Kosmo82899

Hint to the boyfriend. Man up and get a job at the local Mickie D for a few months so he can repay the lost money and make amends. I am sure OP and family will be impressed and give him a 2nd chance.

He does have a job at the local wings joint and is going to school to be an electrician actually. I have no doubt he will pay us back when he has the money. It just shouldn't have come to this in the first place in my opinion.

Still not Carnival's fault and they can't set a precedence by cutting you some slack for a situation like this. There are too many people just like you that would ask for the same. He should have or you should have had a secure place for something that important. Like I said. When we traveled with our kids 19 and 22, I collected drivers licenses at the beginning of our trip to keep with BC and passports. I kept them in a secure place where an "accidental fall" could not happen.

I do agree that it wouldn't be good business practice to reimburse everyone and I will start keeping all important documents together myself in the future. But what would it have hurt to let him on in the first place? Would anyone's security have been at risk because he was on the ship without a ID with him? We were also told on the phone by Carnival and employees at the port that each port is different and they may have let him on at other ports. If it's a policy then stick to it, no exceptions. It's more frustrating knowing that a different customs employee that day or sailing from a different port may have changed the outcome.

If Carnival makes an exception in your case, then it will have to make an exception every time a similar case comes up to be fair to everyone. Where does it end? The young man has learnt an important lesson that will benefit him the rest of his life. Look at this as a positive from an otherwise crappy situation.

I guess I feel like it's not like we weren't totally prepared from the start. He didn't forget to bring what he needed from home or anything it just fell from his pocket at some point in leaving the hotel that morning. If he would have left it at home then I would agree it's on him so tough luck. Since it was purely accidental that it fell from his pocket I feel they could have cut us some slack and or let us have at least part of the money put towards another cruise with them.

The decision to bring along one of kids friends on a cruise means, they would be treated as part of the family and I would be just as responsible for them as I was for my own kids.. I could never leave them behind - I wouldn't appreciate anyone doing that to my son either..

 

Sorry, I agree with OP - if we were all travelling together in one vehicle, everyone would stay together - even if it meant not going.. :(

This is exactly what my wife said. I wasn't totally against leaving him there because he is 18, it would have taught him to be more responsible and he is dating my daughter so therefore I don't like him. :) In the end I couldn't do it though and I think my wife and daughter would have been miserable the whole week anyway so it wouldn't have been fun.

In the end we definitely learned a valuable lesson which hopefully doesn't turn out to be a costly one. Also it may have kept us from some rough seas and nasty weather as we would have most likely been in the path of tropical storm/hurricane Earl that hit Mexico last week. Maybe it was a sign from God lol.

If you truly believe you were wronged, then file a chargeback on your credit card. Carnival will likely win the chargeback. Then you file a chargeback a second time, which goes through the arbitration process. It's very rare that companies continue to fight at that point and you are likely to get your money back without anything additional. If they do continue to fight, you go through arbitration and the worst that can happen is you are out the money you were already out. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain.

 

If you end up winning, Carnival may not want you onboard ever again, though :)

 

My opinion, for the penny that it's worth - is that this says a lot more about Carnival simply not caring. Regardless of what rules or terms state, Carnival can certainly make exceptions "for the sake of customer satisfaction" - that's a term I got used to when working for a major tech company long ago. Carnival wins nothing and it's bad business on their part. But what can you do? I'm not sure how I'd handle it, personally.

This is my biggest issue is just have some compassion and give us a break. Especially since we have went on multiple cruises with them. I'm not saying it was in anyway shape or form Carnival's fault. It was completely on him/us for not making sure sooner he had it. But would it hurt them to be a little compassionate? At one point we were standing at the counter debating whether or not my family was going to go without him and both my kids were crying. One Carnival employee even made the comment that if somebody else was in working in customs that day that they would have probably let us on. I also don't understand why we had to wait over 3 hours just to be told no. The boyfriend had family relatively close to the port and had we been told sooner that he wouldn't be allowed on, the rest of us may have went on the cruise anyway. At least then we could have been assured that he had someone there to pick him up and he wasn't just stranded hundreds of miles from home. I guess I just feel doing a good deed here may cost them a couple grand, which is nothing to them but overall would do more good than harm. We will most likely spend more money than previously if they credit us for another cruise, would be more likely to consider future cruises with them and would pass on that they are a good company that takes care of their customers. As it stands now they will definitely not get any future business from us, not that it will hurt them at all lol.

Just wanted to get some input from other cruisers and any tips on how to possibly win this battle against Carnival. Here is my story. Myself, my wife, my son, my daughter and her boyfriend who is 18 were supposed to cruise on the Carnival Paradise out of Tampa last week. Her boyfriend was denied boarding because he didn't have any form of photo id with him because he accidently left it in the hotel room in Georgia we had stayed at the previous night. We had his birth certificate and the hotel found his wallet with drivers license in it and sent us and Carnival a picture of the license. After waiting for over 3 hours we were told he wouldn't be allowed to board. Now we are fighting with Carnival to try to get the money we had paid to be put towards a future cruise with them. They are refusing to give us anything back or put towards another cruise because we didn't purchase the insurance they offer. We were told by the Carnival employees in Tampa that the insurance wouldn't have helped in this situation anyway but that is not what customer care is telling us. We have been on multiple cruises with Carnival and brought other couples previously on their first cruises. I am failing to see what Carnival feels like they will be losing by giving us our money towards another cruise with them. It was a 5 day cruise from Tampa to Mexico in the cheapest cabin they had so they won't be out much money in my opinion. Anyone with any suggestions on this?