bostoncruiser

In Galveston they do not even ask your arrival time. You just go up and they put you in one of the dozen lines to check in. Two weeks ago I had an 11:00am boarding time, arrived at 10:30 and there was almost no line as they had started boarding early. Was onboard by 10:45.

If you're in the same room just show up together and you'll be fine.

I just went through this process for our June 2022 cruise. For me, it was a super pain in the ass. I intended to use the points to pay for excursions. However when you go online to redeem the points, the OBC doesn't actually post to your account until a couple weeks before your cruise. This was not going to work for us bc by then the excursions we wanted would be gone. So i called...waited FOREVER to talk to an actual person. Was a complete cluster of an experience getting the OBC to show up immediately so we'd be able to apply it to excursions. I had $2000.00 of OBC, so for me, it was worth being on hold forever but if i had to do it over again, I would have called first and asked the customer service agent convert my points to OBC, rather than doing it on line and then calling. I had no idea when I did it, that my OBC would not post immediately. the whole process was such a pain for me, when we got home from our cruise, I cancelled credit card. 

1.  It goes on your Cruise Planner and if you do it early enough you can use it to purchase Special meals, Etc.
2.  If it's on your cruise Planner and you haven't spent it...You gratuities will be deducted from it.  Your OBC is like a checking account...You spend or the she ship uses it to pay for your tips and once its gone, you will be billed for anything over your OBC.
3. We are not sure about this one because we always pay our taxes and port charges before we ever step on the ship.

1. The last time we redeemed it was added & available for cruise planner purchases. Prior to that it was noted at check-in that we had an OBC. Thinking the timing of when you add drives that.
2. If an OBC, they'll take it for every charge until $0
3. Don't think so as that would take a FCC and not an OBC