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Excursions selling out


5waldos
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Just learned that excursions booked in advance are prepaid- something I have not encountered on other cruise lines. Assume that cancelled excursions are refunded quickly?

 

And since we want to use OBC for an excursion- how concerned should we be that an excursion would sell out before we boarded? Is there any way to check on how the tickets are going? Particularly on a small Greek island where outside excursions are very limited.

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Just learned that excursions booked in advance are prepaid- something I have not encountered on other cruise lines. Assume that cancelled excursions are refunded quickly?

 

And since we want to use OBC for an excursion- how concerned should we be that an excursion would sell out before we boarded? Is there any way to check on how the tickets are going? Particularly on a small Greek island where outside excursions are very limited.

 

If the ship cancels an excursion money paid in advance will be refunded. If you cancel an excursion before the deadline that is published onboard, it will be refunded to your onboard account, if you are beyond that date/time you get no money back unless the cancellation is for a medical reason that has been confirmed by the ships medics.

You cannot check out how tickets are going. It certainly has been an issue in the past that trips were full before you boarded or alternatively you get onboard and find it is not going to run due to lack of demand which can leave you scrambling around to sort out something else.

However all this might not be a concern to you are Azamara are working on a solution to allow you to book in advance using onboard credit. It is an IT fix being promised to be delivered during 2017. What is not known is when....there is a hint it could be soon as Celebrity are already doing this and as Azamara and Celebrity share a lot of technology who knows, could be very soon

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If the ship cancels an excursion money paid in advance will be refunded. If you cancel an excursion before the deadline that is published onboard, it will be refunded to your onboard account, if you are beyond that date/time you get no money back unless the cancellation is for a medical reason that has been confirmed by the ships medics.

You cannot check out how tickets are going. It certainly has been an issue in the past that trips were full before you boarded or alternatively you get onboard and find it is not going to run due to lack of demand which can leave you scrambling around to sort out something else.

However all this might not be a concern to you are Azamara are working on a solution to allow you to book in advance using onboard credit. It is an IT fix being promised to be delivered during 2017. What is not known is when....there is a hint it could be soon as Celebrity are already doing this and as Azamara and Celebrity share a lot of technology who knows, could be very soon

Looking forward to being able to use the onboard credit online

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I had called Azamara the other day about this issue. They said you can call and they can let you know how the bookings are goign for the excursions you are interested in. It only helps so much since you still can't book with eh OBC. Hopefully they will be able to do this soon.

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Don't understand why they charge in advance. They could set rules about canceling but still wait until you board since they have your credit card set up for onboard charges. It would also save them having to issue credits when people change their minds in advance or excursions are cancelled. Just seems like an easier approach.

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Just off the Quest two weeks ago and I had the same concern, however, there was no problem booking the excursions we wanted. There were plenty to choose from, too. I don't think many book before hand.

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We recently sailed the Journey B2B from Singapore to Auckland. The only excursions that I know sold out were the new bicycling tours. The Journey now has 15 or so fold-up bikes on board, and they offered 3 (I think) bike tours** at different ports. We would have done one, but by the time we learned about them (on board), they were sold out. We waitlisted for the one in Napier NZ, but it did not open up.

 

I think the snorkelling excursion on the Great Barrier Reef sold out as well. We booked our own (non-ship) snorkel trip, so I'm not 100% certain if the ship's was SRO.

 

** these are organized group tours led by one of the Journey's Shorex staff. You can't just sign out a bike and pedal about on your own like you can on Windstar.

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We will be in the Greek Islands and many stops have only two or at most 3 excursions. With few available privately. This was the basis of my concern but guess we will have an excursions or we won/t. Nothing I can do about it now I guess.

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Don't understand why they charge in advance. They could set rules about canceling but still wait until you board since they have your credit card set up for onboard charges. It would also save them having to issue credits when people change their minds in advance or excursions are cancelled. Just seems like an easier approach.

 

Some cruise lines don't charge in advance (e.g., Princess, although now they give the option of prepaying), and what happens is people book multiple excursions and decide later which ones they are actually going to take. So an excursion can look sold out, but people will cancel once onboard. So then one has to keep checking to see what's available.

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We will be in the Greek Islands and many stops have only two or at most 3 excursions. With few available privately. This was the basis of my concern but guess we will have an excursions or we won/t. Nothing I can do about it now I guess.

