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Logistics for Longer Cruises


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6 hours ago, CPT Trips said:

 

It's a company phone, not a personal phone. Your card isn't swiped, the device reads the chip. You sign a receipt on the screen and get a copy of it electronically.


In that case I'd be fine with it.  🙂

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12 hours ago, wowzz said:

I think you are just being a little paranoid.  It is so much safer than just giving your card to someone who then disappears into a back room with it. 

Also, in the unlikely event of anything untoward happening, it is extremely easy to block your cc payment. 

 


Neither option is a good one, but I'd be very uncomfortable with any business that allows their employees to use personal phones to take payments.  

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23 hours ago, wowzz said:

Seems to me that you are making life unnecessarily difficult for yourself.

I never buy anything that I cannot pay off in full when the credit card becomes due, so have no reason to rob Peter to pay Paul.

 

It is very nice that you are that wealthy, or spend that little.

 

But their are times when life things intrude, that were not planned and people go over budget.

 

Last spring, I had to buy spur of the moment airline tickets to Hawaii due to a death in the family (yes, much of my family is there).  NOT cheap.  NOT planned.

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21 hours ago, Hlitner said:

we lagged behind Europe with the use of cell phones,

 

That was because we had cheap home phone service, while Europe, home phones were quite expensive, and you still paid by the minute of use.  This into at least the late 90s.

 

So when mobile phones came out, they were cheaper than home phones, so people immediately adopted them..  While US mobiles phones were more expensive than land lines, and land lines had long since stopped charging by time (for residences, not so for businesses).

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21 hours ago, Hlitner said:

We have a similar Billpayer system with our credit union.   They will use electronic transfers when its possible and send checks when necessary.  I love Billpayer since it saves me the hassles or writing out checks...not to mention saving the postage.  It has been many years since I have paid a routine bill via check or snail mail :).  But the use of direct electronic transfers where the merchant directly debits your own bank account is still a pretty new thing in the USA.   I routinely use electronic bank transfers between my various accounts (or the accounts of family members) and it is a very handy thing when we take long trips.  With Internet or a Phone connection I can handle nearly all of our financial affairs from anywhere in the world.  Since we have T-Mobile (which works in over 210 countries) life is good and easy :).

 

Hank

 

FTFY

 

 

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52 minutes ago, SRF said:

 

It is very nice that you are that wealthy, or spend that little.

 

But their are times when life things intrude, that were not planned and people go over budget.

 

Last spring, I had to buy spur of the moment airline tickets to Hawaii due to a death in the family (yes, much of my family is there).  NOT cheap.  NOT planned.


If I didn't have enough to cover that type of expense in savings, I certainly wouldn't be planning cruises or other pleasure trips.  

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19 minutes ago, ducklite said:


If I didn't have enough to cover that type of expense in savings, I certainly wouldn't be planning cruises or other pleasure trips.  

My thinking as well. I always worked on the assumption that you should have a minimum of 3 months income tucked away for a "rainy day", although these days I use a 6 month criteria. If I don't have that cushion, I cut back on discretionary expenditure until my savings fund recovers. If you can't afford to take an unexpected  flight to Hawaii, you can't afford a cruuse.

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14 hours ago, Elaine5715 said:

No charities don't.  They incur the fees whereas with checks or cash, they don't

 

Shop around. There are wide variation of fees from bank to bank in any given area. You might even find one that will process CC payments for low/no fee for tax exempt charitable organizations.

 

Two museums we visited recently had no admission charge but had many of their employees set up with tablets and card readers to graciously accept contributions in lieu of admission. One in the UK and the other here in the States. 

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8 hours ago, ducklite said:


If I didn't have enough to cover that type of expense in savings, I certainly wouldn't be planning cruises or other pleasure trips.  

Did you used to watch Suze Orman?  Miss her a lot.  She recommended that people have an eight month emergency fund.  And if you didn't then, yeah, you shouldn't be going on vacations, buying unnecessary things, you name it.

