Price reduction....wait and see?

We are on board the Mariner in October and the price has changed significantly as in £4000!

Have called the TA and are waiting for a response.

We are in the UK and have not made final payment yet so wondered what they would offer as compensation.

Anyone been there?

Pam.

Hi Pam, we have not had that happen to us, but I do check the website on a regular basis to monitor the prices. I would be hoping you would get a money back amount going ob what I have read here that other people have had? . It's too much money to not expect them to compensate you in some way. Others will hopefully give advice as what happened to them? How long have you been waiting a reply from your TA? Jean.

Hi Pam, we have not had that happen to us, but I do check the website on a regular basis to monitor the prices. I would be hoping you would get a money back amount going ob what I have read here that other people have had? . It's too much money to not expect them to compensate you in some way. Others will hopefully give advice as what happened to them? How long have you been waiting a reply from your TA? Jean.

Hi Jean, i only saw it last night and will now have to wait till Monday...at the least to see what will happen.No idea what to expect but is't a significant amount of money to lose. For example, we could cancel (20%) default and reebook and still save £2000.

Not impressed with the TA thus far.

Pam.

Hi Pam, I have read a few people mention this has happened to them, and they all seemed to say their TA was able to negotiate some sort of price reduction for them. Hopefully they will get his sorted for you as am sure they don't want to lose the sale? Jean.

Hi Pam, I have read a few people mention this has happened to them, and they all seemed to say their TA was able to negotiate some sort of price reduction for them. Hopefully they will get his sorted for you as am sure they don't want to lose the sale? Jean.

Thanks Jean, i hope so.

We were just about to book another Regent cruise too so hope they come good.

Pam. :D

I would say that all the more reason they will be more than helpful in this for you. I would mention this to them too, hopefully they will be proactive for you. Jean.

I would say that all the more reason they will be more than helpful in this for you. I would mention this to them too, hopefully they will be proactive for you. Jean.

I'm a little worried about playing that card tbh Jean. I think we will wait to see what they bring to the table and see where it goes from there. Would love to know if anyone had been in that situation before and what their experience was. Thank you for the tip.

Pam.

Our TA was proactive on our upcoming cruise - he not only got us the lower fare when it dropped, he negotiated the reduced Business Class Air (which Regent originally said was for new bookings only). Nothing but good experiences with our guy...

Our TA was proactive on our upcoming cruise - he not only got us the lower fare when it dropped, he negotiated the reduced Business Class Air (which Regent originally said was for new bookings only). Nothing but good experiences with our guy...

Cheers Bill, we will have to wait and see where our TA directs us. First time we have used them and have used (Regent) direct in the past. Well done your guy!

Pam.

Pam, this is my little saga, I hope you find it helpful, I have just cut and pasted this from another thread. However I was in slightly different situation than you described.

We were extremely lucky and very fortunate, in fact Regent UK and our travel was absolutely brilliant, it all started around a year or so ago when we booked a cruise with Regent traveling from Athens to Istanbul, we were quite excited by the itinerary as we had only been to Athens and Istanbul so all the Greek islands in between were new to us. Unfortunately with the aggro out that way they decided to alter the itinerary to Athens to Venice, which was the same as the cruise we done last year, eventually we decided to cancel and we thought we would lose our deposit, but because the alterations were so great Regant U.k said we could have the deposit back in full, but would we mind just looking to see if another cruise might be of interest.

Like most people we only had a limited time period we could work within well eventually we chose the voyager Stockholm to London cruise, we booked and paid our 20% deposit, you probably can guess what happened next, the very next day the email was sent out advertising the 25% off the cruise we booked the day before. I wasn't happy, so rung the travel agent at nine and they said they already had the invoice for the full amount of the fare, I suggested that they rung Regent Uk to argue our case. But before they could ring they had a revised invoice with twenty five percent off. So we are very contented now, but just slightly puzzled why regent didn't just suggest delaying the booking by a day.

Hi charltonkerry,

Thank you and well done. It does seem odd that they didn't tell you to wait a day to rebook but you got there in there end. I got the impression that our TA wasn't all that interested. I called in the afternoon to give them my mobile number as we are going on holiday on Monday and even before i told him the reason i was calling he was a bit snappy with me and said he hadn't heard back from Regent yet. Lets hope he was just having a bad day.

Pam.

Hi Pamela,

This happened to our cruise, just after we paid the final balance. I saw the drops of £550 per person for the same grade of suite. I contact our agent who swiftly got back saying we can either upgrade or have the difference in OBC. We had the OBC. The same cruise had increased last one but all grade waitlisted now. I'm sure they will do something for you, they seem very obliging. Good luck.

Hi Pamela. You need to really get after your TA! That's a big difference in price.

Since you have not made final payment try to get a price reduction. If you can't negotiate that get OBC. Use the credit for laundry, spa services. Don't take an upgrade to another suite. That costs Regent nothing! I would not use the difference for a future cruise.

