appropriate).

[Stonymtncruiser]

2 minutes ago, KeithJenner said:

I believe it has been $99 per day for a while.

 

Very few people pay the full price for it. If anyone wants the beverage package then they pick it as a perk and get it for free (or just the $20 gratuity if appropriate).

 Its not actually free. They boost the price up so you end up paying for it anyway. Check it out, get a price with the Bev package and one without to see the difference. Add in the gratuities and you have to drink quite a bit every day to break even.   

[KeithJenner]

3 minutes ago, Stonymtncruiser said:

 Its not actually free. They boost the price up so you end up paying for it anyway. Check it out, get a price with the Bev package and one without to see the difference. Add in the gratuities and you have to drink quite a bit every day to break even.   

That depends on the cabin you want. If it is one that doesn’t offer a sail away rate then the perks are indeed free. This has been discussed many times before.

 

Anyway, in this case it is all semantics. I was just talking about the amount you are actually charged for the package. 

[ginawech]

3 hours ago, Stonymtncruiser said:

 Its not actually free. They boost the price up so you end up paying for it anyway. Check it out, get a price with the Bev package and one without to see the difference. Add in the gratuities and you have to drink quite a bit every day to break even.   

 

I have already purchased the gratuities package. I have been on 2 other cruises with a relative. I have decided I will purchase a few bottles of wine at the first and second dinner and use them at dinners.  I don't drink enough to make this feasible.

[pbenjamin]

6 hours ago, ginawech said:

Has anyone who is the process of booking a Norwegian Cruise in the near future

noticed that the Premium Beverage Package (formerly known as Ultimate Beverage Package)

has increased in price to $99 per day. I already have a nice suite so will not be 

upgrading and I do not drink enough to pay this much. I have traveled with my cousin

in the past and she paid the Beverage Package but it was not this expensive. 

I believe my cruise consultant told me that NCL has changed their policy.

 

GL

 

The price went up in October of last year.

 

Norwegian Cruise Line hikes drink-package prices; see how much you'll be paying now

[adam_s_allen]

7 hours ago, ginawech said:

 

I have already purchased the gratuities package. I have been on 2 other cruises with a relative. I have decided I will purchase a few bottles of wine at the first and second dinner and use them at dinners.  I don't drink enough to make this feasible.

Not sure if you know this. But you can bring your own bottles of wine on board, you just have to pay a fee of $15 each bottle.

[newmexicoNita]

12 hours ago, KeithJenner said:

I believe it has been $99 per day for a while.

 

Very few people pay the full price for it. If anyone wants the beverage package then they pick it as a perk and get it for free (or just the $20 gratuity if appropriate).

yes you are right: anyone who drinks more than a couple drinks a day is likely to take the drink package as a perk. I imagine that is why so few have noticed any change in price or know when the change happened. 

[latebloomer56]

14 hours ago, KeithJenner said:

I believe it has been $99 per day for a while.

 

Very few people pay the full price for it. If anyone wants the beverage package then they pick it as a perk and get it for free (or just the $20 gratuity if appropriate).

Is tat now 20 a day gratuity per person? That would mean it went up but not very much. Because when we booked UBP was offered as a perk we declined, gratuity per person came to 134.00 each for the week. We don't drink enough to bother. My husband only drinks soda and I might have 1 drink a day. Maybe not even that this trip not many sea days.

[KeithJenner]

4 minutes ago, latebloomer56 said:

Is tat now 20 a day gratuity per person? That would mean it went up but not very much. Because when we booked UBP was offered as a perk we declined, gratuity per person came to 134.00 each for the week. We don't drink enough to bother. My husband only drinks soda and I might have 1 drink a day. Maybe not even that this trip not many sea days.

Yes, I believe it is currently 20%.

 

To be honest, I don't keep right up to date on the beverage package prices and gratuity rates, as they have very little effect on us in the UK, but I believe that the package has been $99 a day and gratuities charged at 20% for a while now.

[Jembeccatoo]

What nobody has mentioned is there is now a second tier drink package being offered. The Ultimate Beverage Package includes alcoholic drinks by the glass and beer costing under $15. 

For additional money, you can purchase or upgrade to the Premium Plus Beverage Package that includes all glasses of alcoholic beverage no matter the price, fresh juice, bottled water, and specialty coffee with meals.

I’ve read that some of the call brands are being price higher to encourage the purchase of this new package.

[ginawech]

6 hours ago, adam_s_allen said:

Not sure if you know this. But you can bring your own bottles of wine on board, you just have to pay a fee of $15 each bottle.

