EES Required in Iceland and Norway?

The information you were given is false. You need the ETA for the UK. You are flying into Iceland, so you will go through EES on arrival at the airport. You dont need to do anything in advance for that.

EES is not permission to enter a country, it is a record of your entry into the Schengen Zone. They were correct that nothing would be required to enter Iceland at this time if you carry US passport.

They failed on their information for your stop in Scotland where you will need an ETA as you already noted. However, I have to wonder if you typed “Scotland” while thinking “Norway” and then their information was correct.

Itinerary Type: You need an ETA if your cruise departs from the UK, ends in the UK, or stops at a UK port of call.

Be sure to only use the official UK ETA app. There are look alike that will charge unnecessary service charges.

you do need an ETA to enter UK, but how it will cope with you entering once at the Scottish port of call, departing later and eventually coming ashore in Southampton wiil be something to look forward to. But unless you do a huge amount of travel it shouldn't matter if they count the sea days between Scotland and Southampton as part of your 180 day allowance. You are correct, you have to obtain the ETA from the official UK website, response time is usually measured in minutes

You will go through EES processing when you arrive at Keflavik, they will do it for you on arrival. But they should mark you as exited when the ship departs*. EES is slightly different from ETA because cruise ship passengers going ashore for day trips aren't processed, they are classed as being in transit. My cousin did a cruise from UK to about 6 places around the Baltic last month, all those places were Schengen area. The only times they needed to show passports was departing from and returning to UK.

• Actually now I think about it, if you make an organised transfer from airport to ship they may count it under the same cruise ship passenger in transit rules and not bother to process you. This may explain why Norwegian said EES doesn't apply

They are likely at least partially correct, or from their view, correct, depending on the itinerary and how they handle entries on the cruise.

Cruises are not typical "entries", you could very well visit another country, but not have to do a formal immigration.

For you, when you arrive by air in Iceland, you will do entry immigration at the airport. EES is no additional step, nothing you have to do ahead of time, it is just normal entry. The cruise line has nothing to do with it, all they care is you show up at the boat.

Port stops, in Norway and Scotland, you may not actually enter, you may just be part of the ship manifest, allowed to wander for the day or whatever you are there, checked out and in of the ship, no actual immigration transaction.

When you arrive in Southampton, you leave the ship, you are no longer the cruise lines problem, but, yes, you will need an ETA.

The only real question is where you do Schengen exit. It is very possible you will do that in Iceland prior to initial boarding.

I did correct my OP, I meant entry to Iceland and Norway...and thank you Paul for the information on possible cruise exceptions - that does make sense. However, I do think NCL visa service is incorrect on the EES - this will (or should - I know there have been issues) be required, and I know there is nothing you do ahead on this.