Cruise pricing just got a little more transparent as Royal Caribbean and Carnival both now show the full price of a cruise including taxes and fees on their websites.
That change reflected a California law that required cruise lines to show the complete price, and it was impractical for either cruise company to show different prices in different states.
That change does not affect the price of your cruise; it just provides transparency. Both Carnival and Royal Caribbean are simply showing the fare you pay at checkout.
Related: Royal Caribbean makes a major beverage package change
You can't opt not to pay your port taxes and fees. Even if you choose never to leave the ship, the cruise line must pay those fees to its destinations for every passenger.
Neither Royal Caribbean nor Carnival includes daily gratuities in their published prices. That's because those fees are technically optional, even though they will be added each day unless you specifically make a change at Guest Services.
Some passengers, however, would like to see Royal Caribbean make a different change to its pricing. They want the cruise line to copy what it offers on its Celebrity Cruises brand: offer an all-inclusive price that includes a drink package and internet.
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Royal Caribbean International CEO Michael Bayley commented on that possibility in response to a question during his annual President's Cruise on Allure of the Seas.
Image source: Dan Kline/Come Cruise With Me
Royal Caribbean has a clear pricing plan
Cruisers who are going to buy internet and a drink package often prefer an all-included price. The benefit is that when they book the cabin and the add-ons together, they can pay for all of it over time, up until the day that the final payment is due. If a passenger instead books a cabin and then later requests the add-ons, they must pay for the add-ons immediately and in full.
Bayley was asked about all-inclusive prices by "Gail from Alaska" during an open question-and-answer session during the President's Cruise, Royal Caribbean Blog reported. (The blog is unaffiliated with the company.)
"I've heard a rumor that the pricing structure for cruising in America is going to be changed to an all-inclusive pricing structure. Is that correct?" she asked.
Bayley was quick to shoot down the idea that the cruise planned to make that change.
"Royal Caribbean is not going in that direction," he said. "I don't think we have any plans to roll it all up into one price."
Bayley added that due to the scale of the Royal Caribbean brand, it makes more sense for the company to give its customers choices.
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Royal Caribbean has been setting records
In many ways, Bayley could justify not making changes because there's no reason to fix what isn't broken. Royal Caribbean, and its sister brands, Celebrity Cruises and Silversea, have been performing quite well.
Royal Caribbean Group Chief Executive Jason Liberty talked about that during the cruise line's first-quarter earnings call.
"The first quarter was tremendous, sending us well on our path to a year that is significantly better than we expected just a few months back," he said. "Wave season combined with a record-breaking introduction of the revolutionary Icon of the Seas resulted in consistently robust bookings at much higher prices than 2023."
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The company expects its success to continue.
"This strong booking and pricing environment across all key itineraries coupled with continued strength in onboard spend led to higher revenue in the first quarter and a further improvement in full-year yield expectations," Liberty added.
Booking "has consistently outpaced last year throughout the entire first quarter and through April, even though we have significantly fewer staterooms left to sell, leading to higher pricing for all of our key products," he said.
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