I’m pretty sure that is not allowed on Norwegian 

[ColinIllinois]

4 minutes ago, ginawech said:

I’m pretty sure that is not allowed on Norwegian 

 

Yes, it is allowed.

 

https://www.ncl.com/faq#can-i-bring-alcohol-board

[KeithJenner]

5 minutes ago, ginawech said:

I’m pretty sure that is not allowed on Norwegian 

It certainly is.

 

As many bottles as you like. $15 corkage per 750ml bottle payable on embarkation.

[ginawech]

6 minutes ago, KeithJenner said:

It certainly is.

 

As many bottles as you like. $15 corkage per 750ml bottle payable on embarkation.

 

[ginawech]

You are correct Keith, and thanks

I stand corrected. From NCL:

 

Guests may bring bottles of wine and champagne on board. When bottles are brought on board and served or consumed in any restaurant, public room area or in their stateroom, a corkage fee will be charged according to bottle sizes noted below.

750 ml Bottle: $15.00 USD

1,500 ml Magnum: $30.00 USD

Wine or champagne sent directly to the ship by travel agents, friends, family, etc. or from another retail source, are subject to the same fees. Box wines are not allowed on board.

[CruiseRookieSteve]

On 3/15/2019 at 4:24 PM, ginawech said:

Has anyone who is the process of booking a Norwegian Cruise in the near future

noticed that the Premium Beverage Package (formerly known as Ultimate Beverage Package)

has increased in price to $99 per day. I already have a nice suite so will not be 

upgrading and I do not drink enough to pay this much. I have traveled with my cousin

in the past and she paid the Beverage Package but it was not this expensive. 

I believe my cruise consultant told me that NCL has changed their policy.

 

GL

I see posts from time to time about people wondering if it is worth buying a drinks package. I just got notified today that Norwegian is changing the name of the Ultimate Beverage Package (UBP) to Premium Beverage Package (PBP?). Some people manage to get the Adult Beverage Package as a free perk on their cruise. Most people seem to agree that the Adult Beverage Package is the same thing as the UBP (or PBP). The normal cost of this package is $99 per person per day and had to be purchased for every adult in your room plus you must also purchase the child's beverage package for every child in your room if you purchase the UBP/PBP. Even with this package you still have to pay the 20% service charge / gratuity and taxes above and beyond the $99 per person per day. There is a less expensive package for $65 per person per day that only includes beer and wine. Both packages include soda and various other non-alcoholic beverages. There are other limits beyond that too. Drinks can't be more than $15 each or you pay the difference. If you buy a bottle of wine you only get 15% off. If you participate in a spirits or wine tasting event you only get a small discount, usually like 15% off for the event. So even with the very expensive drinks package you'll still end up paying gratuity and taxes plus for whatever alcohol tasting events you attend.

 

My wife and I were on a 7 day Norwegian Escape Bahamas cruise last week. I thought I'd just provide our drinking experience and costs in case it might help others decide whether or not to buy a drinks package. During the 7 day cruise my wife and I split a total of 7 bottles of wine, that averages one bottle of wine per day. We also purchased 3 glasses of wine in addition to the bottles. We had a total of 5 cocktails and 1 glass of beer over the 7 days. But in addition to that we also attended 2 wine tasting events. At each event we had 6 glasses of about 2 oz pours for a total of 12 oz each, or about 2-1/2 glasses each at each of the 2 wine tasting events. We also attended a Whisky and Beer Tasting Event.

 

At home the most we'll usually drink is just splitting a bottle of wine (about 2-1/2 glasses) each day. So this was quite a bit more drinking each day than we normally do.

 

The total cost of all this drinking for 7 days came to less than $600 for the 2 of us and that included all tips and taxes! If we had purchased the UBP/PBP it would have cost us $99 X 7 or almost $1400 plus 20% service charge / gratuity plus taxes. That would have been a total of at least $1700 after the additional mandatory fees. The Tasting Events would not even have been included in that except for a small discount.

 

So for us the drinks package would make no sense. We drank as much as we wanted to drink on the cruise, way more than we normally do when not on a cruise, and the total cost to us came to less than $600. That compares to $1700 or more for the drinks package.

 

You'll have to judge for yourself based on what you think you will be drinking as to whether the package is worth it for you. But if you are a couple, $1700 covers a lot of drinking one glass or one bottle at a time even with the high price of drinks on the ship. Even if you buy the most expensive $15 drinks allowed in the drinks package, you would have to buy 100 drinks over 7 days (or about 14 drinks per day, 7 drinks each) to break even. Maybe one can squeeze in 7 drinks on a Sea Day (without getting wasted?), but there are a lot of shore days where I certainly could not manage to squeeze in 7 drinks in the few hours on the ship on those days.

