Real time lesson in air travel to cruise

As luck would have it, we just got on and then off our flight to Lisbon for an Oceania cruise. Mechanical issues. While it may cause us some problems with preplanned appointments in Lisbon, at least we have several days before ship embarkation on July 7.

Real time lesson for CC folks: Never book flights scheduled to arrive on day of cruise departure!

That must be very frustrating but at least you won't miss the cruise.

What airline (UA?) and what alternate plans did they make for you?

That must be very frustrating but at least you won't miss the cruise.

 

What airline (UA?) and what alternate plans did they make for you?

Problem fixed with arrival tine delayed by less than an hour. Fortunately, United at SFO is a maintenance hub and it is generally on top of mechanical items in a flash.

On a related note, just did flight arrangement for future cruise out of Valparaiso and agonized a bit about flying down to Santiago from SFO via Houston only three days pre-cruise. Even with Star Alliance backup possibilities for United, a cancelled international flight to South America can mean up to a 2 day delay unless you accept assignment of your tix to another airline (could lose your mileage upgrades).

Our first Renaissance cruise was in Oct '99. Lisbon-Barcelona. Back then they gave us 2 nights in a hotel but since we love Lisbon we planned on coming in 2 nights earlier. We booked our own air.

Because we had changed reservations from a previously planned trip to Milano at about the same time, we didn't think we needed to get the tickets rewritten ahead of time. We were wrong.

We were delayed going to the airport because of an accident on the highway. Once we got to the airport they had no trouble rewriting my husband's ticket but somehow couldn't do mine. The supervisor took the opportunity to instruct underlings on the procedure and managed to take so much time that we missed our flight. In the meantime, they sent our luggage to Paris ...

So we went home and came back the next night at which time we were able to board. So we lost one day of our planned four in Lisbon but still had three. However, since we'd booked a hotel for the first night when we arrived the next morning they had our luggage (sent on from Paris) AND our room was ready at 7am. So it wasn't a total loss.

The bad part was that we arrived on my birthday which is also a national holiday in Portugal. And we also discovered that the Gulbenkian, one of my all-time favorite museums, closed on that day for a renovation ... so we had to skip it. It all worked out in the end. We came back a few years later and visited the Gulbenkian ...

Had we planned on flying in on the day to catch the ship ... we would have missed it.

So I agree. We ALWAYS go in at least one day early, and most of the time at least two or three. It depends on the city.

Mura

Problem fixed with arrival tine delayed by less than an hour. Fortunately, United at SFO is a maintenance hub and it is generally on top of mechanical items in a flash.

 

That's great news - enjoy your cruise.

Good for you, enjoy your trip. As always we also fly in early-just don't like to do the last minute thing. We enjoy arriving to the ship without a worry---than enjoy the cruise.....

Rick

We were very lucky in one instance - we booked our air with Regent and our flight from LA to Paris and then to Barcelona would have ended in Paris due to a strike in Paris. We called the Air Dept and they re-routed us via Swiss Air via Geneva and then to Barcelona. I only heard about the strike in Paris when we were in the lounge in LAX. We were able to retrieve our checked luggage. The flight on Swiss Air required us to wait in Los Angeles in the terminal with no services for six hours - much better than missing a cruise all together. No it was not Oceania's Air Dept but there were people in the Air France Lounge who did not know about it. But by alerting the Air Department shared with Oceania - those people got re-routed too.

Some years ago we were flying Virgin Atlantic to Barbados to join a Windstar cruise and I was advised not to book the flights for the day the cruise departed. Trouble was at that time there was only 1 direct flight per week! So we "had" to fly in a week early:)!

Fortunately we were planning a 2 week trip so just changed it from cruise then stay to stay then cruise, but since then I've always heeded that advice - it just hadn't occurred to me before - and flown in early.

Ideally I like to add a couple of days "fore and aft" since cruises seem to end rather abruptly.

Has anyone taken the included air and missed the ship's departure?

Problem fixed with arrival tine delayed by less than an hour. Fortunately, United at SFO is a maintenance hub and it is generally on top of mechanical items in a flash.

 

On a related note, just did flight arrangement for future cruise out of Valparaiso and agonized a bit about flying down to Santiago from SFO via Houston only three days pre-cruise. Even with Star Alliance backup possibilities for United, a cancelled international flight to South America can mean up to a 2 day delay unless you accept assignment of your tix to another airline (could lose your mileage upgrades).

