Passports collection

[ak1004]

Our e-tickets has the following information:

 

YOUR PRE-CRUISE INFORMATION

 

The ship will be located at Port Rashid pier. Guests will be permitted to embark the vessel from approximately 2:00-4:00PM.
Please be sure to have your cruise ticket, valid passport and any necessary visas ready upon embarkation. Immigration Officers may begin
processing all guests’ passports at this time. Passports will then be collected by ship’s staff and returned to you after completion of
disembarkation procedures at cruise end.

 

Is this normal for SS? Never had our passports collected and held for the whole cruise. What if we need them on shore?

[turtlemichael]

It's standard practice, particularly on port intensive cruises. It saves many a face-to-face inspection. If you needed your passport for a particular reason, I'm sure they'd give it to you.

[ak1004]

14 minutes ago, turtlemichael said:

It's standard practice, particularly on port intensive cruises. It saves many a face-to-face inspection. If you needed your passport for a particular reason, I'm sure they'd give it to you.

 

Thank you.

 

We did almost 20 cruises, I don't recall this ever happened on any other line. Yes, I'm sure they will return it if we need it, I'm just curious what's the purpose and why no other line does it as far as I remember.

[rojaan19]

We have been  sailing Silversea since 2010  and that is what they  were doing then, and every cruise since then.  Any paperwork  needed for each port is already done,  if you need to  do  a face to  face inspection it is done on an orderly manor  ( deck  by deck  from memory )

I always have a photocopy of the main page with me if I am  off the ship - but have never needed it  😉

As TurtleMichael  said  it is standard practice on all Silvsersea ships.

[Bell Boy]

Standard practice on dozens of Cruise lines,  it's been the practice for years.

 

Had to hand in our passports only recently - Silver Moon , itinerary to the Fjords (ex Southampton UK)  

[jpalbny]

10 hours ago, ak1004 said:

Is this normal for SS? Never had our passports collected and held for the whole cruise. What if we need them on shore?

 

Yes, completely standard and matches up with every sailing we've ever done on them. Same back in the day when we sailed Oceania. Same on Ponant last year, and that cruise was entirely within France.

 

On both SS and Ponant, we have requested our passports numerous times when we needed them on shore for a car rental, or a COVID antigen test (last year when France was still enforcing the passe sanitaire). In every case it's been a complete non-issue and we were able to get the passports without any problem. Just go to the desk that morning once the ship has been cleared, tell them you need your passport, and it will be provided. They do ask that you sign it out so that they can keep track of whose is out.

 

I can't remember which port, but once on SS when there was a local law that you had to carry a photocopy of your passport, they put a copy in our room the night before.

[labrasett]

Leaving passport with SS means they can get immigration processing done as soon as the ship arrives, in some places this can take place before the passengers are even out of bed.    You can always fetch you passport if you think you will need it ashore or ask for a photocopy which will be willingly supplied.

[CruzinFeraBruzin]

I think its a great idea that they hold on to passports, simply for safekeeping.  I wouldn't want to be in a position of losing my passport in a foreign country while on an excursion - especially on cruises where you are in a different country every day.  There are certain ports that require you to show the actual passport or a copy as you go thru immigration after you exit and before you re-board the ship, but for the most part, the ship hangs on to them for the entire voyage. About 20 years ago, I was on a land based tour in Europe and the hotels also required us to submit our passports to them, but this hasn't happened to us recently during independent travel.

[alithecat]

I recommend taking another piece of ID with you, like your drivers license. This summer on our Alaska cruise, on returning from shore excursions several times, the port security wanted to see an ID to make sure it matched the name on my ship's card. I did not travel with either my drivers license or my iPhone, since my husband had his. Silversea had my passport. Fortunately they accepted the copy of my passport saved on his phone. Lesson learned.

[ak1004]

Thank you everyone for replying. This makes perfect sense.

 

I now remember that this was the case on one of our cruises, maybe Crystal? But we sailed on Oceania in Sep.2022 and Dec.2021 and nobody took our passports. maybe it depends on the area you sail (ours were Caribbean and the US)? 

[Lonedaddy]

The took them on our regent splendor cruise around the UK and Ireland.  I kept a picture of it on my phone.  Was actually nice to not have to bring it along all the time.  It was stamped when we got it back by Ireland.