I need to know the amount that cruise ships (visiting the Caribbean)
charge passengers to make outgoing telephone calls to the USA and
Canada, per minute in US dollars. Also, are passengers charged for
receiving phone calls?

Hello.

The cruise lines charge anywhere from $6 to $10 per minute to make
outgoing ship-to-shore calls.

On Carnival...
"From all phones you can make direct calls home via satellite for
$6.99 per minute to the U.S,Canada, and Caribbean Islands, $9.99 per
minute for international calls."
http://www.lifeiscruising.com/communication

Norwegian Sky (Norwegian Cruise Line)
" going satellite phone rate (currently about $6 per minute)"
http://www.expedia.com/daily/ships/P19603.asp?CCheck=1

The cruise ship will not charge you to receive a call. However, the
person calling you will be the one hit with big charges (i.e., up to
$10 per minute).

Many cruise lines use the INMARSAT phone system:
http://www.inmarsat.com/contact_phone.cfm

Or the MARISAT system:
1-800-MARISAT

Or Maritime Telecommunications Network's (MTN) OceanPhone
http://www.mtnsat.com/enhanced_shoretoship.htm
(Note a $7.95 per minute charge is listed on that web page).

Princess Cruise line uses a 900 number:
1-900-CALL-SHIP (with a $9 per minute charge)
see:
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&client=googlet&selm=ezqJ8.20447%24lk6.2043963431%40newssvr10.news.prodigy.com&prev=/groups%3Fq%3D900-call-ship%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26client%3Dgooglet%26selm%3DezqJ8.20447%2524lk6.2043963431%2540newssvr10.news.prodigy.com%26rnum%3D2

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Anyway you slice it, cruise ship-to-shore or shore-to-ship calls are
EXPENSIVE. They're also very unreliable.  I've called people on cruise
ships, and dropped calls are big problem.  Another big (and expensive)
problem that is that when you call the cruise ship, you get the
operator on the ship (and the per-minute charges  start kicking in at
that point).  You could be on with the operator for 5 minutes or so
before they even tell you that there's no answer in the passenger's
room. It's not a fun way to burn $50!

If the cruise ship has email, that's a better option.

Also, if the person calling the ship can send a fax instead, that's
usually more  economical approach.  It might cost $10 to make a
one-minute fax call, but at least you don't have the problem of being
put on hold by the ship's operator. Also, the call is limited to the
one-minute.  With a voice call, there's a tendency to gab (e.g.,
"How's the trip?", etc.).

Another option would be to use a cell-phone when you're in port. If
you need to make or receive a lot of calls, that's probably the
smartest approach. Contact your cellular carrier for more information
about international roaming options, or try one of the rental
companies like Intouchusa.com
http://www.intouchusa.com/
Or Cellularexpressphonerentals.com
http://www.cellularexpressphonerentals.com/

search strategy:
satellite calls, cruise
cruise, "ship to shore", "shore to ship"


I hope this helps.  If anything is unclear or needs amplification,
please use the "request clarification" feature.  Thank you, and good
luck!

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Request for Answer Clarification by meaw-ga on 28 Aug 2003 06:34 PDT

Your answer was excellent! I will want to ask follow up questions in
the near future - is there some way to ensure that "juggler" will be
the one to answer those questions? I am not sure how "Google Answers"
works in this regard. Again, I will rate your reply as "Excellent".
Thank you very much.

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Clarification of Answer by juggler-ga on 28 Aug 2003 07:59 PDT

Thank you very much for the tip!

Yes, you can ensure that I'll be the one to answer your next question
(or at least give it my best shot). In the "Subject" line of the
question, simply put "Attention: juggler."

Thanks again, and enjoy the cruise (if you're the one going). Bon
voyage!
-juggler

Response time was very fast. More than one specific example given.
Links to web sites are great!