Using OBC to pay for gratuities on HAL

[Mandalay1903]

11 hours ago, cruzn single said:

Just last week I had a lot of non-refundable OBC.  On the last evening of the cruise I went to Guest Services and signed a paper to transfer that $$$ to the Crew Appreciation fund.  Easy peasy.  I had a little refundable credit which they gave me in cash.

That sure beats buying up a lot of HAL logo clothing at the gift shop. 👍👍

[Haljo1935]

37 minutes ago, Mandalay1903 said:

That sure beats buying up a lot of HAL logo clothing at the gift shop. 👍👍

An optimal solution would be for HAL to sell HAL gift cards onboard like Carnival does - then we could all just use non-refundable OBC to buy the gift cards. 

Win-win-win-win: HAL ensures (mostly) future bookings, we get real value from OBC, no loading up on overpriced stuff, we have a head start on next cruise or can gift them to others.

[rodndonna]

3 minutes ago, Haljo1935 said:

An optimal solution would be for HAL to sell HAL gift cards onboard like Carnival does - then we could all just use non-refundable OBC to buy the gift cards. 

Win-win-win-win: HAL ensures (mostly) future bookings, we get real value from OBC, no loading up on overpriced stuff, we have a head start on next cruise or can gift them to others.

 

Is there as much non-refundable OBC typically on a Carnival cruise though?

 

We haven't sailed Carnival since Covid, but it seems with HAL we are typically ending up with much more non-refundable OBC than we ever did with Carnival (maybe just a post Covid thing?). I can see HAL wanting their generosity in  OBC to be used up sooner rather than later and not allowing it to be gifted to others.

 

[Haljo1935]

34 minutes ago, rodndonna said:

 

Is there as much non-refundable OBC typically on a Carnival cruise though?

 

We haven't sailed Carnival since Covid, but it seems with HAL we are typically ending up with much more non-refundable OBC than we ever did with Carnival (maybe just a post Covid thing?). I can see HAL wanting their generosity in  OBC to be used up sooner rather than later and not allowing it to be gifted to others.

 

Probably not as much, but any to waste or leave on the table is too much, IMO.

Last month's B2B on Carnival I had $200 at the end of the first week, which, of course, couldn't be used the 2nd week. So on the last night of wk 1 to close out my account, I got a $200 gift card. Then the next day after the 2nd week started, I put that gift card on my account so I had $200 OBC to use.😊

On HAL, I could not have done that.

[DaveOKC]

Wish there was a way to use OBC for extra tips for selected persons (such as room stewards).  Anyone know if this is possible?