Florida_gal_50

Who is blaming new cruisers? Space is always limited. They don’t build an extra restaurant off the back of the ship or make a new restaurant out of empty “boardrooms”. As one poster mentioned hal sends out many, many notifications to book your “free” excursions and restaurants. I do agree that it should be capacity controlled.

I read the Princess boards fairly often. It doesn’t sound like many of the cruises are at capacity but I could be wrong. I was on the koningsdam the week before thanksgiving and the week of. Both were over capacity. The week before thanksgiving is not a holiday cruise. Also I was told but multiple staff on the koningsdam that ALL the cruises in December were over capacity. I was also asked to join a cruise with some friends that left on Jan 25. I wasn’t able to because of work commitments but that has been sold out for at least 6 weeks. The next 2 cruises after that are sold out. This is on the Rotterdam so slightly longer cruises, not 7 days that may sell out easier. Based on this it seems to me hal is doing pretty well with filling to capacity. I would love to hear which ships are sailing almost empty. Maybe you are thinking of March 2022 because that was definitely the case.

But you do know about them now, right? I'm still wondering what fully checking out is.

It's sounds like you've never had 2 booking numbers. I've been treated as an in transit passenger on all 3 of my cruises. I'm not sure what checking fully out means but I'm sure I didn't have to do anything of the sort. On 2 of the three cruises my account and obc carried to the next cruise. They just needed to be linked. There wasn't an option to do mine as a collectors cruise.

What? Wrong people? C'mon. What does that even mean? I fully think they are trying to attract new business. They absolutely have to or die. If everything is free, that's not bringing anything into the coffers.

If I recall correctly I could see the entire itinerary for the 2 weeks. It just wouldn’t let me book anything.

I spent buckets of money in the spa last time, something I rarely do. No free cruises. Like I say I know people are trying their best to rationalize something that is not rational. Many of us are buying upgrades to our cruises such as cabanas. That is probably much more expensive than an upgrade to a oceanview.

It's not about casino players though. These are people that don't ever go to the casino according to them. I've yet to see one post saying I usually go to the casino but this time I skipped it. Not even one. I know people like to rationalize it but it doesn't sound rational to me. I actually entertained a cruise for spring on hal. Prices are very high. Then I heard hal was having some giant gambling situation on that cruise. I won't be touching it with a 10 foot poll. Let them fill it with gamblers and maybe other freebies.

I've had no luck whatsoever booking for the second week on navigator well info the first day of the second week. I wonder if it matters if you have 2 booking numbers ir one.

Well there sure are a lot of threads saying people are getting cabins for free that don’t ever go to the casino. If it was one or two I could see it. Surely there aren’t that many people that stretch the truth.

I don’t think he has stateroom pics on his site. Lots on menus though.

What you say about the casino freebies may be true for some. I’ve seen many, many posts saying they spent very little money in the casino. I’ve also seen numerous posts of people getting free cruises that have never spent a dime in there.

Totally agree. I think I’ve read recently that someone reported that hal is doing a system upgrade this year. Somehow I bet the discount upon booking will escape that upgrade. Like you say they had 1.5 years on their hands to fix things and they didn’t.

I was wondering the same question as the previous poster. I’ve done 3 b2b since the upstart. I had 2 booking numbers for each cruise. I suspect if you have one this won’t apply. I was able to book 4 free 5 star freebies. I don’t use the thermal so I can’t comment. I was able to book my second week dinners about two days before the start of the next one but I had to go to the reservations desk. I did not do it over the phone nor the app because I find that doesn’t work.

You were out of town for months? I actually didn’t buy my have it all until much later on, before my last cruise. Long after the reservations opened up. No problem booking my dinners nor shore ex. My shorex got cancelled while on the ship. Nothing else appealed. That’s the way it goes sometimes. I lost that amount. No need to feel sorry or have compassion. Not everything goes perfect in life. If it does you are very lucky. There is an option of booking what’s called an advantage fare. This is the fare between the non refundable and have it all. This way you don’t have the meals or the shorex including so no worries about booking anything. You pay for everything out of pocket. That may work better for you.

I’ll try even though I mentioned it before. You had the opportunity to book all these things far, far in advance. You chose not too. No compassion required. Sometimes we really need to take responsibility for things that go wrong instead of blaming the company or others.

I have tried that and it hasn’t worked. It did work to get a bottled water off my account.

Now that is a valid complaint because if you book ahead you'll be out of pocket then there is the very possible fight that you'll have with the front desk to get the refund.

That's nice. I'd love to see that myself but I'd understand if that's not in the cards except for world cruises. Thank you for answering.

What exactly is being harsh? You have the opportunity to book something ahead. What would the reasons that you wouldn't? I'm not sure what the point is of this thread since it so easy not to be disappointed unless that's your plan. You don't even have to pay one cent to do that.

So true. I bring paper copies of everything.

Is the lunch menu changing daily? On the shorter cruises it's tge same everyday other than the fish of the day. Thanks

I really feel it's a shortage of staff.

That makes sense unless you cancel the cruise. I think if you cancel the cruise it should be returned.

I don’t know why have it all people would be disappointed. You can book online before the cruise for specialty or shorex. If you don’t seems that’s on you.