In this video you're going to discover the nine things that cruise lines don't
tell you, and don't want you to know. Hi I'm Gary Bembridge and this is another
of my Tips For Travellers. Please subscribe to the channel and you'll
never miss the next video packed full of travel tips and advice. The first thing
that cruise lines don't tell you and don't want you to know is that the ports
that are listed on your itinerary are not guaranteed. The cruise lines are able
to, at the captain's discretion, change or not call into a port if it's deemed that
it's either unsaf,e the weather's too bad or the some incident that prevents them
or they feel it's not suitable going into that port. So the cruise line
doesn't tell you upfront that you may not go to all of the ports that are
listed on your itinerary. Of course they normally do a try and do everything they
possibly can to make all the ports, so for example I've actually been on a
cruise where half of the six ports that we were due to call on we never made it
to, and I've been on many other cruises where one or two of the port's have had
to be cancelled or skipped. Normally it's due to weather.
Another thing that the cruise lines don't tell you, but it's very important
to know, is that the cruise ships do not wait for passengers who are late back to
the ship. Perhaps they have gone self touring and have lost track of time and don't
get back by the all aboard and departure time. If you've gone on a cruise
line excursion and it's running late, the ship will wait for that. But if you are late
back to the ship and the ship has left without you, they also leave you on your
own. It's up to you to make your own plans and either get yourself back to
the ship or head home. They do not provide support and help. Often the
port agent will try and be as helpful as possible. Also if you have a medical
emergency and you have to leave the ship for medical reasons, the cruise line will
also then leave you to then sort it out yourself. So again very important to make
sure that you have travel insurance to cover yourself if you are perhaps late
back to ship and stranded in port, or if you do have a medical issue, then the
ship will not wait for you and also the cruise line will take no responsibility
for sorting you out if you are left behind. Another thing that the cruise
lines don't tell you and don't talk about is about crime. Now crime does
happen on a ship. The good news is though the level of crime is likely to be much
lower than it is on land. Now it gets a little bit murky in terms of the
statistics and no one's 100% sure of how much crime that's actually
happened on cruise ships, because there's no strict regulations about where crime
gets reported - and who gets reported to. Now in terms of the reported crime
statistics, which are pretty low, the main reported crime is actually assault
and sexual assault. Now bear in mind these numbers though are pretty small.
It's also not known how much for example theft takes place because it's
felt that many of these statistics on small theft are probably not reported, and
just sorted out within the ship. So bear in mind when you go aboard a cruise ship
you're not entering a guaranteed crime free. Most cruise ships also have some
kind of prison facility. Now this may just be a room with very little
furniture and where, if there is a member crew or a passenger that needs to
actually be held in a prison situation, there is normally space onboard which is
known as the brig. One of the things that cruise lines do not talk about is
that they do dump a lot of stuff into the ocean. There are very very strict
rules and regulations about what can and cannot be put into the ocean, and in fact
Cruise Lines follows some stricter regulations than they are required to
by maritime law. So let's take a look at what actually they are allowed to put
into the ocean. They are allowed to put in to the ocean sewerage once
they're into international waters. The maritime regulations actually allow you
to put untreated sewage into the sea, however cruise lines follow the CLIA
(the Cruise Line Association) regulations where they only put treated sewage into
the sea. Food waste is also normally processed. It's crushed down turned into
almost a liquid form and this can also be released into the ocean once they
head into international waters. Grey water is another key side product of
cruise ships, so this is stuff that comes out of the showers, perhaps from washing
dishes, and again this water is normally treated and is able to be put into the
ocean. All glass is separated into color, its crushed down and put into bags and
is disembarked in certain ports and they sold on to people who do recycling.
