Are you satisfied with Oceania's air arrangements?

Flying from my city to anywhere is very expensive so the inclusion of air was a boon for us. My only issue was that we did not arrive in Papeete until the evening before the cruise left port and with all of the on-boarding activities (such as going to the safety muster after midnight our time after traveling all day) we didn't get to go to bed until long after midnight and were exhausted. Would have rather gotten to the ship early to mid afternoon to have time to unpack and such.

Pearzee - for the most part, just about ALL of Tahiti flights arrive at very inconvenient times. I can't think of one city where there are flights from where you arrive in early afternoon. Oceania really had no choice.

I hope this has not been covered before, but is there an air deviation fee for both directions?

The fee covers both direction if chosen at the same time

If you only choose the outbound flights you want then later decide to pick the inbound flight you will pay the deviation fee again

I've been reluctant to jump in since we have taken the credit and booked our own air on all of our previous Oceania cruises. On those past cruises, the air credit was very close to what we ended up paying with our TA booking our preferred flights. We always arrive prior to the start of the cruise, and usually stay a few days after as well.

We are using Oceania air for the first time on our cruise next month. We chose to do so because O offered the $99 premium economy upgrade, which was very attractive compared to what we would have paid for the upgrade on our own. Our TA negotiated with Oceania for awhile to get the flights we wanted on the airline we wanted, but was eventually able to get our desired nonstop to Europe and a good connection.

After the airport bombing in Brussels, I was concerned about our connecting time on our booked flights through Frankfurt. The connection met the time requirements, but I was concerned and asked my TA to see if O could give us an earlier flight from Paris to Frankfurt. Oceania did give us an earlier flight - our TA said that they originally wanted to charge us an additional air deviation fee for this, but since they could book the same fare class they waived this and booked the earlier flight for us.

So...in the booking process, I have to say that Oceania has been very accommodating. Hopefully, it will all turn out as nicely when we take the flights. I would suggest going into the process knowing what flights you want - the first flights suggested were not ones we would consider and our TA began suggesting the alternatives we wanted until found a mutually agreeable flight.

Pearzee - for the most part, just about ALL of Tahiti flights arrive at very inconvenient times. I can't think of one city where there are flights from where you arrive in early afternoon. Oceania really had no choice.

It was my understanding that there were two other flights that arrived earlier in the day. We just happened to get the last flight. Luck of the draw, I guess.

Although we were very anxious about our ability to navigate a 90 minute transfer arriving in Chicago from Stockholm, we were able to make the connection. We literally RAN through the airport to get to our gate just as boarding began. Immigration in Chicago was very fast and customs was a snap.

However, the concern that many things could go wrong weighed on us throughout our cruise.

The cruise was fabulous and worth it!!!

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Although we were very anxious about our ability to navigate a 90 minute transfer arriving in Chicago from Stockholm, we were able to make the connection. We literally RAN through the airport to get to our gate just as boarding began. Immigration in Chicago was very fast and customs was a snap.

However, the concern that many things could go wrong weighed on us throughout our cruise.

The cruise was fabulous and worth it!!!

 

 

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That's good to know as we have a flight from LHR to ORD with a connection time about 15 more than you had coming up next month.

Glad you enjoyed your cruise. Feel free to start a new thread and tell us about it.

This is our first time on Oceania. We had them book the flight, a fairly short/simple one from point to point. The flight time we received was 6:00 a.m. To be honest, I didn't realize that planes even flew *that* early. We will be at our destination airport very early, at least 5 hours before ship's boarding time.

 

On the minus side, we probably won't even sleep the night before, factoring in travel time to the airport. On the plus side, the TSA lines will hopefully be short, as no one in their right mind would catch a plane that early.

 

Our previous cruises have been on Princess, and we've always used PrincessAir without issue. The flight times have been reasonable, and we never missed our cruise, even traveling on the same day.

 

I'll reserve judgment and see how it goes with Oceania.

 

Karen

I thought I would update our experience with Oceania Air. We had no problems whatsoever. We received pre-check status on both of our flights and sailed through security. Because we were at SFO so early, we had time for breakfast before boarding our flight; we arrived at the Seattle airport early, the shuttle to the ship was available within two hours (time for a latte), and we were allowed to check into the Regatta early. Disembarkation on the Regatta was our best cruise experience ever, and the return flight home was without incident.

I would have no hesitation in booking Oceania air again, based on our recent experience.

Karen

I needed to book a flight from MIA to PSP, the credit I got for "E" class, just adding $145.00 got us first class.

And on a cruise from (Regent) got $2500.00 back for Business Class, I purchase miles during a sale the airline was having and we're now flying First Class to Lisbon. And the miles only cost $2000.00 that I needed.

Hi neighbor. Not too far from us. Hard flying out of PSP with limited flights and I hate going to LAX.Will have to for our Nov. 2nd flight to Rome.

