1. Being influenced by someone who 'guarantees' you a cruise ship job if you pay them $$$$. Unfortunately this a false promise and one of the biggest scams out there. And anyone who guarantees you a job on a cruise ship and then asks you for money upfront is conning you. Plain and simple. After all, they don't know who you are and they know nothing about your personality, skills, experience or qualifications, so how can they make this promise?



Remember, the only people who can assure you of a job are the cruise line companies themselves. That's after they've reviewed your application, interviewed you, checked out your references, etc, etc. And they won't charge you for the job at the end of it either!

2. Emailing your resume to cruise line companies, without them asking you to. If a cruise line company wants you to email them, then they will tell you to via a job advertisement or through the employment page of their website. They will also give you a specific address to email. But too many people make the mistake of simply firing-off a load of hopeful emails to cruise lines, in the hope that one gets through to the right person. Your chances of success are slim to none by following this method.

A much more effective approach is to prepare a great looking 'resume package' that is physically posted to the correct person at the cruise company.

3. Posting your resume to an online service where cruise lines supposedly browse this website for potential candidates. Guess what? Cruise lines don't need to do this because they already have thousands of people applying to them every week of the year. And they use a network of employment agencies in virtually every country that do a lot of their screening, interviewing and recruiting for them.

4. Purchasing an "official application form". There is no such thing as an "official" cruise ship job application form, no more than there is an official application form for the 'automobile industry' or the 'retail industry'. Each cruise line company will have its OWN standard application form. The application form for Carnival Cruise Lines is NOT the same as the application form for Holland America Line and so on. So an application received on any other form but their own, will go straight in the trash can. It's worthless to them.

Unfortunately there are several companies out there who will happily charge you $49 - $99 for their "official cruise line application form". So not only are you pinning your hopes on a useless form that won't even get looked at, but you're also paying for this privilege!

The only way to apply for cruise jobs is via the method that the cruise line has set in place. Be it an online application form which is on THEIR website or sending your resume to a postal or email address in which THEY have specified.

5. Relying on poor, outdated information. Yes, there is a lot of free information on the internet. But often these 'freebie' websites do more harm than good. After all, where's the incentive for the site owner to keep his stuff nice and fresh and continually updated? There isn't any.

We get emails from people all the time telling us how they mailed 10 fancy resume packages off 3 months ago, but have just had 7 back 'returned to sender'. This is false economy. So not only have you wasted money in postage fees, but you have just also wasted 3 valuable months in which you could have had the interview, got the job and maybe now working onboard in some far-off exotic location!

Look closely at any website offering cruise ship job info whether it's a freebie or a paid site. And ask yourself; does this site look professional? Or does it look like it was put together by a hack amateur sitting in his bedroom hoping to make a few easy dollars? And do you believe that the website owner has genuinely worked on a cruse ship and has helped others do the same? If not, do you really want to be trusting their information?

Also remember that investing in quality information is NOT the same as "paying for a job". If the product or service is good, then you are paying for the time, energy and money that goes into keeping everything updated and providing you with a good support service as and when you need it.

So there you have it. I hope you have found this information useful in your cruise ship job search.