 

If someone sees something I'm missing in my calculations, I'm certainly open to being corrected. Of course, if you are getting the drinks package as a free perk, you can't beat that. We are getting it for the first time as a free perk on our next cruise. But already I'm fretting over not being able to buy wine by the bottle without having to cover most of the cost above and beyond this free perk.

[ginawech]

Great point! I am traveling alone. I have already bought one bottle of red wine and one bottle of white wine and I’m a Bronze member so there will be champagne delivered to my suite on the first day of my cruise. I don’t drink enough to purchase the package. Next time I’ll try to get the Free at Sea but I’m not concerned!

[PTC DAWG]

On 3/19/2019 at 4:01 AM, CruiseRookiesCom said:

I see posts from time to time about people wondering if it is worth buying a drinks package. I just got notified today that Norwegian is changing the name of the Ultimate Beverage Package (UBP) to Premium Beverage Package (PBP?). Some people manage to get the Adult Beverage Package as a free perk on their cruise. Most people seem to agree that the Adult Beverage Package is the same thing as the UBP (or PBP). The normal cost of this package is $99 per person per day and had to be purchased for every adult in your room plus you must also purchase the child's beverage package for every child in your room if you purchase the UBP/PBP. Even with this package you still have to pay the 20% service charge / gratuity and taxes above and beyond the $99 per person per day. There is a less expensive package for $65 per person per day that only includes beer and wine. Both packages include soda and various other non-alcoholic beverages. There are other limits beyond that too. Drinks can't be more than $15 each or you pay the difference. If you buy a bottle of wine you only get 15% off. If you participate in a spirits or wine tasting event you only get a small discount, usually like 15% off for the event. So even with the very expensive drinks package you'll still end up paying gratuity and taxes plus for whatever alcohol tasting events you attend.

 

My wife and I were on a 7 day Norwegian Escape Bahamas cruise last week. I thought I'd just provide our drinking experience and costs in case it might help others decide whether or not to buy a drinks package. During the 7 day cruise my wife and I split a total of 7 bottles of wine, that averages one bottle of wine per day. We also purchased 3 glasses of wine in addition to the bottles. We had a total of 5 cocktails and 1 glass of beer over the 7 days. But in addition to that we also attended 2 wine tasting events. At each event we had 6 glasses of about 2 oz pours for a total of 12 oz each, or about 2-1/2 glasses each at each of the 2 wine tasting events. We also attended a Whisky and Beer Tasting Event.

 

At home the most we'll usually drink is just splitting a bottle of wine (about 2-1/2 glasses) each day. So this was quite a bit more drinking each day than we normally do.

 

The total cost of all this drinking for 7 days came to less than $600 for the 2 of us and that included all tips and taxes! If we had purchased the UBP/PBP it would have cost us $99 X 7 or almost $1400 plus 20% service charge / gratuity plus taxes. That would have been a total of at least $1700 after the additional mandatory fees. The Tasting Events would not even have been included in that except for a small discount.

 

So for us the drinks package would make no sense. We drank as much as we wanted to drink on the cruise, way more than we normally do when not on a cruise, and the total cost to us came to less than $600. That compares to $1700 or more for the drinks package.

 

You'll have to judge for yourself based on what you think you will be drinking as to whether the package is worth it for you. But if you are a couple, $1700 covers a lot of drinking one glass or one bottle at a time even with the high price of drinks on the ship. Even if you buy the most expensive $15 drinks allowed in the drinks package, you would have to buy 100 drinks over 7 days (or about 14 drinks per day, 7 drinks each) to break even. Maybe one can squeeze in 7 drinks on a Sea Day (without getting wasted?), but there are a lot of shore days where I certainly could not manage to squeeze in 7 drinks in the few hours on the ship on those days.

 

If someone sees something I'm missing in my calculations, I'm certainly open to being corrected. Of course, if you are getting the drinks package as a free perk, you can't beat that. We are getting it for the first time as a free perk on our next cruise. But already I'm fretting over not being able to buy wine by the bottle without having to cover most of the cost above and beyond this free perk.

I would contend that rarely is the drink package bought at full price...YMMV. 

 

That said, math is easy, and everyone’s drinking math is different...

[CherWolf]

It would also be interesting to compare the price of getting it as a perk versus just having a sail away cabin.  There is typically a big difference in the price of the cabins with the perks (including the extra gratuity)  vs. the sailaway cabins, so you have to do that math as well.  As stated above, most people don't purchase the package, they get  it as a perk (which is not free!)

