Canceled excursion refund--credit card or OBC?

[FantasiCat]

I hope someone here can help me because I am confused. I booked three excursions through Princess for my upcoming cruise using my $100 OBC and paying the balance with my credit card. On 11/7 I got an email that one of the excursions (which cost $89.95) was canceled and I would receive a refund on the original form of payment within 10-15 business days.

 

Here’s where my confusion is—would the original form of payment for this excursion be considered my credit card or the OBC? I’ve been checking my card statement every day and have not seen a refund, and my OBC balance according to Cruise Personalizer is still $100. I called the help line and the representative seemed to think that because I show an OBC balance that the refund had been processed as OBC, but then shouldn’t the balance be $89.95 instead of $100? Or does the balance not update until after embarkation? Or should the refund have showed up on my card and I need to call Princess again?

 

Ideally I would like to resolve this before my cruise next week so any advice will be extremely appreciated!

[phoebe2m]

When one of our excursions was cancelled we didn't receive a credit to our credit card. We had paid mostly with OBC and $80ish dollars on our credit card. Our OBC still shows the full amount we have always had so I guess they don't deduct the money until you actually go on the excursion? I will be interested to read replies from others. 

[jeno]

I was told today that if you pay any portion with OBC ,  it all goes to OBC. Anytime you call you get a different answer. Mine were for a world cruise with 50 ports so it was very convoluted on adding everything up and subtracting this and that got every excursion booked.  I asked her just to concentrate on where my $530 ended up.  I was shorted about $40 and she eventually made good on it. This was my 5th phone call about the issue and had chatted twice. The last chat person out and out lied to me to get me off the chat.  Frustrating.  

Edited December 1, 2022 by jeno

[Guest ldtr]

Any amount of the excursion paid with OBC will be refunded to OBC, any paid by CC will be refunded to the credit card used.

 

Once you get close to sailing all refunds will be made in the form of OBC (same as if you cancel on board)

 

 

[jeno]

5 minutes ago, ldtr said:

Any amount of the excursion paid with OBC will be refunded to OBC, any paid by CC will be refunded to the credit card used.

 

Once you get close to sailing all refunds will be made in the form of OBC (same as if you cancel on board)

 

 

She told me I had paid part with obc and part with cc but because some had been paid with obc, the whole refund went to obc. 

[Guest ldtr]

Just now, jeno said:

She told me I had paid part with obc and part with cc but because some had been paid with obc, the whole refund went to obc. 

Not how it has worked for me.  I have 6 cruises booked and have made some changes on excursions. The refunds have gone to the original purchase form of purchase.  OBC to OBC, and any cash amount to CC.  Have done 4 cancellations  in the past month for cruises between January and the end of December 2024.

 

Had one that Princess canceled and again the refunds were split going to the original form of payment.

 

 

[Thrak]

Waiting to find out this exact info. Because I had more OBC than my wife and Princess has (stupidly) changed so that it isn't just all lumped together, I had booked mostly with OBC with a bit on the Credit Card.  Princess dropped two ports on our cruise and added one - after final payment of course. We never got any notice from them that our excursion had been dropped even though it was in a port that is no longer part of the cruise. We sail tomorrow and I'm hoping to find the $210 refunded as OBC when we get onboard.

[FantasiCat]

2 hours ago, ldtr said:

Any amount of the excursion paid with OBC will be refunded to OBC, any paid by CC will be refunded to the credit card used.

 

Once you get close to sailing all refunds will be made in the form of OBC (same as if you cancel on board)

 

 

Is there any way to see the breakdown of OBC vs credit card for each excursion, since I booked all three at once and Princess only canceled one of them? Or would it all have gone to OBC since the cancelation happened pretty close to the sail date (33 days)?

[Rick&Jeannie]

4 hours ago, FantasiCat said:

Is there any way to see the breakdown of OBC vs credit card for each excursion, since I booked all three at once and Princess only canceled one of them? Or would it all have gone to OBC since the cancelation happened pretty close to the sail date (33 days)?

No...I've had a real issue with the lack of decent accounting in regards to excursions for quite some time.  If you don't take screenshots and/or keep all emails that pertain to payments for excursions you have almost no chance of tracing what has happened.  It has gotten to the point where I will only book one excursion at a time and then wait for the confirmation email in order to have an "audit log".

[caribill]

6 hours ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

No...I've had a real issue with the lack of decent accounting in regards to excursions for quite some time.  If you don't take screenshots and/or keep all emails that pertain to payments for excursions you have almost no chance of tracing what has happened.  It has gotten to the point where I will only book one excursion at a time and then wait for the confirmation email in order to have an "audit log".

 

In the past (no idea how it is now), once on board the accounting system basically does the charging over again from scratch, charging excursions first to non-refundable OBC and then to refundable.

 

So it is possible that part of what one paid for excursions in advance with a credit card could end up being paid with non-refundable OBC and the person ending up with some refundable OBC.

 

Example. Booked $200 excursions in advance, paying $100 with non-refundable OBC and $100 with CC. Booking had $70 non-refundable OBC that could not be used in advance to purchase shore excursions.

 

On board the $200 of excursions are re-processed to use the original $100 non-refundable OBC and the $70 non-refundable OBC that could not be used pre-cruise, a total of $170. $30 would stay having been paid with the credit card, but since the CC was originally used to pay $100, the other $70 would be on the onboard account as refundable OBC.

 

On board,

[Coral]

Mine have been OBC (refundable). 

 

I have had to call to get a refund to the credit card and had to be assertive to do so as the Princess employee kept saying "don't you want OBC - everyone wants OBC" and I had to explain that this was money I put out from my credit card. This was done with months to go on a cruise.

[FantasiCat]

1 hour ago, caribill said:

 

In the past (no idea how it is now), once on board the accounting system basically does the charging over again from scratch, charging excursions first to non-refundable OBC and then to refundable.

So I could wait and check my OBC balance once on board and see if it matches the amount of my refund, and go to Guest Services if it doesn’t. That definitely sounds more appealing than fighting with Princess over the phone!

[FantasiCat]

8 hours ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

It has gotten to the point where I will only book one excursion at a time and then wait for the confirmation email in order to have an "audit log".

Based on this experience I may have to start doing it that way as well!

[paradiselivin1]

Our OBC still shows the original amount after booking a few excursions. I also think that it doesn't get charged until onboard but makes it tough to recall how much you have spent prior to boarding without keeping great records. I recently had a tour canceled for my upcoming cruise next week with no notice from Princess. Naturally, no change to my OBC on this cruise as it hadn't been deducted..

[that]

18 hours ago, Thrak said:

Waiting to find out this exact info. Because I had more OBC than my wife and Princess has (stupidly) changed so that it isn't just all lumped together, I had booked mostly with OBC with a bit on the Credit Card.  Princess dropped two ports on our cruise and added one - after final payment of course. We never got any notice from them that our excursion had been dropped even though it was in a port that is no longer part of the cruise. We sail tomorrow and I'm hoping to find the $210 refunded as OBC when we get onboard.

Bon Voyage

look forward to review upon return