Originally Posted by
sbedelman
For them to assess this they would have had to disclose as part of the cruise contract that the transaction was going to be made in a currency other than US $.
If the contract was between you and another US entity and the price was in $$ then it cannot be subject to a forex fee. There is no wiggle room on this.
I'm not sure what your point is. Many of the biggest credit card issuers are now charging fees for all transactions
processed outside the US. It doesn't matter what currency or where the actual business is.
The party to complain to is the bank, not the merchant, since the merchant isn't charging the fee. In my experience the banks will sometimes reverse the fees in cases where they truly came as a surprise. For example, I had no problem getting Citibank to reverse a foreign transaction fee I was charged for a lane reservation at a bowling alley in NYC (the bowling alley's website happens to use a Danish credit card processor).
That said, I now use my Schwab card whenever I think there's any chance something could get processed outside the US.