VAT aboard the ships?

[liddia]

We are booked on Symphony of the Seas next May for a Med cruise. I've been reading up on what to expect on a Med cruise and one thing I've seen mentioned is VAT. I've seen it mentioned when it comes to making a pricey purchase on land, but today I came across a post saying that there is VAT added to drink purchases aboard the ship, making the tax a whopping 28%! Does anyone know if this is true? If it is, would I be better off to purchase the drink package? My husband and I aren't big drinkers and this is a port intensive cruise with only one sea day, so not a lot of time to drink anyway.

[DocLC]

I don't recall seeing this on my two Northern Europe sailings. Perhaps this is only when docked?

[tiny260]

We cruised on Harmony in 2016, probably the same Mediterranean itinerary that Symphony is going to take, I looked on some old receipt's I kept and a $32.40 bill from Sabor had a $2.72 cent tax on it.   

[DocLC]

3 hours ago, tiny260 said:

We cruised on Harmony in 2016, probably the same Mediterranean itinerary that Symphony is going to take, I looked on some old receipt's I kept and a $32.40 bill from Sabor had a $2.72 cent tax on it.   

Do you remember if you were at sea or in port at the time?

[tiny260]

Sorry, DocLC, I would have to look at the receipt again, because we ate at Sabor multiple times. I want to say that yes we were at sea, I will check again and let everyone know.

[tiny260]

I looked and I still can't answer your question totally, because that western Mediterranean the departure times were so different and can't tell by just the time printed to know if I was at sea or not. What I did see today that I didn't last night was there was another line labeled "Service Charge", so for the above check there was a $1.15 service charge. So then I found another receipt that was definitely on a sea day for Sabor, that had a tax but no service charge.

So where I think you are going is that while in port the VAT applies (Probably as a service charge on the receipt) and at sea it doesn't.

Hope this helps.

[L454S]

Onboard the Rhapsody now in the Med. No taxes on the T/A from Tampa, but since Barcelona(B2B), there is a tax added no matter if we were in Spain, France and now Italy. It seems to be as others have posted, just under 10% on food like Giovani's. However, buying pictures in the ships photo shop was taxed at 21%. It does state in the compass that foods and drinks will be taxed at 21%.  Drink purchases made with the preloaded 3 drinks for Diamond have not incurred added charges to us.

 

I know that does NOT clear things up, but just wanted to post current information.

[dorts]

It all really depends on the itinerary. If a cruise leaves from Barcelona on a closed loop with stops only in EU countries then tax will be applied to all onboard purchases as far as I can tell. Up to 21% (on top of automatic 18% gratuity). A caveat though: any pre-purchased packages such as dining and drink and specialty restaurant reservations before the cruise will not have the tax added so best to do this probably before sailing. However, if your cruise, such as my upcoming Med cruise, stops at a non-EU country (Montenegro in my instance) then the tax will only be added while in Spanish waters. Therefore, for the first few hours of your cruise do not buy anything really onboard to avoid the tax. If you have a drink package then you can begin using this in port and in Spanish waters immediately without tax being added but buying on a pay-as-you-go basis will for the first few hours. A little complicated but hope this helps :)

[tiny260]

Thanks, L454S and dorts, that explains a lot, I still had my cruise compasses from my trip, and thought they explained the VAT in one of them but couldn't find it, it might have been on a separate sheet of paper and I threw it away...