How much onboard credit do I need?

[Angeliki19]

I “give” myself an Onboard Credit to cover my expected charges. It can be done online under Gifts.

I do not pay gratuities with the cruise fare - I include it as part of my Onboard Credit; it is deducted automatically from that balance.

I typically make my “gift” 1-2 weeks before sailing (that’s also when I buy the gift cards online from target. They arrive via e-mail fairly soon after order; 3 hours or sooner. I think there is a $ limit.)

I don’t want to tie up money in Disney Gift Cards if there’s a significant chance I wouldn’t sail.

I am more likely to underestimate my expenses and just have the extra go on my credit card (a shore excursion may get cancelled).

Also, if you are considering a future cruise, I think the Placeholder/ Future Cruise Deposit ($250) can go on Room credit/gift cards

Thank you! So helpful! This is exactly what I am trying to do. I will wait until 1-2 weeks out as you said because I don't want to put too much on gift cards in case disaster strikes and we can't go.

 

[Angeliki19]

Not sure if anyone asked, how long is your cruise? This will make a big difference.

7 nights.

 

[Angeliki19]

OP here- another question- is it possible to assign OBC to specific people in the room? LIke can I give each of my children $50 of OBC to use at their discretion, or is it all just lumped together?

 

[lanejudy]

LIke can I give each of my children $50 of OBC to use at their discretion, or is it all just lumped together?

It's just 1 amount for the cabin. The kids can either have charging privileges allowed or you can revoke them. But you would need to watch the amount spent and turn off each kid's charging when your limit was hit.

 

[71 Truck]

7 nights.

My wife and I do 7 night cruises. We pre pay our 4 tipping positions when we book our cruise. We will tip additional money to those positions in cash.

We do not do excursions.
We do not buy picture packages.
We have no children.


We will put down $1000.00 using our Disney Visa. It is used for Tastings, Lounge bills and additional tips to bartenders, gifts in the stores and the Pallo server tip( we are Platinum so we don't pay for Pallo).
We also will buy internet at some point during the cruise so my wife can keep in touch with her elderly father and the person who takes care of our house while we are away.

Most cruises we usually go over that amount but not by much. This last cruise we did not use it all so the balance went back on the credit card.

 

[Disney Mickey&Minnie Fan]

Did you see the items OP specified? THAT is what I am basing my estimate on.
Beverage tastings run $40-$70 a person
Dinner at Remy is $125 plus tip. 20% tip puts it at $150
Excursions range from $58 to $449 per person per port. (3 ports, $174) (most excursions are around $100.
Automatic gratuities are $133 per person for a 7 day. Most folks add something more to that.

That's $496 MINIMUM given what OP listed.
Take a more typical $100 excursion in three ports, you're at $622. Give your Cabin Steward, Server, Assistant Server and Head Waiter $20 extra each, you're at $702. Add a second beverage tasting (the OP said tastingS) you're at$742 And that is with NO adult beverages (alcoholic or coffee) other than the tasting. And that is nothing for souvenirs. And it includes nothing for meals if you choose to eat on shore in ports. It adds up quickly.
Nothing wrong with spending less that the budget, but I think my budget estimate is pretty responsible given what the OP listed.

Thank you for mentioning the extra tip amounts for the Cabin Steward, Server, Assistant Server, and the Head Waiter. We have always packed extra cash to tip the cruise staff working these positions. Place the cash in the envelops provided on the cruise ship and hand to the staff members on the last night. We usually tip the cabin steward a bit more.

 

[auntlynne]

OP here- another question- is it possible to assign OBC to specific people in the room? LIke can I give each of my children $50 of OBC to use at their discretion, or is it all just lumped together?

When I travel with my sister, I give the OBC to myself. But I am also the person responsible for my onboard charges - our folio shows separate charges and balance owed.

I have heard that you can use the physical gift card in the shops.

You could experiment for us and see if you can put an OBC on your kid’s account. I think it might work. And now I am curious…

Since you will select that you are responsible for the charges for persons x, y, z in your cabin (which includes gratuities if not pre-paid and shore excursions), it is probably easier to just tell them they have money in the account to spend or give them gift cards to use in the shop.

Whatever works best for you. Just throwing out ideas (from a person who doesn’t travel with kids).

 

[Angeliki19]

I “give” myself an Onboard Credit to cover my expected charges. It can be done online under Gifts.

