Boatsie

With the Plus Packages adding “NEW” stuff 2 times after increasing price to $60…is just waiting to buy the Plus sometime after booking a smarter choice in case they add more “NEW” stuff?  Even people who bought a $10 upgrade to $60, missed out on the latest additions of the free room service & OnBoard delivery.  There doesn’t seem to be any benefit of giving up the $60 per day ($1920 in our case) until we see what more is behind the curtain.  Thoughts??

47 minutes ago, COCKYMARK said:

What makes everyone so sure it is not going to be better in almost 3 months?

For specifically the Oasis of the Seas....they have a bunch of crew members on board (14 reported and unofficially around 60) who have tested positive for corona virus.  The logistics of how they plan on getting the crew off the ship are unknown, so that might throw a wrench into their plans...for the whole industry, over & above the problems dealing with a manpower nightmare with future ‘paying’ bookings drying up,   (1)  there is no cure for viruses; (2) vaccine for the virus is 12 months away at best; (3) most every port for touring & replenishing supplies, is closed thru summer (4) a lot of people who might have cruised,  are currently unemployed.

Cruising in June isn’t happening...RCCL & all the other know it, they just want to hold on to everyone’s money as long as they can.

Another vote for taking the money while you have a chance and they still have it to give.

You’ll have to get in line though...still waiting for my cash refund I asked for over 2 weeks ago for cruise they cancelled.

Requested refund via RCCL email links over 2 weeks ago for our cruise (cancelled by RCCL) that was supposed to sail this past Sunday. We also used FCCs from Hurricane Dorian cancellation to pay portion of this cruise.  

As of today (Mar 31)..our credit card showed no refunds of taxes/port charges; no refund of cruise fare; and we haven’t seen any email about reissue of FCCs

Something to consider for people opting for FCCs vs. the cash refund...once you relinquish your cash refund for (essentially purchasing?) the 125% FCCs, and if the next cruise you pick doesn’t sail...there will be no cash offer the next time around. 

On 3/25/2020 at 3:38 PM, mitsugirly said:

 

 

 

I didn't say anything about adding another 25% ??  I'm asking if we used the 125% certificate to pay for a different cruise, since ours was cancelled by RC, and then if they extended the time again (which is now mid-May at this point but IF they extend that date again and cancelled the cruise booked to replace our April 12th cruise) to a later date, then would they just reissue another 125% certificate?

I think that’s the way it is supposed to work...i’ve done that (using an FCC towards purchase of my present cancelled cruise) and still waiting on reissue of that FCC with an extended expiration date.  I have $2200 in FCC hanging in limbo at the moment—people considering taking them up on the FCCs they’re offering shouldn’t assume they are as good as the cash amount shown on the certificate.

 I’ve heard there is currently some confusion at RCCL of handling these FCCs to book new cruises (depending on who at RCCL you call), they’re making you put a cash deposit down on new cruise before applying the 125% FCC, even though they rolled your original cash deposit into the 125% FCC.  It’s screwed up and confusing for those wanting new trips.  However, I don’t think it’s an issue if you use your FCC to pay off a future cruise you’ve already got booked.

Add to that the issue that they’re supposed to refund the cash value of taxes & port fees from the cancelled cruise to your credit card fairly quickly (before calculating the 125% FCC)....i’m still waiting to see that come back to my card too.

As they continue to slowly drag this thing out and cancel cruises bit-by-bit, and more cruises are cancelled, the FCC situation will get more & more complicated as they issue, reissue & re-reissue these things.  FCCs might be a good idea for people applying them to an already-booked cruise with a time horizon in mid-to-late 2021, otherwise, it’s like playing a game of whack-a-mole picking cruises that may or may not be sailing.

2 hours ago, mitsugirly said:

Our Oasis cruise was cancelled (April 12) and have been looking at other cruises and found one for May 30th. Those of you that don't think cruising will start up again any time in May or June, if we booked that May 30th cruise, wouldn't they just extend another 125% certificate and you'd rebook again? Just wondering. 

They wouldn’t take the first 125% certificate and add another 25% on that...they’d simply take the 125% certificate and maybe extend the expiration date at best.

In my case, I used a “Hurricane Dorian” FCC to purchase a portion of a cruise RCCL cancelled in the first round of cancellations....it’s been 10 days since I filed the refund request from the cancellation notification and I still haven’t heard a peep out of RCCL on the status of my requested cash refund or extension of my old FCC.

4 hours ago, shemp2000 said:

Good question.  Here is what my insurance is doing for people, not a refund but a voucher.  Never hurts to ask you insurance company

 

If you cancelled your insurance policy on or after January 24, 2020 due to Coronavirus concerns and you are not eligible for a refund, you may be eligible instead for a travel insurance premium voucher for the full value of the policy purchased.  To be eligible for a premium voucher, your original trip departure date must be no later than April 30, 2020.  All premium vouchers issued must be redeemed for a new travel insurance policy for a covered trip booked no later than September 30, 2020.  However, the trip departure date may occur after September 30, 2020. 

