Cunard Australian Cruises Paying the extras in US Dollars

[Peal]

With the onboard account for drinks excursions etc, all charges are in US dollars. At the end of the cruise the account is charged in AUD dollars at Cunards conversion rate. I have a 28 Degrees credit card that allows me to pay in US dollars at a reasoble conversion rate. Does anyone know if -

Cunard allows customers to pay in US dollars?

Is the Cunard conversion rate reasonable?

On the QE2 for the Pacific cruise on the 20th Feb. First Cunard cruise.

[Pushka]

37 minutes ago, Peal said:

With the onboard account for drinks excursions etc, all charges are in US dollars. At the end of the cruise the account is charged in AUD dollars at Cunards conversion rate. I have a 28 Degrees credit card that allows me to pay in US dollars at a reasoble conversion rate. Does anyone know if -

Cunard allows customers to pay in US dollars?

Is the Cunard conversion rate reasonable?

On the QE2 for the Pacific cruise on the 20th Feb. First Cunard cruise.

It's always best to let the credit card do the conversion and not the merchant. All cards allow this to happen, it's a matter of whether the merchant processing allows it. Can you prepay anything?

[MicCanberra]

Prepay everything that you can, ask at the desk to pay your account of in USD.

[arxcards]

Pay your onboard folio in $US. Even if Cunard offers a reasonable conversion, 28 degrees will have the best possible conversion for the day. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

I can't see the currency details online but just checking the US amount from the cruise statement, and the AUD amount on our 28 Degrees account, from our recent Cunard cruise it looks very much like it was charged in USD and converted to AUD by 28 Degrees. I don't recall setting this up on My Cunard so it must be the default, which is what I'd expect for a cruise line operating in USD. 

[arxcards]

5 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

I can't see the currency details online but just checking the US amount from the cruise statement, and the AUD amount on our 28 Degrees account, from our recent Cunard cruise it looks very much like it was charged in USD and converted to AUD by 28 Degrees. I don't recall setting this up on My Cunard so it must be the default, which is what I'd expect for a cruise line operating in USD. 

Royal has both options, which you can choose with your online check-in. Unless it has changed since covid, they would default to doing their own conversion, so we always had it confirmed we were paying in $US at check-in. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

15 minutes ago, arxcards said:

Royal has both options, which you can choose with your online check-in. Unless it has changed since covid, they would default to doing their own conversion, so we always had it confirmed we were paying in $US at check-in. 

Princess has both options as well but I don't recall seeing that for the Cunard cruise.

[LittleFish1976]

6 hours ago, Peal said:

With the onboard account for drinks excursions etc, all charges are in US dollars. At the end of the cruise the account is charged in AUD dollars at Cunards conversion rate. I have a 28 Degrees credit card that allows me to pay in US dollars at a reasoble conversion rate. Does anyone know if -

Cunard allows customers to pay in US dollars?

Is the Cunard conversion rate reasonable?

On the QE2 for the Pacific cruise on the 20th Feb. First Cunard cruise.

 

I'm not sure where you got the information from that Cunard will charge the balance of your account to your card in AUD. My experience is that they make the charge in USD and your card does the conversion. If you want to confirm this, check with the purser's desk once you're aboard.

 

Think you'll find yourself on the QE rather than the old QE2! 😁

[Peal]

Thanks everyone. All clear now. First time on a US dollar ship. And mixing up the QE with the QE2.....

[OzKiwiJJ]

20 minutes ago, Peal said:

Thanks everyone. All clear now. First time on a US dollar ship. And mixing up the QE with the QE2.....

Have a great cruise! QE is gorgeous! Make sure you check out the pub and the library, as well as the gorgeous Queens Room. The Commodore Club is the perfect place for sailaways.

Edited February 1 by OzKiwiJJ

[resordanis]

15 hours ago, arxcards said:

Royal has both options, which you can choose with your online check-in. Unless it has changed since covid, they would default to doing their own conversion, so we always had it confirmed we were paying in $US at check-in. 

