OBC Billing ISSUE

[Timinator 58]

I recently booked a cruise with RC and received a $450 on board credit.  I bought drink packages for each of my family members.  I paid 347.48 for my sons and mine together and 189.84 for my wife’s.  It totaled 537.32 so I ended up paying 87.32 in cash.

 

347.48

189.84

537.32

(450.00)

    87.32

 

Subsequently my wife’s drink package was being offered at a bigger discount, for a total cost of 148.54 vs the 189.84 I was originally charged.  They told me to cancel the first package and repurchase the second and then what would happen is my checking account would be charged the 148.54 but within a week I would be credited the 189.84 in my checking account.  What happened is instead of getting the 189.84 back in cash, they gave me another NON REFUNDABLE use it or lose it OBC.  So this is how I look at it.

 

If I would have waited and purchased all three drink packages with my wife’s new price my cash outlay would be

 

347.48

148.54

496.02

(450.00)

   46.02 cash outlay

 

What happened is:

 

347.48 my and my sons package

189.84 my wife’s old package

148.54 my wife’s new package

685.86

(450.00)

235.86 cash outlay (a payment of 148.54 +a payment of 87.32)

(189.84) OBC credit use it or lose it

    46.02

 

Although I am made whole I have outlayed 235.86 in cash instead of the net of 46.02 and they have given me a credit to purchase more items that I may or may not want.  What can be done about this?  Every time you cancel and re book does that just build up the OBC credits?  That is not how it was presented to me.  Please help or point me in a direction I can truly get support.    THANKS!!!!

[Atlantix2000]

While you've given a lot of numbers, there's a lot of important information missing.  Normally, cruise planner purchases are refunded to the original method of payment.  So if you used OBC, it refunds as OBC and can be immediately reused.  If you paid by credit card, it gets refunded to the credit card but this does take time.  You said the refund would go to your checking account, but I didn't think it was possible to pay that way so that is confusing.  Is there a Travel Agent involved?

So here's some questions.  When is your cruise?  Are you past final payment?  If you're very close to the cruise, they might prefer to give OBC because you wouldn't get the refund before the cruise (though it seems unusually to make it non-refundable).  Are you booked under US rules?  Most answers you get here will be from US cruisers.  International rules are often different because of different consumer protection laws.  $450 in OBC is an unusually high amount.  Did it come from Royal, a Travel Agent, casino related?  And who did you speak with?  They gave the normal US answer (cancel, rebook, refund to original form of payment) but if you spoke with the US call center about an international booking you might not get the right answers.

[Pooch]

You can cash out your unused OBC at the casino.  There’s detailed instructions somewhere here from AshleyDillo.  Easy and fast.

[Timinator 58]

Atlantix,

 

Aug 6 is my cruise date. No I am not past final payment date. I assume I am booked under US rules as I am a US citizen.  The credit Card I used was s debit card and tied directly to my checking account that is why I expected the money to return to my checking account.   I paid $87 by Debit card the first time and $148 by debit card the second.  My travel agent has spoken to RC and i have spent two, 2.5 hour long conversations (mostly on hold) with various CSR reps but did not get anywhere.  In fact one time I was put on hold and no one ever came back.   I believe the $450 was from RC. Not Casino related.

[MaryCS62]

If you haven't prepaid gratuities, it can also go to that

That being said -- Royal math sucks, we've had a lot of issues with FCC not matching what it should, and my DH has had to call and email several times to fix things

[AshleyDillo]

It appears this may have been typical Royal IT failure at play. I'm not sure that it was able to handle the refunded purchase that you made since your method of payment was a combo of OBC and cash.

When processing a refund for Cruise Planner purchases, purchases made with OBC gets refunded immediately and is available for immediate use while the cash refund takes 7-10 business days to return to the original method of payment. When you did your refund it probably defaulted to refunding as OBC first as that would be immediately available for you to use to make an additional purchases.