 

also

 

If you have not yet begun your trip, you may modify your insurance policy and apply the entire premium paid to a new booked trip.  Your new premium will be calculated based on the details of your rebooked trip.  If the new premium is greater than your original premium, there will be additional premium charged.  If the new premium is less than your original premium, no amount of the original premium will be refunded

 

 

 

Which insurance company was this?

How much will you lose if you don’t hand over final payment now?

Under the CWC program, I believe getting a percentage of your total cruise cost refunded has been flushed.  Once they have you’re money, and you cancel under CWC, you only get back FCC.  

If the cruise gets “voluntarily” cancelled by them, which was the case currently,  it’s 125% or refund.  But future cancellations just might be “mandated” by authorities...in which case, the refund rules just might change again, and not probably in the favor of the customers.

But what if we used some old FCC to purchase a portion of this cruise and there was still time left to the old FCC expiration date (September 2020)...what happens in that case?

If we booked the our now cancelled RCCL cruise that was partially purchased with FCC gotten from another cruise that was cancelled due to hurricane...how do they usually credit that?

47 minutes ago, Ivebeenpwnd said:

Wish they announced it yesterday since I am on a flight to get to Miami for the symphony of the seas on saturday now

Ouch! Sorry to hear that.  You might want to consider looking into spending the week at a really nice Orlando resort ...with Disney World & Universal shutting down, there may be some screaming last minute deals on hotels

On 3/6/2020 at 7:34 AM, Hllb said:

I have a cruise from Venice to Rome scheduled for July.  Hoping things settle down by then and it's a go, but trying to come up with scenarios if it's cancelled.  The cruise is for my daughter's 16th birthday, so if it gets cancelled, I'd still like to take her somewhere (I took her brother to Korea for his 16th last year).  What would YOU do if your summer cruise was cancelled?  Stay home?  Cruise somewhere else?  Vacation somewhere else?  Where else would you consider going? Looking for back up ideas here 😄

Mom (or Dad?) and daughter USA Roadtrip!...Route 66 Chicago to Santa Monica, CA 👍

2 hours ago, Ourusualbeach said:

The only cruise (other than those excluded by dates) that you cannot apply the FCC to is one from which the FCC was originally issued.

Does a cruise have to be taken before  the FCC “expiration date,” or does it just need to be BOOKED before the expiration date (and therefore taken after the expiration date).

48 minutes ago, lanceholt said:

...........  I understand this was something the White House suggested last weekend at the cruise line meeting...to just ban anyone over 70 and the cruise lines pushed back.  BY THE WAY, this has NOTHING to do with supporting our government or cooperating, or anything like that and I really resent those implied criticism of lack of loyalty or patriotism.   This country is divided enough as it is, and last I checked it is still a free and equal country which has a lot of legislation concerning discrimination.

 

It wasn’t a WH proposal to ban travelers over 70..it came from Adam Goldstein, the CEO of Cruise Line International Association  (& former VP of RCCL) who represents the cruise line industry

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/11/coronavirus-cruise-industry-proposes-travel-ban-for-people-over-70.html

2 hours ago, erdoran said:

WHAT THE HECK IS EVERYBODY’S PROBLEM?  Cruises will be around in the future.  This smells like a compromise between cruise lines & CDC where CDC probably wanted to shut them down because of the higher possibility of Covid-19 spread on ships, and the CLIA fought back and they eventually agreed to something to make it more difficult for the community at highest risk to cruise.

 

I note this doesn’t require the cruiser to be free of risk factors if they are under 70, and it also doesn’t address cardiac disease, which is top on the list of co-morbidities with poorer outcome.

 

IMHO it’s too watered down, it should be a bit stronger.  Not that NCL will know if you are 40 and have COPD, but I wish there was some way this would be a bit more widespread.  I know we can’t ask everyone who is sailing to get a doctor’s note, but medically I think people should really have it in their faces what the risk factors and consequences are if they choose to cruise.  No risk factors, great!  

 

Let the flames begin—and no, I am not a troll, I think my post count speaks for itself.

The problem is...they are keeping the money of the 70+ year old people (who might not be fit to travel or whose doctor doesn’t want the liability of signing a form) and giving them worthless FCC in return.  

If they don’t want the customer to cruise...give them back the cash they paid for the cruise.

Is there anyone who is 75+ years old and has a cruise booked between now and the end of May 2020 going on the cruise and not considering cancelling it?

1 hour ago, MoniMommy said:

Only you can make that call. I canceled because of my 81 year old mother. But is it were just me and my kids I would have went. Even now I am considering going on the cruise by myself and sending kids to moms. If the price drops enough I may do it. For now I took my 50% redubd and 50% FCC. I hope we will be able to go in Oct. I am going to book, but if the advisery against cruising is still in effect at the time of Final Paymeny I will cancel because I dont want 2 FCC. I will also book a refundable deposit fare.

I’m figuring (in at least the next couple weeks) that the cruise ships will be the cleanest and most uncrowded they’ve ever been.