No one can predict the future. Good luck…keep after your TA!

Hi Pamela. You need to really get after your TA! That's a big difference in price.

Since you have not made final payment try to get a price reduction. If you can't negotiate that get OBC. Use the credit for laundry, spa services. Don't take an upgrade to another suite. That costs Regent nothing! I would not use the difference for a future cruise.

No one can predict the future. Good luck…keep after your TA!

On every cruise line I have ever been on if you have not made final payment they will give you the price reduction.

Just wondering if Regent is different from the other lines. We also have a cruise booked for Sep/Oct and the price has not gone down as of yet.

I just booked an Alaska cruise on Regent for next year. My TA told me any price reductions or incentives offered between now and final payment will be applied to our reservation.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums mobile app

Thank you all for the feedback. I think the US is a little different from the UK but who knows Hope it's good news for us and we can book our next Regent cruise.

Pam.

My TA has been an absolute train wreck and fired her from all future travels. However, my contact at Regent/Oceania (Andrea) has been the greatest in answering questions. Is there any benefit in regards to pricing or upgrades that a TA can provide over booking directly with Regent?

My TA has been an absolute train wreck and fired her from all future travels. However, my contact at Regent/Oceania (Andrea) has been the greatest in answering questions. Is there any benefit in regards to pricing or upgrades that a TA can provide over booking directly with Regent?

Maybe something in the form of on board credit and on some other cruise lines they sometimes offer people a night in the specialty restaurants (the ones that payment is required).

However, on our Sep cruise Regent's website offered up to $600 OBC if you book something now but they (Regent) gave it to us.

Many travel agents will rebate to you a significant portion of their commission. You can save 10+% of the posted cruise fare this way. Big savings.

My TA has been an absolute train wreck and fired her from all future travels. However, my contact at Regent/Oceania (Andrea) has been the greatest in answering questions. Is there any benefit in regards to pricing or upgrades that a TA can provide over booking directly with Regent?

The answer is YES!! My parents use to book directly with Regent and during the many cruises booked, not ONCE were they ever proactive in offering any type of compensation in the event of a price reduction or OBC. In fact, at no time did my parents benefit from booking directly - the analogy is that they paid sticker price for the car.

Once I started to get involved with the bookings, I went through a number of TAs before finding one (compliments to Wes for the great referral) who has been great - always looking after our best interest and if there is a price reduction or some other type of promotion being offered, they fight for us and because this agency does a significant amount of business with Regent (which is really an important factor), they have always been successful.

In the process of using the services of a number of different travel agencies, there really is a huge difference in the services offered and the benefits received.

gnomie :)

We also took a suggestion from Wes and use a great travel agent. I!m guessing that it is the same one that Gnomie uses. They have helped us out of numerous poor situations while saving us money. Find yourself a good agent. I am so sorry I can' t mention them by name.

Thanks Gnomie and Ann for your kind words.

This is off topic but wanted to share:

For those of you who pay for your cruise with the American Express Platinum card, may have a deal for you if you invest with Charles Schwab. Pls see link below:

Why? Get an additional 43000 Membership rewards points, a $100 or $200 AMX credit depending on the scale of your Schwab investments, $200 airline fee credit, Global Entry fee credit and a few more bennies.

I checked with the cruise travel specialists at AMX and you can use multiple AMX-P cards to deposit towards your cruise and still get the $300 SBC as long as one of you has the platinum card.

I rcvd my statement credit four days after getting my card (Ida applied for hers yesterday) and got my 40K AMX points yesterday. Had our TA deposit $3K more towards our final payment on Auckland to Hong Kong. This also was timely as my renewal for Global entry is due and used this card for that--AMX will pay the $100 GOES fee.

In other words, if this works for you just deposit another $3K, get a statement credit immediately, 40K MR points (worth @ 1.8.pts about $720).

This is a unique/good deal now that AMX has limited it's bonuses to one per lifetime of the card.

Hope this helps.

http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/investing/accounts_products/credit_cards

My TA has been an absolute train wreck and fired her from all future travels. However, my contact at Regent/Oceania (Andrea) has been the greatest in answering questions. Is there any benefit in regards to pricing or upgrades that a TA can provide over booking directly with Regent?

Yes, some TA's do give large rebates and/or provide OBC's and/or free gratuities. Mine does. :)

I have a great contact at Oceania/Regent that I usually book with initially and then have my TA take over the booking to get the "perks". You have to do this within 30 days however.

We also took a suggestion from Wes and use a great travel agent. I!m guessing that it is the same one that Gnomie uses. They have helped us out of numerous poor situations while saving us money. Find yourself a good agent. I am so sorry I can' t mention them by name.

Ditto, we got our TA from Wes. :-)

Great news, out TA called this morning and we have a price match on the lower price. No OBC's or anything, just a price match.

Once we get the paperwork through we will book our next one.

Now off to explore our wee holiday. :)

Thank you all for you comments.

Pam.