We are very pleased to announce that we are ready to deploy shortly the Crew Wire Transfer project to the rest of the fleet. Currently implemented only on Paradise, Destiny, and Fascination (in progress).
As you know, the Wire Transfer project allows crew members to wire funds to the crewmember’s bank of their choice anywhere in the world from the convenience of the ship. After the crewmember provides us with their banking information by filling a WIRE TRANSFER APPLICATION in its entirety, and it is verified, the anticipated flow would start with the crewmember giving the paymaster US dollars and the foreign currency or dollars he/she would like to purchase by way of filling out a WIRE ORDER form. Once an account has been established, the information will remain in the database and thus the Wire Transfer Application form will not need to be submitted each time the crew member desires to wire money. Banking information can be updated by simply filing out a new Wire Transfer Application form in replacement of the old one.
On a weekly basis, crew members participating will fill a Wire Order Form and bring it to the Paymaster who in turn would send the money, currency desired, and banking information to our foreign exchange service provider which, in turn, would send a wire almost immediately to the crewmember's bank account. The conversion rates compare very favorably to what we pay on our corporate business, and there would also be a fee to the crewmember of $5 to cover wiring costs. Kindly note that the crewmember's bank receiving the money may impose their own fee but we have no control over this.
Enclosed herewith is a copy of the brochure explaining the program to be printed and distributed by Paymasters to the crew together with the next payroll. This will allow the crew members to start verifying their banking information and filling out the Wire Transfer Application form in preparation to when the program is installed onboard by our IS Department.
Our Corporate Trainers have kindly agreed to post a laminated copy of the brochure in their Benefit board, likewise once IS confirms that the program has been installed, Corporate Trainers have agreed that they will start including it in their orientation sessions to the crew. Wire Transfer Application forms and Wire Order forms should be available in an area easily accessible to the Crew only (not in areas where guest may traffic), in order for crew to fill it at their leisure and bring it already filled out to the Paymasters during crew office hours. We kindly ask Chief Accountants to coordinate with the Hotel Directors as to the best possible place.
Crew members should be instructed to establish an account by filling out the Wire Transfer Application form at least one week prior to wire money. This will allow the Paymaster to input and verified the information during the non-crew hours and forward the original forms to Headquarters for final verification.
The program has a minimum and maximum amount limitation for wiring of US$250.00 and US$5,000.00 respectively per crew member per transmission. Paymasters can collect money any time during crew office hours (Except Payroll/Gratuities pay day) and should transmit while on home ports only due to connectivity issues with the satellite. For vessels doing the 3 and 4 day run, they should transmit only on Monday (Fantasy on Sunday). For 5/5/4 run transmissions should only be done Monday and Saturdays. vessels doing anything other than 3/4, 5/5/4, and 7 days run should contact Andrew Kondrat and/or myself to coordinate a transmission schedule.
Paymasters are also instructed to read the enclosed manual in order to understand how the program works and to clarify any questions and/or concerns they may have. The manual provides clear indications regarding business rules and it has a whole section dedicated to useful tips. It also contains clear step by step information on how to establish accounts in the FXOnline database and a description of how to perform the accounting functions of the program. In addition to the above, following this email, we will be sending to Paymasters only a system’s training manual.
Once the program has been installed onboard Paymasters are hereby requested to contact Andrew Kondrat and myself to conduct a test transmission and make sure we are ready to go live. We also herewith request that after the test transmission has been successfully completed, Chief Accountants coordinate with Hotel Director’s in order to notify the live date perhaps during the Hotel Director’s meeting with all the Department Heads. Also we suggest that a notice with the live date should be posted in some of the crew bulletin boards.
As usual, should you have any questions regarding this program please do not hesitate to contact me.
Thank you and regards to all,