I do not pay gratuities with the cruise fare - I include it as part of my Onboard Credit; it is deducted automatically from that balance.

I typically make my “gift” 1-2 weeks before sailing (that’s also when I buy the gift cards online from target. They arrive via e-mail fairly soon after order; 3 hours or sooner. I think there is a $ limit.)

I don’t want to tie up money in Disney Gift Cards if there’s a significant chance I wouldn’t sail.

I am more likely to underestimate my expenses and just have the extra go on my credit card (a shore excursion may get cancelled).

Also, if you are considering a future cruise, I think the Placeholder/ Future Cruise Deposit ($250) can go on Room credit/gift cards

It's just 1 amount for the cabin. The kids can either have charging privileges allowed or you can revoke them. But you would need to watch the amount spent and turn off each kid's charging when your limit was hit.

When I travel with my sister, I give the OBC to myself. But I am also the person responsible for my onboard charges - our folio shows separate charges and balance owed.

I have heard that you can use the physical gift card in the shops.

You could experiment for us and see if you can put an OBC on your kid’s account. I think it might work. And now I am curious…

Since you will select that you are responsible for the charges for persons x, y, z in your cabin (which includes gratuities if not pre-paid and shore excursions), it is probably easier to just tell them they have money in the account to spend or give them gift cards to use in the shop.

Whatever works best for you. Just throwing out ideas (from a person who doesn’t travel with kids).

So when I go to the gift section, and choose Onboard Credit, it looks like I have to provide a recipient. That's why I was wondering if somehow they keep it separate for each person. I will certainly try it out and see if it works, but I am also expecting it to be like LaneJudy said and it will just all be together. That is fine too.

 

[Mommb]

Whether or not the credit is applied separately, you can tell your kids how much each has available to spend, and you can monitor their individual spending in the Navigator app onboard. The folio for your account will list the spending by passenger.

 

[Mike Marzano]

... If you spend more, you can stop by Guest Services to apply a gift card. Do this before the last day, when GS gets busy.

On our Nov cruise, charges hit my on file credit card multiple times throughout the cruise. So I would definitely suggest every few days.

@Angeliki19 as a frame of reference we are a Family of 3 (Son is 15). When we did the Very Merry Time cruise on the Fantasy at the end of November (7 night eastern Caribbean), charges to my band were around $1100, my wife's $1400, and our son's $500. My wife and I did a kick off tasting at the juice bar, Remy Dinner, Palo chocolate liquor tasting. All 3 of us did the Sting Ray Adventure at Castaway, Canopy/Zipline, and one other excursion that included Megan's Bay Beach. Our son had a non-alcoholic specialty drink with every dinner. My wife is more into alcohol than me. And that includes the automatically charged gratuities and purchases at the gift shops and pop-corn and specialty buckets for movies.

You can view the charges in the app as you go. So you can have an idea of when to visit the front desk with more gift cards if you didn't put enough credit on your room.

I did try doing the onboard credit using my Disney Visa, as someone said it was eligible for the 6 month 0%, but it went as a regular charge, not the 6month/0% thing.

 

[dad of 3 addicted to DCL]

Yes, I agree!!! Every little bit helps. Thank you for reminding me about the Remy tip.. very helpful!

We have never done the internet packages but we have only done 3 day-cruises before. This is our first 7-day, so I guess maybe we should think about it. Do you have one you recommend? I do not want my kids to have wifi.. I want them to unplug. So it would just be me and my husband using it periodically just to check in at home?

My wife & I get the mid tier package for the both of us so that we have good communications with the kids [in college].

Of note, we debarked Magic the morning and we overran our OBC by $12. That made me happy

 

[71 Truck]

On our Nov cruise, charges hit my on file credit card multiple times throughout the cruise. So I would definitely suggest every few days.

@Angeliki19 as a frame of reference we are a Family of 3 (Son is 15). When we did the Very Merry Time cruise on the Fantasy at the end of November (7 night eastern Caribbean), charges to my band were around $1100, my wife's $1400, and our son's $500. My wife and I did a kick off tasting at the juice bar, Remy Dinner, Palo chocolate liquor tasting. All 3 of us did the Sting Ray Adventure at Castaway, Canopy/Zipline, and one other excursion that included Megan's Bay Beach. Our son had a non-alcoholic specialty drink with every dinner. My wife is more into alcohol than me. And that includes the automatically charged gratuities and purchases at the gift shops and pop-corn and specialty buckets for movies.