 The US government, media and future customers will be watching them like a hawk.  I’d assume they would love to have happy, healthy customers bouncing down the debarkation gangway telling the world what a great time they had.

At least that’s the way my mind is rationalizing the situation to the part of me that is still thinking about canceling the cruise. 😬

2 hours ago, rimmit said:

Glad you had a different experience than me. Another example of RCI being inconsistently consistent.  
 

This was definitely a huge issue for me in the past, and I have even brought it up on the forum about 2 years ago, and the response I got was none to kind.  We were definitely issued an FCC that was basically our cruise divided 4 ways which was a pain as we couldn’t find any cruise we could apply it too before it expired.  I finally got them to extend the FCC expiration. So we could find a cruise to use it on.  It was a total pain.  I am glad you are having a better experience.

I’m now considering the lesser of two evils:

Do I go on the cruise, have a good time  & risk corona virus and/or an extended period of quarantine?

OR

do I waste hours on a phone call sorting out reinstating my previous FCC, current FCC (with different expiration dates); praying that RCCL won’t screw it up and I get what was agreed to over the phone; cancelling hotel, parking & trip insurance; finding a new cruise that fits within the limitations of the FCC terms of service; rebooking said cruise; purchasing new trip insurance (with more restrictions); and rebooking hotel & car parking.

what to to, what to do......

16 minutes ago, ryano said:

 

Absolutely Ive not only heard of it happening, it happened to me when we cancelled our Harmony cruise because of hurricane Dorian.   Not only this but she will also have to pay yet another deposit to use the FCCs as well.   We found that to take a comparable cruise in the same cabin on Harmony, we would have to put up no less than 1500.00 total which included a 250.00 per person deposit, no matter when in the next year that we booked it.    We decided to apply the FCC toward an Alaska cruise on Ovation and Im certainly hoping I dont have to cancel it and take another FCC.    

If you used your FCC to purchase your Alaska cruise, and you cancel the cruise, you will forfeit the entire value of the FCC and only be issued a new FCC in the amount you paid in addition costs over & above the original FCC. It sucks, but it’s the way they’re doing it now.

2 hours ago, 20165 said:

Bankruptcy is also my concern, although i think we have a ways to go before we get close to that...  I got burned before with AA stock before they declared bankruptcy.  But RCL is tempting at this low level.  Hard decision.

 

All these cruise companies went into this situation up to their eyeballs in huge debt.  They were relying on their consistent stream of new revenue to stay afloat to begin with. That’s not the greatest business model to hook your retirement star to—especially given the current situation and how much more debt they’re going to need to see them through and have to pay back later (albeit at lower interest rates thanks to the Fed).

At best, cruise stocks might be a tempting speculative play...but for a retirement portfolio??...nope.  Not while there are better bargains ripe for the picking.

2 hours ago, RosieRoo said:

Yes, if you cancel your booking you forfeit the FCC and only get the credit for the $800 you paid. I am in the same situation with my March cruise. If I cancel even under the new policy I will lose $1600 in FCC. 

I’m in the same situation of losing a $2200 FCC if I cancel.  

Are you going to cancel your cruise or have you already cancelled by contacting RCCL?

I still have about 2 weeks to decide....see no point on waiting on “hold” for 2 hours.  Hoping the company might sort out the operation during that time.

Oh hell no!

Do you realize that if this thing drags out and with no new revenue coming in for maintenance of those huge ships & idle staff payroll, those companies will first cut dividends (driving the stock price down further).  The next step is to file for bankruptcy protection...meaning the current stocks will be flushed (and become worthless) and their liabilities be be erased (think “FCC” gone).  

There’s bargains galore in the midst of this bloodbath...Apple, Disney, Home Depot, Amazon...better yet...S&P 500 ETF.

16 hours ago, MoniMommy said:

Thanks. I understand that. I am just thinking ahead. If things are still bad at the end of July I anticipate this offer being extended, and similar rules will apply. So I am just thinking ahead to September and the possibility of needing to cancel a cruise that has a FCC applied.

Another issue that might come up, if this thing drags on, is the cruise lines may file for bankruptcy protection, giving them permission to wipe out their liabilities to stay solvent —which would include liquidation of their current stocks as well as all FCCs.

BUT....if you used FCC (from a previous cruise) to purchase your current cruise, and you cancel it, you will forfeit the amount paid by using the FCC.  You will then only be issued a new FCC in the amount paid over & above  that from the old FCC.

in our case, $2200 from a FCC from Hurricane Dorian that we used to purchase our cruise that leaves in 2 weeks, will end up in the pockets of RCCL and we will only get a few hundred bucks in new FCC.  The kicker is, the $2200 FCC from Dorian had an expiration date of August 2020, but it doesn’t matter...RCCL will just get the $2200  five months early. 

Salute Mr Fain!

Just keep this little loophole in mind when you use your FCC to book your future cruise 👍

Does anyone know what type of sweetener is used on RCCL in their sugar free dessert ...specifically the ice cream they serve in the MDR.  Has anyone tried it, is it any good and is one flavor better than the others?