As with airline tickets, the hotel room prices you see advertised are not what you end up paying, by a long shot. First, every Caribbean tourist destination charges a room tax or hotel occupancy tax -- essentially a way to increase government revenues by taxing visitors who won't be around long enough to complain much. Examples of room taxes charged in the Caribbean include:
- Antigua and Barbuda: 8.5%
- Bahamas: 12%
- Barbados: 7.5%
- Dominica: 5%
- Dominican Republic: 23%
- Grenada: 8%
- Haiti: 10%
- Jamaica: 15%
- St. Kitts and Nevis: 7%
- St. Lucia: 8%
- St. Vincent and the Grenadines: generally 7%
- Trinidad and Tobago: 10%
The resort fee, a.k.a. the "activity" fee, is a close cousin to the airline fuel surcharge, in the sense that it's a sneaky way for hotels to jack up room prices without having to raise their basic room rates. Theoretically, these fees are supposed to cover the use of resort amenities, but if that's the case, what are the regular nightly charges for, just the use of your room? Puh-leez.
Resort fees can be quite hefty: $10 or $20 in some cases, but as much as 10 percent of the cost of your total stay at one well-known British Virgin Islands resort.