[CruisingNole]

On 3/16/2019 at 1:12 PM, KeithJenner said:

It certainly is.

 

As many bottles as you like. $15 corkage per 750ml bottle payable on embarkation.

 

RCL (and I believe Carnival and Disney) do not charge a fee unless the passenger requests the server to open the bottle in the dining room. I believe the "corkage" fee charged simply for walking onto the ship with a bottle of wine is unique to NCL.

[CruiseRookieSteve]

6 hours ago, ginawech said:

Great point! I am traveling alone. I have already bought one bottle of red wine and one bottle of white wine and I’m a Bronze member so there will be champagne delivered to my suite on the first day of my cruise. I don’t drink enough to purchase the package. Next time I’ll try to get the Free at Sea but I’m not concerned!

The beverage package is definitely not worth it unless you are a significant drinker. The official policy of Norwegian is you can bring as many bottles of wine onboard by just paying a $15 corkage fee per bottle. That is well worth it as the cruise ship marks up the prices of bottles of wine 2 to 4 times the retail price. Thus find a nice $20 bottle of wine and pay $20 plus $15 = $35 to drink it on the ship. For an equivalent bottle of wine you would pay Norwegian at least $40 and more likely $60 to $80 for that same bottle of wine. I found that Norwegian has a number of inexpensive bottles of wine at the bars, about $20 to $30 per bottle. But the retail value of those wines are from $6 to $12 per bottle. I don't mind spending money on a good bottle of wine, but it is a shame to pay good money for a cheap bottle of wine. Bringing your own wines on board and paying the $15 corkage fee is definitely the way to go.

[CruiseRookieSteve]

5 hours ago, PTC DAWG said:

I would contend that rarely is the drink package bought at full price...YMMV. 

 

That said, math is easy, and everyone’s drinking math is different...

I agree. We are getting the drink package as a free benefit on our next cruise. But with mandatory gratuity and fees, it will still come to about $100 per person. That is worth it to us. But, I'm not happy about the limitation of which wines would qualify to be included without paying extra.  It does make me wonder if the $99 per day is just listed so that those that get it free can feel they are getting a huge bargain. Does anyone ever buy the drink package at $99 per day at full retail price?

[CruiseRookieSteve]

5 hours ago, CherWolf said:

It would also be interesting to compare the price of getting it as a perk versus just having a sail away cabin.  There is typically a big difference in the price of the cabins with the perks (including the extra gratuity)  vs. the sailaway cabins, so you have to do that math as well.  As stated above, most people don't purchase the package, they get  it as a perk (which is not free!)

Complicated. We've never found the "5 Free" benefits as worth it for us. They never have FREE airfare from where we fly from, just discounted airfare. And we are always able to find airfare cheaper (or free using points) than the discount airfare offered in the "5 free" NCL benefits package. We can never use the internet bene as we always buy the full unlimited internet package. The shore excursion and specialty restaurant benes are interesting but not worth a lot to us. So that just leaves the unlimited beverage package as the bene of the most value. But we have found that their are saving on rooms that go beyond the "sail away" available without any benes. You won't find them online. You have to talk to a travel agent, or even a Norwegian travel specialist, who can talk to you about much lower prices on rooms that include no benefits. These are not "sail away" bookings. You can select the room you want and get it with no benefits at much lower prices than the listed prices. These are prices not listed online and are only available through travel agents and NCL booking reps. I've found it is usually more worth it to book without any benefits than to book with all the NCL benefits. The "sail away" can also be a bargain if you are careful. On a recent cruise we booked a "sale away" for a mini suite at just a slight more cost than having picked our own balcony room. I noticed on our ship that there were no mini suites with obstructed view so figured that we probably would not end up with a bad room even using the "sail away" option. We were very happy with the room assigned to us by NCL.

[CruiseRookieSteve]

4 hours ago, CruisingNole said:

 

RCL (and I believe Carnival and Disney) do not charge a fee unless the passenger requests the server to open the bottle in the dining room. I believe the "corkage" fee charged simply for walking onto the ship with a bottle of wine is unique to NCL.

We were on a cruise with a huge party where almost nobody was bringing wine on board. We gave everyone one bottle of our wine to bring on board for us and were able to bring on board about a case of wine. It was enough to last almost an entire 14 day cruise. Our dining room server for the most part was able to not charge us the corkage fee. We made sure to give him a significant additional tip to compensate for all the corkage fees that he saved us. I believe the official policy on Carnival is that if you open the bottle in your cabin and bring it to the restaurant without a cork they will not charge you a corkage fee.