No Geoff, Royal only have the one option now, had this confirmed recently. You are correct, before Covid there was 2 options.

[Peal]

7 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Make sure you check out the pub and the library, as well as the gorgeous Queens Room. The Commodore Club is the perfect place for sailaways.

Definitely on our list, especially an afternoon tea in the Queens Room. Have 14 nights, so hopefully can take-in most of the highlights. Got a last minue deal on an obstructed oceanview, so no access to the premium Queens and Princess Grills.

[OzKiwiJJ]

24 minutes ago, Peal said:

Definitely on our list, especially an afternoon tea in the Queens Room. Have 14 nights, so hopefully can take-in most of the highlights. Got a last minue deal on an obstructed oceanview, so no access to the premium Queens and Princess Grills.

Get to the Queens Room very early for afternoon tea or you might miss out. We didn't get there in the end. The one day we tried the queue was huge.

[resordanis]

1 hour ago, Peal said:

Definitely on our list, especially an afternoon tea in the Queens Room. Have 14 nights, so hopefully can take-in most of the highlights. Got a last minue deal on an obstructed oceanview, so no access to the premium Queens and Princess Grills.

Nice scones and everything else in the Lido Bistro if you miss out and no queues, unfortunately not the white glove service though😩

[Peal]

6 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Get to the Queens Room very early for afternoon tea or you might miss out

How early do you think? 30 minutes?

[Jean C]

On 2/2/2024 at 11:10 AM, Peal said:

Thanks everyone. All clear now. First time on a US dollar ship. And mixing up the QE with the QE2.....

Many many moons ago I went on the original Queen Lizzy and Queen Mary. I had an aunt who emigrated to New York who used to visit London regularly. Before flights became mainstream, it was a trip across the Atlantic on the Queen Elizabeth or Mary. We would go to see her off and back in those days visitors could go aboard for a look around. It was very posh, even though my aunt travelled steerage class. I must put the QE2 on my bucket list, for old time's sake 😊

[OzKiwiJJ]

10 hours ago, Peal said:

How early do you think? 30 minutes?

I'm not sure exactly, probably at least 30 minutes. We got there later than intended and the queue was huge.

[Peal]

Just to follow up on my original question. I used by 28 Degrees Latitude credit card to book the Steak House. Cost was $90USD. Latitude Credit Card charge was S138.80 AUD. The XE currency converter says $90 USD = $138.11 AUD

So Latitude conversion rate is fairly resonable.

[OzKiwiJJ]

1 hour ago, Peal said:

Just to follow up on my original question. I used by 28 Degrees Latitude credit card to book the Steak House. Cost was $90USD. Latitude Credit Card charge was S138.80 AUD. The XE currency converter says $90 USD = $138.11 AUD

So Latitude conversion rate is fairly resonable.

We've always found them to have exceptionally good exchange rates. The XE graph function allows you check the rate close to the time the transaction was posted to the card, in half hour increments, so you can really get a good idea how close the Latitude rate is.

[arxcards]

1 hour ago, Peal said:

Just to follow up on my original question. I used by 28 Degrees Latitude credit card to book the Steak House. Cost was $90USD. Latitude Credit Card charge was S138.80 AUD. The XE currency converter says $90 USD = $138.11 AUD

So Latitude conversion rate is fairly resonable.

The 28 degrees conversion rate is THE daily conversion rate determined by the inter-bank rates on the day prior to the transaction (US time). XE is the live inter-bank rate, hence the minor discrepancy between the two.

 

28 degrees is the best possible rate for the day, as it is the official inter-bank rate without any commission being taken. A charge on most Australian credit/debit cards would have converted $US90 into approx $AU145.

 

PS: This is true for Latitude 28 degrees, but Latitude has other credit cards that do not have the benefit of commission free conversion. You will not get this rate on their Go mastercard you got with your 128 year interest free purchase from Harvey Norman.

Edited February 11 by arxcards
PS