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Upgrade Fairy Paid Me a Visit - Not Sure if I Should Be Happy....


Winchester Ranger
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Honestly, it depends on the sort of cruise or crossing you're on. I would not want a sheltered balcony in the tropics, but many people prefer them for a crossing. Also it depends where the two rooms are located. For a crossing I personally like to be more amidships.

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It probably depends on how obstructed your previous balcony was. You will have a much better view of the sea (as long as you are standing up).

You will be able to use it no matter what the weather so it probably will be more useful during a crossing.

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I'd take a Sheltered Balcony cabin anyday over an Obstructed View Balcony cabin.

 

In the former you have a direct view of the sea and, looking down, able to enjoy the ocean rushing past. You are protected from wind and spray, and the "balcony" is very private, feels more like a separate room to your cabin than a traditional balcony.

 

In the latter, you have little privacy as the promenade deck is right below*. The view down is, of course, of passengers walking to and fro. You may indeed have no sight of the ocean. As for looking straight ahead... well I hope the very favourite colour of the people who book these cabins is... Orange, 'cus they are going to see an awful lot of Orange :eek:.

 

(*On one occasion, when walking early in the morning on the promenade, I saw/heard a passenger strolling ahead of me bid a hearty "Good Morning" to a lady on a Deck 8 balcony who had clearly forgotten how close the promenade was, and how visible she was on her balcony. She was "dressed" "as nature intended" and vanished back inside faster than a meerkat down its burrow).

 

Enjoy your crossing, Bon Voyage! :)

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I'd take a Sheltered Balcony cabin anyday over an Obstructed View Balcony cabin.

 

In the former you have a direct view of the sea and, looking down, able to enjoy the ocean rushing past. You are protected from wind and spray, and the "balcony" is very private, feels more like a separate room to your cabin than a traditional balcony.

 

In the latter, you have little privacy as the promenade deck is right below*. The view down is, of course, of passengers walking to and fro. You may indeed have no sight of the ocean. As for looking straight ahead... well I hope the very favourite colour of the people who book these cabins is... Orange, 'cus they are going to see an awful lot of Orange :eek:.

 

(*On one occasion, when walking early in the morning on the promenade, I saw/heard a passenger strolling ahead of me bid a hearty "Good Morning" to a lady on a Deck 8 balcony who had clearly forgotten how close the promenade was, and how visible she was on her balcony. She was "dressed" "as nature intended" and vanished back inside faster than a meerkat down its burrow).

 

Enjoy your crossing, Bon Voyage! :)

 

Me too, I would choose the comfort of a sheltered balcony over a restricted view especially on a TA crossing when the weather can be a little more inclement. Seems a worthy upgrade to me :)

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So I have been bumped from my lowly DC (restricted view balcony) to cabin 625X - a BY category sheltered balcony.

 

Is this a good move ??

 

 

Of course it is !

 

The sheltered Balcony staterooms are now in a higher category than the obstructed on deck eight.

 

It took us ( seasoned Cunarders ) several years to convince Cunard Marketing, that a 'sheltered balcony' was a much 'better category' than the open balcony 'With an Obstructed View'! Why on earth would one want to be looking at Orange Tenders directly in front of you, not to mention all the mechanism etc.

 

Originally, ( in the early years of QM) the obstruct view's on deck eight were promoted as a higher category than the sheltered.

 

If you want to see the sea ,then accept the sheltered .

 

Of course you may have difficulty seeing the sea from your bed ...but when you get up and walk around it's bliss ;)

I wouldn't dream of booking an obstructed view on deck eight , It's pot luck trying to find one that has a bit of space between the obstruction.:)

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It took us ( seasoned Cunarders ) several years to convince Cunard Marketing, that a 'sheltered balcony' was a much 'better category' than the open balcony 'With an Obstructed View'! Why on earth would one want to be looking at Orange Tenders directly in front of you, not to mention all the mechanism etc.

 

 

That's where Cunard and I almost parted ways. They "upgraded" us from the sheltered balcony, booked a year earlier, to deck 8 and insisted that it wouldn't be right to move the newly designated couple because "they might not want an upgrade". I spent a week in agony waiting for our TA to return from vacation as we were due to sail in two weeks. He returned....and within an hour we were back in our original cabin. I was so relieved that I didn't even bother to write my intended scathing letter. :).

 

So yes, Winchester....I think you did very well.

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This year we booked direct with Cunard for the Nov Grand Caribbean. This was for us a 2nd QM trip during a special double celebratory year. We saw a saver fair without any deck allocation. What we eventually got was an upgrade to a more mid section BC unobstructed balcony cabin on the 11th deck. Without paying for the choice of cabin the saver fares are very much a lottery of circumstance but fortune happened to smile by way of an upgrade on this occasion. Our thanks to Cunard for helping to make our special year even more special :)

Edited by robbie_3
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Perhaps a naive question, but how do you know when the Upgrade Fairy visits you? Do you get notified via email? Do you only accidentally find out if you check the status of your reservation online? Can they do it any time? Etc..