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On 10/10/2019 at 9:46 AM, ducklite said:


If I didn't have enough to cover that type of expense in savings, I certainly wouldn't be planning cruises or other pleasure trips.  

 

But also, why take money out of savings, which is earning some (small as it may be) interest, to pay off something that is 0% interest cost?

 

 

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2 hours ago, SRF said:

 

But also, why take money out of savings, which is earning some (small as it may be) interest, to pay off something that is 0% interest cost?

 

 


I was talking about a poster who is carrying debt on credit cards (not interest free) because he has no savings.

 

The only time I've paid things with no interest off early is a couple of car loans where I've paid off the balance when there were only 2-3 months left just to make it go away.  The lost interest was negligible.  

 

I zero out credit cards through the month, but again the interest I would have earned on the money is pennies, and that money is already in my checking account to pay the balance off at the end of the month.

 

Again, if I didn't have savings that would cover unexpected costs and force me to pay interest on credit cards as a result, I wouldn't be taking cruises or other vacations.

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3 hours ago, ducklite said:

Again, if I didn't have savings that would cover unexpected costs and force me to pay interest on credit cards as a result, I wouldn't be taking cruises or other vacations.

There's the whole "what if you could no longer work" or it was going to take you a long time to find work.  You have rent/mortgage, car payment, insurance, utilities, etc.

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15 hours ago, clo said:

There's the whole "what if you could no longer work" or it was going to take you a long time to find work.  You have rent/mortgage, car payment, insurance, utilities, etc.


Exactly!

 

Disability insurance doesn't pay immediately and doesn't pay for the first week at all.  Unemployment also skips a week and then pays a fraction of your normal pay.  

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1 hour ago, ducklite said:


Exactly!

 

Disability insurance doesn't pay immediately and doesn't pay for the first week at all.  Unemployment also skips a week and then pays a fraction of your normal pay.  

I have an attorney friend, self-employed, who likely makes decent money.  And/but lives way beyond his means.  We had one brief convo where he said that he has no plans to ever retire.  Right.  Plans.

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On 10/13/2019 at 10:49 AM, clo said:

I have an attorney friend, self-employed, who likely makes decent money.  And/but lives way beyond his means.  We had one brief convo where he said that he has no plans to ever retire.  Right.  Plans.

 

There are a lot of people like that.

 

And there are a lot of people who will not accept any debt and only work, and plan on having fun when they retire.

 

My FIL was like that.  Ran a country store, worked 6.5 days a week.  NEVER took a vacation.  NEVER took time off.  

 

When he retired, his wife was not doing well, so he had to stay home and take care of her.  When she got bad enough she had to be in a nursing home, 2 weeks later, he fell and broke his hip.  Next morning, they got him up for PT, to had a clot break loose, and had a stroke.

 

He never got to do ANY of his plans.

 

You have got to have a balance in life.

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20 minutes ago, SRF said:

 

There are a lot of people like that.

 

And there are a lot of people who will not accept any debt and only work, and plan on having fun when they retire.

 

My FIL was like that.  Ran a country store, worked 6.5 days a week.  NEVER took a vacation.  NEVER took time off.  

 

When he retired, his wife was not doing well, so he had to stay home and take care of her.  When she got bad enough she had to be in a nursing home, 2 weeks later, he fell and broke his hip.  Next morning, they got him up for PT, to had a clot break loose, and had a stroke.

 

He never got to do ANY of his plans.

 

You have got to have a balance in life.

That's one if the reasons I stopped working in my 50s and went to live in Spain for a few years.  Did all the financial calculations,  and knew that financially I would be worse off than if I carried on working for another 10 years,  but that those 10 years would be years I would never have again. 

Have never had a moments regret. 

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On 10/10/2019 at 11:20 PM, clo said:

Did you used to watch Suze Orman?  Miss her a lot.  She recommended that people have an eight month emergency fund.  And if you didn't then, yeah, you shouldn't be going on vacations, buying unnecessary things, you name it.

what sort of bubble did she exist in?

 

Meanwhile back in the real world.............................

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27 minutes ago, DarrenM said:

what sort of bubble did she exist in?

