Can I cash traveler's checks on board?

[arzz]

Here is an antiquated question. We used to always travel with traveler's checks. We would buy a bunch and take them on our cruises until they were gone. Simple way to carry cash. Still had some in 2020 when the pandemic curtailed our travel. Found them in a drawer recently and it turns out getting them cashed is no longer simple since no one uses them anymore. We can drive to an American Express bank and cash them … but wondering if Seabourn will cash them when we cruise in a few months?

 

Does anyone have any recent experience or knowledge?

 

Again, thank you in advance. 

[cruisr]

I haven’t used traveler checks in probably 40 years. Your post is a trip down memory lane.  
 

A quick google search said that you can deposit them in your personal bank account.  You just have to sign them in front of the bank teller and deposit them into the account matching the name on the travelers check.

[arzz]

Unfortunately your google search is probably as antiquated as my question as our local bank, which sold them to us originally, has refused to take them.

 

Thank you anyway.

[whystayhome]

That’s surprising.  My husband recently found travelers checks when cleaning out a client’s apartment, took them to her bank and voila!  They were credited to the client’s account.

 

linda

[SLSD]

You can call Seabourn and find out, but I am willing to bet that the answer is no.  

 

I did a little research just now and see that you asked this same question in something like 2012!  

 

My online research says that Carnival will cash traveler's checks, but says nothing about Seabourn.  

Edited July 16, 2023 by SLSD

[arzz]

@SLSD I probably did ask this question in 2012 when we took our first Seabourn cruise on the Pride. At that time time they cashed them and in fact if we hadn’t had them we would have been up a creek in Dubai at the end of our journey. We spent a few nights in Dubai and found our credit cards no good at most places - if the Intercontinental Hotel had not cashed them for us not sure what we would have done.  Also totally unsure why our credit cards did not work there.
 

That was almost as much fun as our trip to France some years earlier when our ATM card that our bank assured us would work in France did not work. Once again our Traveler's Checks kept us from starving.  This is why we were so loyal to Traveler's Checks. Though we do, now, finally understand that they are as antiquated as we are.  😒

[SLSD]

10 minutes ago, arzz said:

@SLSD I probably did ask this question in 2012 when we took our first Seabourn cruise on the Pride. At that time time they cashed them and in fact if we hadn’t had them we would have been up a creek in Dubai at the end of our journey. We spent a few nights in Dubai and found our credit cards no good at most places - if the Intercontinental Hotel had not cashed them for us not sure what we would have done.  Also totally unsure why our credit cards did not work there.
 

That was almost as much fun as our trip to France some years earlier when our ATM card that our bank assured us would work in France did not work. Once again our Traveler's Checks kept us from starving.  This is why we were so loyal to Traveler's Checks. Though we do, now, finally understand that they are as antiquated as we are.  😒

I remember using them years ago.  I can't remember the last time.  It might have been in the 1990s in France.  

[markham]

How much travellers checks do you have? No matter what, that’s a lot of money to tie up for 10+ years pointlessly.
 

You might as well figure out how to spend them where you live and take some large USD bills with you in the bottom of your hand luggage. And open an account with a smarter bank to advise you on credit card/debit card usage abroad. They do work.

 

Happy and healthy sailing?

[arzz]

Dubai in 2012 is the only place our credit cards did not work - ever - and there were other folks we had met on Seabourn at the time having the same difficulty. They worked for us everywhere else we have traveled, and worked fine once we left Dubai. We had advised our credit card companies where we were traveling.  What was going on in Dubai is still a mystery to us. 

 

The ATM issue happened only in France and that was many years earlier.
 

We have never had thousands tied up in traveler's checks that we did not use fairly promptly.  They were just our security blanket.  Pre-pandemic we would commonly cruise for 30 to 60 days at a time and having extra cash available was comfortable. We also used to cash unused checks as soon as we got home. We absolutely forgot about the traveler's checks in question and we are talking about hundreds here not thousands.  And we were surprised at how difficult it will be to recover the funds. 

[whogo]

Today's bank tellers have probably never seen a travelers check. Phone your bank, arzz, and find out how they intend to honor the checks they sold you. You may have to talk to the customer service rep's boss's boss. Travelers checks have the same magnetic routing codes as any other check and should be handled about like any other check.

[Mr Luxury]

I haven't used Travellers Cheques in twenty five years.

Who uses them these days.

Go back to the bank that issued them and cash them in.

[Khareef]

3 hours ago, Mr Luxury said:

I haven't used Travellers Cheques in twenty five years.

Who uses them these days.

Go back to the bank that issued them and cash them in.

provided the bank still exists...