You can view the charges in the app as you go. So you can have an idea of when to visit the front desk with more gift cards if you didn't put enough credit on your room.

I did try doing the onboard credit using my Disney Visa, as someone said it was eligible for the 6 month 0%, but it went as a regular charge, not the 6month/0% thing.

My wife and I were on the Fantasy in December 2023. We book our cruise through our travel agent. When we place our on board credit on our account using our Disney Visa we have her do it and it is done at 0% for six months.
I am not sure if it makes a difference that she does it for us.

This is a link to a post that discuses this topic.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/b...disney-chase-for-0-apr.3939820/#post-65310606

 

[Mike Marzano]

My wife and I were on the Fantasy in December 2023. We book our cruise through our travel agent. When we place our on board credit on our account using our Disney Visa we have her do it and it is done at 0% for six months.
I am not sure if it makes a difference that she does it for us.

This is a link to a post that discuses this topic.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/b...disney-chase-for-0-apr.3939820/#post-65310606

I am a TA. I had not done that before, I asked others at my Earmarked host agency they didn't know either. So I called Disney's agent line. Unfortunately he way they instructed me to do it, did not work as 6month/0%.

 

[71 Truck]

I am a TA. I had not done that before, I asked others at my Earmarked host agency they didn't know either. So I called Disney's agent line. Unfortunately he way they instructed me to do it, did not work as 6month/0%.

In the past we have always had our travel agent do all of our on board credit, pre pay our tips and any purchases (room decorations, cheese tray, beer) before we get on the ship.

Every Disney cruise we have done since we got our Disney visa credit card, and it has been several, we have always gotten the 0% for 6 months.

Not sure how our travel agent had done it however I do remember someone saying it all had to be done a certain number of days before you sail. I heard it can't be done to get the 0% for six month once on the ship at guest services, once again not sure how true any of this is.

Here are some links to other post about the 0% for 6 months deal.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/b...disney-chase-for-0-apr.3939820/#post-65310606

https://www.disboards.com/threads/disney-visa-0-interest-on-pre-purchased-onboard-credit.3934255/

 

[BZW]

I have a few questions regarding onboard credits. This will be the first time we have added credits to our account prior to the cruise. I am curious if we should also put down a credit card? If we do put down a credit card, will they automatically use our onboard credits prior to charging our card?

Thanks in advance!

 

[sponica]

We always figure about $1,000 per person.

Honestly, this jives with about what we spent on a 4 night. Two beverage tastings, the photo package, Palo brunch, BBB and pirates league, and a couples massage. Add in the drinks at dinner and on the pool deck and on castaway cay and some souvenirs.

And my husband sent some laundry to be cleaned which was a pretty penny.

And I got internet on the last day to check on the dog as I was still getting news alerts and there was weather that had gone through the area.

 

[sponica]

I have a few questions regarding onboard credits. This will be the first time we have added credits to our account prior to the cruise. I am curious if we should also put down a credit card? If we do put down a credit card, will they automatically use our onboard credits prior to charging our card?

Thanks in advance!

They'll run through any credits first before they charge the card. I had put credit on my account and then went to guest services and added my rewards to the account and some gift cards. We like to spend money on vacation.....they run the card on file after all the credit is exhausted.

 

[BZW]

They'll run through any credits first before they charge the card. I had put credit on my account and then went to guest services and added my rewards to the account and some gift cards. We like to spend money on vacation.....they run the card on file after all the credit is exhausted.

Thank you! We like to spend money too LOL.

 

[RedHead0186]

I have a few questions regarding onboard credits. This will be the first time we have added credits to our account prior to the cruise. I am curious if we should also put down a credit card? If we do put down a credit card, will they automatically use our onboard credits prior to charging our card?

Thanks in advance!

PP already stated that they will use up onboard credits first. I would still also put down a credit card. If you don't, and you go through all your onboard credits, they'll freeze your ability to charge things to your account. It can be resolved by a trip to guest services to make a payment; however, for me that's more hassle than it's worth when I could just have a card automatically run before that happens.

 

[Angeliki19]

OP here- so I purchased some OBC by "gifting" myself with a gift card. It said I would get a confirmation email, but that still hasn't come. I know sometimes Disney IT is not the best, but I am nervous I just put down $1000 and it's lost somewhere. Is there any other way to confirm this before I get on the cruise? I want to add more but not until I have some way to verify that the first amount went through ok.