This just jogged my memory. On one of the cruises I had this discussion with one of the future cruise sales people. She said that O contracts for a minimum number of seats on their flights. If you opt out of the included air at a time when they think they won't sell all of the seats they've contracted for, the credit they offer you will be quite low.

We are most happy with O's options, We opted out of air and received a $450 credit each (+/- $1100 Cdn $) and booked in Comfort seats on Delta for $668 Cdn $. As you may have noticed in the arithmetic, we are in fact being paid to do our own thing and it just happens when the US$ is higher than ours and the flight deals are good. In the past we have used air deviation on O with success, but generally book our own flights and take the air credit. The Air Travel Dept at O is most fair and usually very considerate of passenger requests within the constraints that t:Dhey have to work with - this has been our experience.

We are most happy with O's options, We opted out of air and received a $450 credit each (+/- $1100 Cdn $) and booked in Comfort seats on Delta for $668 Cdn $

That is a good deal for r/t comfort seats ...where are you flying to/from ?

That is a good deal for r/t comfort seats ...where are you flying to/from ?

EDM to SEATAC, finally we get a break for living in the West and the ship is less than 1000 miles away.

EDM to SEATAC, finally we get a break for living in the West and the ship is less than 1000 miles away.

Situations like this do come up where your departure airport is near the ships departure port. Because the fare that includes the air is the same no matter where in North America a passenger lives, the credit for all the passengers will always be the same as well. This means people who live nearer the ships departure port have a better chance of saving by using the credit while those living further away from the cruise departure port will have to pay more. Just another reason why each person has to determine the best way to utilize Oceania Air or take the credit and make their own flight reservations. Asking others who you don't know where they live if it is better to take Oceania Air or take the credit is an futile effort as everyone's situation is different and thus the answer needs to be researched by the people traveling for their specific flight routing.

An advantage of using Oceania Air is the flexibility it provides to take advantage of last minute offers to switch itineraries or departure dates. If you booked a very popular itinerary/sailing date, you might get last minute upgrade offers. We got some very tempting upgrade offers, and finally I was able to talk my DH into pulling the trigger. For us it was still on the same ship and departure date, but we had the flexibility to consider anything thrown at us. If we had booked our own air, we would not have had the same flexibility.

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My issue, as presented in another thread, is a major carrier is having a hell of a sale currently. Since it is before the 270 day pre sale date, I don't know what O will/can do for me. There are complications with the most all the flights, but they are workable.

Here's my issue. I have no, as in zero, problem putting down the money to either O, or the airlines, to book my flight tomorrow morning and lock it all in. ZERO. By doing so, I'm taking all the risks. I just want to know what options O might bring to the table now, during the fare sale. Problem is, O doesn't seem to want to talk to me for another 60 days. There is possibly money in it for O to talk to me now, but I guess they are so flush with cash that they'd rather stick to strict policy! :rolleyes:

My issue, as presented in another thread, is a major carrier is having a hell of a sale currently. Since it is before the 270 day pre sale date, I don't know what O will/can do for me. There are complications with the most all the flights, but they are workable.

 

Here's my issue. I have no, as in zero, problem putting down the money to either O, or the airlines, to book my flight tomorrow morning and lock it all in. ZERO. By doing so, I'm taking all the risks. I just want to know what options O might bring to the table now, during the fare sale. Problem is, O doesn't seem to want to talk to me for another 60 days. There is possibly money in it for O to talk to me now, but I guess they are so flush with cash that they'd rather stick to strict policy! :rolleyes:

You have to do what's best for you. O has 10,000 travelers to work on.

For our cruise last month, we used Oceania air for the first time (took the credit and booked our own air on previous cruises) since Oceania was offering a $99 Premium Economy upgrade. I posted previously on this thread discussing our excellent experience booking - and changing - our air arrangements.

Since we've now completed our trip, I wanted to say how pleased I was with both the booking of the air and how the air arrangements turned out. We flew nonstop Tampa->Frankfurt and Frankfurt->Tampa in premium economy booked on Lufthansa. They were two of the most pleasant flights I've experienced recently. The connecting flights to Lisbon and from Paris were pretty much like US interstate cattle cars, but that's what I expected in the height of summer. And that's not a problem with Oceania's air.

So from start to finish, our first experience with O air was excellent. As I said in my previous post, you need to know what flights you want before working with O air - the flights we took were not the first (or second or third) offers proposed. But if you get Oceania to agree to the flights you want, the experience can be terrific.

Flying from my city to anywhere is very expensive so the inclusion of air was a boon for us. My only issue was that we did not arrive in Papeete until the evening before the cruise left port and with all of the on-boarding activities (such as going to the safety muster after midnight our time after traveling all day) we didn't get to go to bed until long after midnight and were exhausted. Would have rather gotten to the ship early to mid afternoon to have time to unpack and such.

