Cash, travellers cheques or credit cards

[Hockeychic]

I am trying to decide how much actual cash I need to have on a cruise. How I know pretty much everyone is charged to your room so that isn't a problem. I am worried about on the Islands??

Do you use cash, travellers cheques, credit cards???? Is it safe to use credit cards.

Sorry for my ignorance but this is my first time leaving North America.....

Thanks

Kim

 

[jgalecpa]

I am trying to decide how much actual cash I need to have on a cruise. How I know pretty much everyone is charged to your room so that isn't a problem. I am worried about on the Islands??

Do you use cash, travellers cheques, credit cards???? Is it safe to use credit cards.

Sorry for my ignorance but this is my first time leaving North America.....

Thanks

Kim

Dear Kim,

These are great questions.

I travel quite a bit outside the US and I use all three on any given trip (plus, often my ATM).

Mexico tends to have a higher incidence of credit card fraud, so I would recommend cash or Travellers cheques there.

In any US territory or port, Credit cards are fine.

In other places, what you use depends often on the "foreign transaction fee" (if any) that a credit card company might charge, and also any "foreign currency Translation fee" that can be charged as well.

If I were going on a seven night cruise to foreign ports, I would take about $1,000 in travellers cheques with me.

I would have about $500 cash and also carry credit cards.

I would always use the TC's in mexico first, then cash.

In other countries it would depend on how I "felt" about the business I was with. The bigger the business, the more comfortable I would feel.

While TC's seem to be going the way of the IBM Selectric typewriter, I still feel they serve an important use in these kind of travels.

As the cruise progesses, I use my remaining TC's to pay down/off my DCL room charge, so I often leave the cruise with minimal Charge cards or Room bills.

Of course, I would NEVER hesitate to give DCL my credit card.

Hope this helps!

Jim

PS If you are spending money in a foreign currency (like Euros), it is almost always a better deal to use an ATM and get local cash.

 

[bbowers]

One more thing we certainly didn't think of last year - if you happen to be travelling after a bad storm/hurricane has struck the islands... their phone lines (used for approving credit cards) may not be functioning and you may not be able to use your credit cards. We ran into that last September, which put an abrupt halt to our shopping at Nassau! Luckily we only wanted t-shirts anyway and DH had enough cash on him (and I hadn't even brought my purse).

 

[tvguy]

We took $1000 in travelers checks, $800 in cash, and a credit card. I did have an ATM card too, but I don't feel comfortable using that because the fraud protections aren't as strong as with a credit card (although some banks do offer fraud protection on ATM and Debit cards, but they sometime except purchases made outside the U.S.

 

[Hockeychic]

Great thank you all for the info.

Kim

 

[kg66]

We go with the TC's too, but I recently saw on TV that they are going to start offering a TC card that looks like a CC, and it records your balance as you go, no more carrying all the papers, and easier to keep track of. I'm hoping that these are available in Canada before our next vacation in March 2006. Have a great time. If you're hesitant, cash your TC's at Guest Services before you get off the ship at the port each morning you're docked at a new island.