 

Meanwhile back in the real world.............................

8 months might be a bit excessive, but I always reckoned that you should have the equivalent of 6 months salary as savings before making any extravagant discretionary expenditure.  As Harold  Macmillan said "Events, dear boy ".

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I dont disagree with the last bit there about extravagant discretionary expenditure. But its only people that exist in these "I'm alright Jack" bubbles that can believe most average folk have any savings, never mind 8 months worth.

 

And I know of very few average folk with no savings that decide to go into debt to go an expensive cruise.

 

But they will go into huge debt to get a car, or even a mortgage. Leaving them living month by month.

 

They have no choice.

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6 minutes ago, DarrenM said:

I dont disagree with the last bit there about extravagant discretionary expenditure. But its only people that exist in these "I'm alright Jack" bubbles that can believe most average folk have any savings, never mind 8 months worth.

 

And I know of very few average folk with no savings that decide to go into debt to go an expensive cruise.

 

But they will go into huge debt to get a car, or even a mortgage. Leaving them living month by month.

 

They have no choice.

But buying a house, or to a lesser extent, a car, means that you are buying an asset, which, in the worst case scenario, has some value. Going into debt to buy a holiday is madness.

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On 10/14/2019 at 1:49 AM, clo said:

I have an attorney friend, self-employed, who likely makes decent money.  And/but lives way beyond his means.  We had one brief convo where he said that he has no plans to ever retire.  Right.  Plans.

A lot of people plan not to retire, not because they can’t afford to, but because they are doing a job they enjoy and have the capacity to do well past what many consider retirement age, it is very common among lawyers I know a few Judges who retired on great pension plans, but keep working after they are forced to retire from the Bench in their 70s.

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I am not at retirement age yet, but I know two people that retired in their 50s, and had all sorts of plans.

 

Lost touch a little with them both, with me working away from home.

 

But saw them both months later. I honestly believe that in the two years since they retired they have aged alarmingly.

 

Their plans although working, have meant they see less people daily, have nothing to really get their teeth into, and have, in my opinion, descended into what I saw happen to my father, which I vowed would never happen to me, and that is, pottering around in the garden, for no real reason, taking up bowls, and spending waaaaay too long, just being on their own. They lost their edge.

 

Their plans included spending as much time with their grand kids as they could. Not sure they meant they would become surrogate parents. Which they now are. And why is it, when folk become grand parents they suddenly look like grandparents?

 

They wear carpet slippers now and cardigans, dont go to the pub any more, young mans game, prefer to play bingo, thats what old folk do, etc etc.

 

Now I know they are just two examples, well three with my father, but I refuse to go that way. I want to keep as young an outlook on life for as long as possible, and keep as fresh as I can. If that means working till I drop, then fine. At least I would have been living.

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1 minute ago, DarrenM said:

I am not at retirement age yet, but I know two people that retired in their 50s, and had all sorts of plans.

 

Lost touch a little with them both, with me working away from home.

 

But saw them both months later. I honestly believe that in the two years since they retired they have aged alarmingly.

 

Their plans although working, have meant they see less people daily, have nothing to really get their teeth into, and have, in my opinion, descended into what I saw happen to my father, which I vowed would never happen to me, and that is, pottering around in the garden, for no real reason, taking up bowls, and spending waaaaay too long, just being on their own. They lost their edge.

 

Their plans included spending as much time with their grand kids as they could. Not sure they meant they would become surrogate parents. Which they now are. And why is it, when folk become grand parents they suddenly look like grandparents?

 

They wear carpet slippers now and cardigans, dont go to the pub any more, young mans game, prefer to play bingo, thats what old folk do, etc etc.

 

Now I know they are just two examples, well three with my father, but I refuse to go that way. I want to keep as young an outlook on life for as long as possible, and keep as fresh as I can. If that means working till I drop, then fine. At least I would have been living.

They should have moved to Spain like I did. Dealing with Spanish bureaucracy,  trying to get our electricity reconnected every time we had a storm, and pruning our olive and almond trees kept me young! Plus the red wine of course.  

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