This freaked me out a bit, but my own stupidity to blame.

Cruising 5/19/17 Papeete-LAX with the one way flight from LAX-Papeete. Took Oceania's air as the credit was only $400. Reading this discovered that it's possible to get the flight that arrives at 9:30PM and the ship departs at 11PM. It's hard to believe that the cruise line would ever put a passenger on a flight that cuts it so close but the above poster obviously ran into this. If the flight is even slightly delayed, you're out of luck and probably miss the first port. Only 90 min to get bags and taxi to port is an omg to me.

Have been to Tahiti many times, and husband worried about being away for nearly 3 weeks so we don't have any interest in arriving a few days early. But kind of expected to be assigned the red-eye arriving 5am. These are the only arrival times available.

So no option but to request a deviation which isn't my preference but sitting on a flight worrying about collecting bags and getting a taxi to the port doesn't sound like a good start to a cruise. Usually do a deviation and that's what'll have to be at this late date- hope we're not to late to get a decent flight!

Like I say it's my own stupid fault for "assuming".

Nancy

And, you are forgetting immigration which is separate from customs and unless you have Global Entry will take longer than customs. And, you will be coming into Terminal 5 from which you will need to leave the secure area then take a train to american in terminal 3 which is about a mile away. If you don't have a boarding pass for your American flight, you will need to get a boarding pass from american hopefully at a kiosk, then get thru security and out to your gate.

 

This will be daunting to get to your flight in 90 minutes if your flight is on time and if not virtually impossible. Only thought if you can't get your boarding pass from SAS is to on line check in for your American flight before going to the airport in Stockholm or at the airport at American which I don't believe is in Stockholm so get your boarding pass before heading to the airport. Hope you are staying at a hotel before flying home as you can't print a boarding pass until 24 hours before the flight and that will be the morning you disembark the ship.

 

Can't find minimum connection times but, if you are on oceania air, highly recomment your TA contact Oceania and get your flights changed as too iffy.

What is going to happen if you miss the connecting flights? We also have only 95 minutes for the connection flights from UA (Rome to O'Hara) to UA on our forthcoming Insignia cruise. Oceania wants $225 pp to change the last flight segment to a later time. There is only one flight left on that day which is also three hours later, so waiting for next day flight can not be ruled out. If rebooking to the next available flight an included option with O air? Does the 'limited quota" on O negotiated discounted air limit rebooking chance beyond available seats? Global Entry saves time with Immigration but won't help if we have to wait for luggages to unload, and we have been waiting for luggages many times after clearing Immigration on many flights before.

Oceania wants $225 pp to change the last flight segment to a later time.

To be clear, Oceania is telling you that $225 per person is the additional cost of that preferred flight, which they are offering to pass on to you as an up-charge.

Your choice is identical to the one which you would face if you were buying that flight on the free market, i.e. if the peace of mind is worth the $225 to you, then spend it. :evilsmile:

What is going to happen if you miss the connecting flights? We also have only 95 minutes for the connection flights from UA (Rome to O'Hara) to UA on our forthcoming Insignia cruise. Oceania wants $225 pp to change the last flight segment to a later time. There is only one flight left on that day which is also three hours later, so waiting for next day flight can not be ruled out. If rebooking to the next available flight an included option with O air? Does the 'limited quota" on O negotiated discounted air limit rebooking chance beyond available seats? Global Entry saves time with Immigration but won't help if we have to wait for luggages to unload, and we have been waiting for luggages many times after clearing Immigration on many flights before.

If you are flying on UA and connecting to a UA flight all on one PNR and you miss your flight, it is the airline's responsibility to put you on the next flight at no extra expense to you.

It may be on a UA flight if available or another airline. If you have to overnight, it also is the responsibility of the airline. I don't see a need to pay $225/pp to get on a later flight - the airline will do it for you free of charge if needed.

JMO.

If you mean O'hare airport in Chicago then 95 minutes is cutting it tight. One of the worst airports for clearing customs. The workers just don't seem to care at all.

If you mean O'hare airport in Chicago then 95 minutes is cutting it tight. One of the worst airports for clearing customs. The workers just don't seem to care at all.

Believe you mean immigration ORV. Customs has always been a breeze just walking thru and turning in a piece of paper. Immigration is the great lineup except for global entry where the line goes back and forth many times especially when a bunch of wide bodies come in at about the same time.

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Believe you mean immigration ORV. Customs has always been a breeze just walking thru and turning in a piece of paper. Immigration is the great lineup except for global entry where the line goes back and forth many times especially when a bunch of wide bodies come in at about the same time.

 

 

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I'm sure you're right, I consider it all one big procedure from the time I get off the International flight till I'm on my connecting flight. Walk a long way, present documents, get luggage, go through more lines, check luggage back in, get to your gate, sometimes no time for a bathroom break or a snack. Good thing most of the hubs are only about an hour flight on to our home airport.