A short cruise to the Bahamas from South Florida would seem to be among the simplest of all international travel experiences. But a close look at some of the government regulations and cruise line policies reveals a hodge-podge of immigration requirements that some may find confusing.
The State Department wants all international travelers to have a passport, a spokesman said, but the department does not actually set requirements for cruise line companies. That is now up to the Department of Homeland Security.
Celebration Cruise Line, which leaves out of the Port of Palm Beach, will also accept a birth certificate. But it has to be an original, government-generated birth certificate, not a photocopy, along with a photo ID such as a driver’s license.
And the birth certificate has to have a raised seal. “That’s how you can tell if it’s going to be accepted,” said Glenn Ryerson, Celebration senior vice president of sales. But even if it does have a raised seal, Ryerson said, it still may not be accepted if it’s from a hospital.
Actually, you should be able to board the ship and take the cruise with just a driver’s license, but it has to be an enhanced driver’s license, according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The only problem with that is, only four states offer enhanced driver’s licenses, which contain a computer chip, and Florida is not one of them.
Also, that’s only if the cruise you’re taking is a “closed loop” cruise: one that begins and ends at the same port.
But Ryerson said even enhanced driver’s licenses aren’t accepted by Celebration, which follows standards of other cruise lines.
Not surprisingly, all of these ifs, ands and buts create occasional confusion among passengers scrambling to board their ship. Earl Pitman, Celebration pier supervisor at the Port of Palm Beach, explained:
“One problem is there are so many different kinds of birth certificates throughout the 50 states. Some of them are copies, some are certified copies, some are hospital copies, which we don’t accept.
“Immigration is tightening the rules on us every day. We try to get our customers to travel as much as possible, but as time goes on, they keep tightening it and tightening it.
“It’s difficult and sometimes we have to make a call” by rejecting a document, he added. “Some of these birth certificates are frail and torn, and the State Department doesn’t want hospital birth certificates at all anymore.”
On its customer service telephone recording, Celebration says you only need a passport for an overnight stay. The company offers two packages from Palm Beach to Grand Bahama: A two-night stay and a four-night stay.
But the two-night stay isn’t really considered a stay-over in the Bahamas, Ryerson said. That’s because passengers board in the evening, travel overnight to Grand Bahama, roam the island, then sail home the next night. The four-night stay involves a sleep-over at a resort. So for the two-night trip, a birth certificate is OK but a passport is required for the four-night trip.
The process was sufficiently confusing to ensnare Joan Alleman of Palm Beach. She booked a New Year’s Day two-night cruise with her family of nine, with six adults and three children. Of the six adults, four of them had passports but two brought only driver’s licenses. The three children had birth certificates.
Her adult children called Celebration Cruise Line three times, Alleman said, “and each time they were told that the documentation required was a passport or driver’s license, and for the minor children, birth certificates.”
When they came to board, they were told that the driver’s licenses were not acceptable. Irate, they called Pitman. “He went on about how the line was not responsible for your having the proper documentation,” Alleman said. “He’s correct about that, but if that is the information the line is giving you, the line is responsible.”
Both Pitman and Ryerson said they couldn’t comment on specific cases, but insisted the problems experienced by Alleman and her family are rare. In fact, Ryerson said, “I can guarantee you” that passengers aren’t told they can board with only a driver’s license, enhanced or not.
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