 

We always book the excursions we want early and pay for them. Once we board we immediately go to the Land Discovery desk and have them cancel some of the excursions and then rebook them, which is charged to the onboard account. The funds from the cancelled booking go into our shipboard account as refundable. At the end of the cruise, when all the accounting is done, the credit balance is refunded.

 

Depending on the size of your non-refundable credit (and the cost of the excursions!) you should only have to do this for a few excursions. I plan it out in advance with a spreadsheet, which can be a big time saver when standing at the excursions desk - but I'm a spreadsheet person anyway.

 

The only problem comes when one of the excursions is already full - if you cancel, you lose it and have to go on a waitlist. But Excursion staff can tell you which excursions are fully booked so you can chose an alternative.

 

Yes, this process means your money is tied up until the end of the cruise but we'd rather have the excursions we want, than fret whether the excursions will still be open.

 

There are people who don't book until they board. I notice this because they are the ones who complain about not getting the excursions they wanted...

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That is a good idea- may do just that. We don't have huge amounts of OBC this time so I guess we could also just plan on eating and drinking well onboard. Will have to think this through but it seems to make great sense.

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Not entirely sure, but I think I read in another thread that Azamara is not permitting this any longer . . . pre-booking an excursion, cancelling it onboard, and rebooking using OBC. I'd check it out before going ahead with the process. If this is accurate, you may wind up missing out on excursions you do want.

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Not entirely sure, but I think I read in another thread that Azamara is not permitting this any longer . . . pre-booking an excursion, cancelling it onboard, and rebooking using OBC. I'd check it out before going ahead with the process. If this is accurate, you may wind up missing out on excursions you do want.

 

As I mentioned in my post, you should work with the Excursion staff on this and have them check to ensure the excursion you want still has openings. In fact, you should book the excursion first, then cancel the previous booking. We did this in February and the staff were very helpful. Since we have OBC for another cruise later this year, we're planning to do the same.

 

It was reported in another thread that Azamara is changing their website to allow using the OBC to book excursion prior to the cruise but I can't remember when it's scheduled for implementation.

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It was reported in another thread that Azamara is changing their website to allow using the OBC to book excursion prior to the cruise but I can't remember when it's scheduled for implementation.

 

The last time I checked I was told probably the end of September 2017.

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At the Azamara UK presentation this week they were very excited about the development which they said they were now at the stage of testing so later in the Summer sounds right. Let's all hope the testing all goes smoothly and there are no setbacks.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Celebrity have just started allowing OBC to be spent pre cruise.... when I got the email I did wonder how the new system would work with the notoriously bad website, but went ahead, tried to book a shore excursion and it couldn't have been easier.

Hopefully, the same option will be available on Azamara very soon.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Celebrity have just started allowing OBC to be spent pre cruise.... when I got the email I did wonder how the new system would work with the notoriously bad website, but went ahead, tried to book a shore excursion and it couldn't have been easier.

Hopefully, the same option will be available on Azamara very soon.

 

Royal Caribbean allow it as well. I wonder why Azamara is last to the game, since they offer the more restrictive OBC? Neither RCI nor X limit any OBC to excursions only.

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The lines I have cruised simply do not charge the excursion until the day it happens. Takes the OBC then charges whatever is still due to my onboard account. Seems to be the easiest way of doing it- does Azamara actually prepay companies? Few of the excursions that I book on my own require prepayment- although some do in fact require a deposit. But a cruise line should be able to negotiate a deal where they don't pay until the excursion is happening with whatever number of travelers actually go on the tour.

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The lines I have cruised simply do not charge the excursion until the day it happens. Takes the OBC then charges whatever is still due to my onboard account. Seems to be the easiest way of doing it- does Azamara actually prepay companies? Few of the excursions that I book on my own require prepayment- although some do in fact require a deposit. But a cruise line should be able to negotiate a deal where they don't pay until the excursion is happening with whatever number of travelers actually go on the tour.

 

Pre-payment depends on the area.

 

Pay at the conclusion of tour was generally the case for our independently-booked excursions in the Mediterranean, but for the British Isles, our independently-booked tours have been pre-payment of the whole tour price.

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Pre-payment depends on the area.

 

 

 

Pay at the conclusion of tour was generally the case for our independently-booked excursions in the Mediterranean, but for the British Isles, our independently-booked tours have been pre-payment of the whole tour price.

 

 

That is our experience in the British Isles also.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

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