New charge on NCL
 

Apparently NCL w/o any announcement has imposed a charge of $7.95 for room service delivery. I read that even NCL travel reps were not informed of this. No other cruise line has such a fee.

Along with this they have also raised the daily gratuity & now have 2 tiers; from $12 to $14.95 for regular cabins & higher for the suites; from 15% to 18% gratuity on bar purchases & I believe the pizza delivered to your cabin is higher than the original $5 fee.

The poop has hit the fan over on CC!

I saw that too. It is well over 1k posts now.

Actually, charging extra for room service is not uncommon on a lot of European cruise lines. But I can see why this is a big deal on NCL (not to mention an unwelcome change).

It is my understanding that they are "testing" this fee on two ships only; of course the entire fleet may be next.

Giro: I believe you are right.

Forgot to mention that a gratuity will now be added to the extra charge restos - I believe 18%.

As for the daily cabin increases... maybe it is valid for the suites & higher cabins increase...after all the stewards are working in much more space than the lower-priced cabins.

I think the daily fee went up marginally, from $12.00 to $12.95. We prepaid it to beat the increase for our Getaway cruise next mo.

Tipping the concierge and butler for suites has always been done separately, so I think that is just answering a call for convenience (all other tips are automatically added ... and suite guests probably didn't want to have to pull out the cash for other tips). Others may disagree, but I see this as a service.

The rest is just fee creep. Workers on ships need higher salaries, and this is how the cruise line is providing them. These increases are mostly spread among the crew, so I think that's just a fact of life.

Room service is different and (to me) not unexpected. I see the same thing happening in hotels. It's an expensive, work-intensive, time-consuming service to provide, and it's not one that's used a lot. So they are asking people who use it to subsidize keeping a certain number of workers devoted to it. I like room-service breakfast as much as anyone, but I've never had room service for anything else. What I think most ships should do is eliminate room service for everything other than certain easy-to-deliver foods and have a set breakfast menu (uncooked only). But that's just me. If I really wanted to eat breakfast in my cabin, I would probably pay for the privilege without asking because I don't do it every day.

It all depends on just which accommodation level one books, does it not? Of course, when one is in The Haven one pays more upfront. Revenue generation has ALWAYS been the goal and will continue to be so.

Is this really any different than airlines charging for so-called snacks and meals? The high price one pays in "economy" for cocktails? Baggage fees, etc., etc.?

And like the airlines the cruise lines are going to "test the waters" (no pun intended) and <B>if passengers don't protest with their feet</B> we already know the outcome.

At about the same time NCL started charging for room service on the two named ships they also, perhaps in an effort to counter balance it, made a restaurant on each ship free. On the Epic the Noodle restaurant is now no charge and I believe Asian themed restaurants on other ships are too.

My TA clarified this issue for me. She said this service charge is for the Breakaway and Getaway only. The Continental breakfast is free but it applies to all other deliveries. The expanded breakfast menu is included in this charge as is say if you want a burger or any other RS delivery.

No extra charges if you are in the Haven.

I was told this is "test" to see how it works. We'll see. For us we rarely use RS anyway. The only time I did was when I had noro while on the Connie. I have often wanted to use but the boss say no. :S-

As far as I know, the RS fee has been expanded to even older ships, like the Sun.

Last September, on HAL, even to inside cabins and even ordering off the main dining room for dinner, RS was completely free. And there was no corkage to drink wine in the cabin.

Haven't checked back with them this year.

Perhaps NCL is going the route to lower the base fare and offer lots of free extras and/or drop the base rate to rock bottom for drop n go, and hope people aren't aware of their upcharges.