Also your cabin steward and other people on board and the environmental
team will make sure that all other waste is sorted, so paper, plastics, etc is
sorted. Many cruise ships will incinerate a lot of rubbish but are
not allowed to put that ash into the ocean and it gets taken off when
in port. There is very strict regulations though on things like
chemicals, that are used perhaps for creating photographs, cooking oil and those
type of products and they are not allowed to put those into the ocean. So those have
to be packed up and they are disembarked in a port. One thing I recommend you do
is if there ever is there behind-the-scenes tour which includes
meeting the environmental officer, do it because it's really interesting to go
and have a look at the whole recycling and the treatment plant on board a
cruise ship - and they will explain in much more detail with that specific ship does
in terms of getting rid of waste. Of course the other thing to realize is that
cruise ships do have a pretty big carbon footprint. The cruise industry is trying
to improve it, so there are more regulations around the type of fuel used,
how much fuel is used, the speed that they travel and of course looking for
alternative forms to make it more eco-friendly - but of course it does have
a big carbon footprint. The next thing I want to talk about is that people do go
missing off cruise ships. Up to 19 people go overboard or missing from a cruise
ship every year. Now bear in mind there are millions and millions of people that
go cruising, so the number is pretty small. Also bear in mind that it is
pretty much impossible to fall off a cruise ship. Anyone who's been on a cruise
ship will note that the railings are pretty high, and so most people go
overboard tend to have done it because they've either deliberately jumped
overboard or they've been very drunk and irresponsible and done things like
climbed up on the railings. Whilst we're looking at this slightly ghoulish
side of cruising, the other thing that cruise lines don't tell you is that they
do have a morgue and they're also required to carry body bags. Most
publicly available reports say that up to 200 people a year die on board a
cruise ship, most tend to be elderly passengers. So the numbers dying on board
are relatively low when you consider the huge amount of people that go cruising,
and most of the deaths are due to natural causes.
If someone dies on board the normal procedure is to take people off at the
nearest port, have a death certificate and repatriate them home. If you hear
over the public address system "Operation Rising Star" that indicates that there
has been a death on board. The other thing that cruise
lines don't tell you very overtly is that although they're owned normally by
American, or perhaps British owners, they register the ships in foreign places
particularly Liberia, Panama and the Bahamas. The reason for this is they then
do not have to follow the rules of their country where they are owned, they don't
follow US. rules or the UK rules, and they can follow the rules of the
country where they're registered, and those countries which are flags of
convenience countries tend to have much more liberal employment laws,
environmental laws, safety laws. So actually the cruise lines are able to
operate their ships with less strict regulations than they would if they're
registered for example in the United States.
Another thing the cruise lines don't really tell you upfront is
that their cancellation policies are incredibly tight and very very strict. So
of course it's buried within the cruise contract, but importantly make sure that
you understand what the cancellation conditions are when you book a cruise. So
for example in many cases you will lose up to 25 percent of the cruise fare if
you cancel up to 90 days, now normally what that means is whatever deposit
you've paid. You will usually lose between 90 days and 60 days you can
lose anything up to 50% or sometimes even 75% of the cruise fare if you
cancel. And after 60 days and certainly after 30 days you're going to lose
anything between 75% and 100% of the fare. Also importantly
many cruise lines count a name change as a cancellation. So if you have perhaps
traveling with a friend or a partner and they have to drop out for whatever
reason and you want to substitute someone, many Cruise Lines will
count that as a cancellation. Make sure that you understand what the
cancellation charges or penalties are going to be and take up travel insurance
that's going to cover cancellations, because you never know what's going to
happen - particularly booking a cruise way in advance.
Another thing that cruise lines don't tell you is when you book and buy your
ticket you're actually accepting the cruise contract. So you're not given
the cruise contract to look at, but it's in the brochure or you can look
at it online. You are agreeing when you buy your ticket and
pay for the ticket to the contract. A couple of things that people don't
always understand that the contract includes are some of
the following: so for example there's normally a clause that says that the
cruise line is able to search you and your cabin whenever they want to without
having giving you a very strong reason to do that. Secondly they're also saying
they take no liability for contractors. Now many of the facilities on board
like photography, the spa perhaps lecturers are not normally
employed or often not employed by the cruise line, and the cruise line is
saying that they will have no liability if there's any issues. That even in many
cases includes medical facilities, which are often contracted out to a separate
company. The third area is around photography. Often in the cruise
contract it will say that the cruise line can take images of you, and they are
able to use that in marketing or even advertising in many cases without
rewarding you. On the other side sometimes cruise contracts state that if
you take images they can also stop you using them whether it's on social media
that can ask you to take them down or whether you want to use them on blogs or
whatever. So sometimes in the cruise contracts it actually restricts what you
can do with your own photographs. Also very very importantly, the cruise contact
will normally state where if there's any litigation or legal dispute where the
jurisdiction is going to be. They can decide to name a particular court so if
you ever end up having to get into dispute with the cruise line, and go to
court, they will in the cruise contract to determine where that court will be -
and of course they're likely to have chosen a court or jurisdiction which
they think is going to be best for them. I hope you find that helpful and has given
you something to think about. What I'd love you to do if you've
enjoyed this video is to watch many more of my Tips For Travellers videos and
you'll get more travel inspiration, advice and tips.