Any OBC you do not spend in the Cruise Planner before the cruise will be available onboard when you sail. If you did not pre-pay the daily gratuities/service charge the OBC will be applied to offset that.

If you don't charge ANYTHING on the sailing, you can visit the casino onboard and use the slot machine to charge to your account to offset the OBC. 

 

 

[Timinator 58]

Thanks @AshleyDillo

Not perfect but OK.  Two more questions:

 

1) Are you saying I can use it to gamble? or can load on a machine and get the cash?

2) If other items I purchased with OBC  are lowered is there a way to cancel and re-purchase without paying out more cash only to get credits back?  The way I am currently looking at this is I should have only paid $46 in cash but have paid $236 because of an "IT glitch"

 

[Atlantix2000]

Well, honestly, the debit card MAY be the source of the issue.  There have been many long posts written (here and across the internet) why they aren't a good choice for online purchases.  I'll just sum those up by saying it's always better to spend someone else's money (the credit card company's) than your own money (your checking account).  Even if your transactions had worked the way we think they should, your checking account would still be charged twice while you waited for the refund to arrive.  What if you needed that cash for rent/utilities/etc?  With a credit card, you'd have a month for the pending charges and refunds to sort themselves out without costing you anything.

For purchases made only with OBC, this process should be both easy and instantaneous to get the lower price without costing you anything.  However, there's always a small risk that you cancel something and before you get it rebooked, other people have purchased all the remaining items leaving you with nothing.  Excursions, restaurants, and dining/beverage packages can and do sell out.

[Moby Dick]

21 minutes ago, Atlantix2000 said:

Well, honestly, the debit card MAY be the source of the issue.  There have been many long posts written (here and across the internet) why they aren't a good choice for online purchases.  I'll just sum those up by saying it's always better to spend someone else's money (the credit card company's) than your own money (your checking account).  Even if your transactions had worked the way we think they should, your checking account would still be charged twice while you waited for the refund to arrive.  What if you needed that cash for rent/utilities/etc?  

Yes!  Also, in the U.S. a "debit card" offers no dispute protection, by law.  A "debit card" only offers a banking facility promises.  A "credit card", by law, offers many protections, less now than it used to be, but still a lot more than a "debit card" offers.  

I also agree, use someone else's money.  And if you are paying back in time, you are paying back with inflated $$$$$ and I hope with a well researched C.C. company rate of %. I'm paying 7.4%, right now.  Yes, it could go up, I understand that.  But, with this CU, I'll always be quite a bit lower than other financial institutions.  

Happy sailing!

[AshleyDillo]

2 hours ago, Timinator 58 said:

) Are you saying I can use it to gamble? or can load on a machine and get the cash?

Load it to a slot machine as a room charge, cash out and redeem the ticket. No need to gamble with it if you don't want to.

There's no way to guarantee a refund is going to be processed the way you want if it is a mixed payment between OBC and cash.

The best way to prevent this is to only choose to use the OBC when your purchase is less than the OBC balance you have. This way you aren't splitting a payment up between different methods of payment.

Just remember if you paid fully in cash and are trying to repurchase for a lower price, you have to front the full amount of the new purchase price while you wait for the refund to process to your card.

[Reigert2008]

Another thing to look for is whose purchases were put on the credit card.in my experience, the OBC starts with the person named first and then goes to the second and so on.  I suspect your wife’s package was paid for fully with OBC this the refund in OBC.  If you booked everything at once, the last person on the receipt is probably the once that went to the credit card.

 

example (made up numbers)

OBC available $50

i buy two drink packages for $100 each

myself — $100
my wife — $100

when I use the OBC, it goes to my drink package

myself — $50 OBC, $50 credit card

my wife — $100 credit card

 

 if I cancel just my package, I expect to get $50 in OBV and $50 to the credit card.

however, if I cancel just my wife’s package I expect to get $100 back to the credit card.

 

once again,this has been my experience when repricing, but YMMV