MIAMI -- Royal Caribbean is planning a January rollout of
CruisePay.com, a Web site that agents can use to electronically
debit agency checking accounts to pay for Royal Caribbean and
Celebrity bookings, including deposits and final invoices.
Royal Caribbean is testing CruisePay with one agency and is
planning to open it up to another 20 or so agencies this month,
before the official launch.
CruisePay uses VirtualPay, from the National Processing Co. in
Louisville, Ky., to process the electronic bank transactions but
embellishes it by providing agents with detailed, up-to-date
information on payments due for each of their individual and group
bookings.
"We believe we are the first in the industry to come out with an
electronic payment system that lets you see what you owe," said
Mark Musial, Royal Caribbean's applications development
manager.
CruisePay is free to agents and will reduce their operating
costs as well as Royal Caribbean's, he said.
For example, Musial said, CruisePay eliminates overnight
delivery charges for agents trying to meet booking option
deadlines, and saves on postage costs as well as the time spent
checking with Royal Caribbean to see if payment was received.
Agents spend about $500,000 to $1 million a year in postage and
delivery fees for payments going to Royal Caribbean, he said.
With CruisePay, agencies can make last-minute payments; the
bookings immediately are protected; Royal Caribbean's database
reflects the payment, and the monies show up at the cruise company
the next day, he said.
Agents can view amounts due within the next seven days or within
the next 60 days, and they can change the numbers so that, for
example, they can pay more than the minimum owed for a particular
booking.
Agents will be able to mix and match payment methods. For
example, a deposit could be paid for with a customer credit card,
by traditional means, and the balance could be paid via
CruisePay.
"The travel agent is the ultimate decision maker of how payment
is going to be made," Musial said.
Agencies do not have to commit to using CruisePay for every
transaction, yet the benefits to Royal Caribbean are so compelling
that "we would love them to use it all the time," Musial said.
Royal Caribbean will pay fees on CruisePay transactions but the
cost is outweighed by the savings, he said.
Although about 60% of payment transactions at Royal Caribbean
are made on credit cards, the cruise company still takes in about
40,000 paper checks per month -- 98% of them from travel
agencies.
If payment is made by electronic checking debit via CruisePay,
nobody at Royal Caribbean's end has to open envelopes, key the
payment information into the computers and take the checks to the
bank. That saves on labor costs and reduces the potential for
errors, like payments for one booking being posted for another,
Musial said.
As far as payment methods go, "It's by far the cheapest," said
Rebecca Perez, manager of cash operations at Royal Caribbean.
Currently, CruisePay is offered only to domestic and
international agencies with U.S. dollar accounts at U.S. banks.
The CruisePay system will be password-protected so that agencies
can see only their own booking information, and it will use "state
of the art" encryption technology to ensure security.
Royal Caribbean provided these advance instructions for getting
started with CruisePay:
Access the Royal Caribbean and Celebrity Cruises travel agents
only site by logging onto CruisePay.com.First-time users will be guided through the sign-up process by
clicking on "North American Travel Partners." The security process
may take up to 48 hours. Agents then will be notified of the travel
agency sign-on and password.The next step is to click on CruisePay and follow instructions
for making electronic payments, including setting up banking
information and the CruisePay password.