 

All the way up to check in time.

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Perhaps a naive question, but how do you know when the Upgrade Fairy visits you? Do you get notified via email? Do you only accidentally find out if you check the status of your reservation online? Can they do it any time? Etc..

 

I received an email that was entitled "Upgrade Notice" - of course I suddenly developed unrealistic expectations and desperately scanned for a PG or QG code :D

 

Thanks for the advice, guess I'll roll with it.

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We were fortunate on a recent Queen Victoria cruise to have been visited twice by the upgrade fairy. She first came a calling and moved us from a front balcony to a mid-ships balcony and then two days before we travelled we discovered that she had moved us to a Princess Suite.

 

She has certainly caused a dilemma because having tasted the Princess Suite and all that is associated with it things are going to be difficult when we book the next time not to book at the same level as the suites.

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We booked a CB grade restricted view balcony for our forthcoming cruise on the QE next month, while checking our voyage personaliser I noticed we have been allocated stateroom number 6200 which I believe is a BD grade as not too sure about the grading system would this be considered as a good upgrade.

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We booked a CB grade restricted view balcony for our forthcoming cruise on the QE next month, while checking our voyage personaliser I noticed we have been allocated stateroom number 6200 which I believe is a BD grade as not too sure about the grading system would this be considered as a good upgrade.
Yes you now have a clear view after all that's what anyone wants from their balcony.
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We booked a CB grade restricted view balcony for our forthcoming cruise on the QE next month, while checking our voyage personaliser I noticed we have been allocated stateroom number 6200 which I believe is a BD grade as not too sure about the grading system would this be considered as a good upgrade.

 

We would be very happy with that - maybe your aft next door neighbours will invite you in for a drink (or two) into their Q1.

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An upgrade is only good if you feel the grade up was to your liking.

Several years ago the travel agent screwed up and didn't have the booking marked no upgrade and I was moved from a deck 5 balcony which I had chosen to a deck 11 balcony which worked out to about 5 upgrades. I rarely go up to that part of the ship and like the lower decks so I can use the stairs because most of my time is spent on decks 2 and 3. The deck 11 meant I would have spent a lot of time in elevators because I can walk the stairs a few decks but not that many.

The travel agent had to pay for moving me back down to a deck 5 balcony (not my original one). I parted ways with the travel agent after that. She refused to say she was sorry for the mess up. A simple sorry would have retained my business. That was the 5th Cunard voyage she had handled not to mention several other Princess cruises.

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An upgrade is only good if you feel the grade up was to your liking.

Several years ago the travel agent screwed up and didn't have the booking marked no upgrade and I was moved from a deck 5 balcony which I had chosen to a deck 11 balcony which worked out to about 5 upgrades. I rarely go up to that part of the ship and like the lower decks so I can use the stairs because most of my time is spent on decks 2 and 3. The deck 11 meant I would have spent a lot of time in elevators because I can walk the stairs a few decks but not that many.

The travel agent had to pay for moving me back down to a deck 5 balcony (not my original one). I parted ways with the travel agent after that. She refused to say she was sorry for the mess up. A simple sorry would have retained my business. That was the 5th Cunard voyage she had handled not to mention several other Princess cruises.

Without a doubt, some travel agents are much better than others. We were very fortunate to have found an excellent TA prior to our first QM2 TransAtlantic back in 2012 and have used him every year since then.

 

We booked our upcoming 2016 QM2 WC segment back in early March for a category BY (forward) on deck 5. On the date our last payment was due, he called and told us that he had gotten us an upgrade to a category BU (midships) also on deck 5 and that we will be getting a rather large refund from Cunard. He also got us much better rates on hotel rooms and the return flight than the best rates I could find after searching for hours on the internet.

 

Bob

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  • 1 month later...

We have a CB guaranteed cabin (obstructed view balcony) for 90% of our upcoming QV World Cruise (Southampton to Hong Kong). We are continuing on as far as Singapore. Our TA said this small additional segment had to be booked separately and we got a BA balcony cabin (6090 on Deck 6) for this short leg. The TA indicated on our reservation for the long part of the journey that we had Cabin 6090 for the final part. Obviously it would be great if we could keep the same cabin throughout as it would be a hassle to have to move for the last few days. Does anyone know if Cunard would be likely to upgrade us to either the same BA cabin or another BA cabin for the entire cruise?

 

I'd really like to know what our cabin number will be so I'm able to figure out what kind of TV is in the cabin. I want to be able to hook up our laptop to the TV so we can watch our own movies on the slightly larger screen.

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