Followup #1: just got an apology e-mail from United with web address to collect a "token of thanks." Haven't had time to check it out. But, if past "thanks" are any indication, it'll be travel certificates with value based on cabin class.

United gets it's fare share of detractors (as does any airline). But, even now that I am retired and no longer receiving the perks of a 1K flier, I still appreciate the way they GENERALLY (hiccups now and then which make the 6 o'clock news) treat passengers when it comes to problem like delays. United pilots will always announce details of issues along with plan for remediation. Even smaller items like errant headphone jacks will net you travel certificates if you bring the issue to the attention of a flight attendant who then cannot fix it right there and then.

Followup #1: just got an apology e-mail from United with web address to collect a "token of thanks." Haven't had time to check it out. But, if past "thanks" are any indication, it'll be travel certificates with value based on cabin class.

United gets it's fare share of detractors (as does any airline). But, even now that I am retired and no longer receiving the perks of a 1K flier, I still appreciate the way they GENERALLY (hiccups now and then which make the 6 o'clock news) treat passengers when it comes to problem like delays. United pilots will always announce details of issues along with plan for remediation. Even smaller items like errant headphone jacks will net you travel certificates if you bring the issue to the attention of a flight attendant who then cannot fix it right there and then.

Delayed flight likely $150 credit. However they have quit many of the other remunerations - broken IFE. Last time got zippo until I complained. Also the free hotel for a weather delay has been removed as as guaranteed benefit. But status still has some benefits for irregular ops. Approaching my 3M lifetime milestone but things have changed throughout the airline industry. Bottom line counts more than passenger loyalty.

ENJOY YOUR CRUISE!

So, after flying to HNL from Big Island and staying overnight, getting up at 4 am to make the only wide body flight with lie flat seats to SFO, we find out at the airport that our flight was cancelled! No maintenance hub here, also pilots go past their allowance of work hours. Finally get on a later flight downgraded to Premium Econ. They did what they could, gave us the whole row of seats, free drinks and food, but I book only for the space and ability to sleep, especially facing the length of travel we faced (155 degrees of longitude - nearly half way around the world!). No instant refund, but given the website address for refund in difference of fares - something to do on sea day tomorrow!:rolleyes: glad we made our Virgin Atlantic flight, but only had a brief stop in lounge. Lesson #2 - leave lots of time between flights!!!! 4 hours shrank to 1 hour!:eek: all these things have been cured by a fabulous first day precruise in Lisbon. See you onboard in a couple of hours.

Sorry to hear about this. But, clearly, air delay is becoming the rule rather than the exception. Hopefully, all who swear by flying in on embarkation day will read this thread and rethink that strategy.

In booking flights for next cruise, I just used "beaucoup" points to have only one connection and, even then, picked the longer 4 hour layover over a two hour one. Also, glad Houston (between SFO and SCL (Chile) is a United hub (in case there are issues).

Delayed flight likely $150 credit. However they have quit many of the other remunerations - broken IFE. Last time got zippo until I complained. Also the free hotel for a weather delay has been removed as as guaranteed benefit. But status still has some benefits for irregular ops. Approaching my 3M lifetime milestone but things have changed throughout the airline industry. Bottom line counts more than passenger loyalty.

 

ENJOY YOUR CRUISE!

Sounds like you and Flatbush had better luck than these guys.

Sounds like you and Flatbush had better luck than these guys.

I remember seeing this some time ago but just looked at it again (thanks, Catherine). In reading through the comments I see that Taylor replaced his guitar (gave him two as I recall) because due to the video they have had such an increase in buyers! When he told the Customer Service manager he'd just make a video and put it on u-tube the manager was unimpressed ... 6,000,000 hits later United wanted to settle.

Mura

Delayed flight likely $150 credit. However they have quit many of the other remunerations - broken IFE. Last time got zippo until I complained. Also the free hotel for a weather delay has been removed as as guaranteed benefit. But status still has some benefits for irregular ops. Approaching my 3M lifetime milestone but things have changed throughout the airline industry. Bottom line counts more than passenger loyalty.

 

ENJOY YOUR CRUISE!

As it turns out, the perk offer was due to limited food choices and not the mechanical delay. We took the 2500 miles/person option over $50/person travel coupons.