HHI Cruiser1

@Sthrngary Thanks for starting this thread and all the info and numerous answers which many have added too. You posted Oceania Secrets information as a pdf; however, in all 136 pages of this NCL Haven thread I can not find a pdf version of your NCL Haven secrets. With what appeared to be several 'updates' in your posts responding to questions within these 136 pages, could you post a new updated 2023 NCL Haven Secrets as pdf? Thanks again.

Port Lockroy is British Post Office stop; however, Viking's ships are too large to allow landings at Port Lockroy (we were just there and couldn't land, only water activities). Port Lockroy people did come onboard and each passenger got one self stamped post card (which will to transferred to Port Lockroy sometime during a future visit by Viking). If possible, British Air Mail stamps should work if you want to send more post cards. Maybe on future Port Lockroy visits, people from Port Lockroy will bring additional post cards and other stuff to sale (as they indicated they normally do, but didn't on our cruise).

Today once we got to EZE airport, passengers were separated into 2 groups - Delta/United flights and American flights. Delta/United group got to store their luggage (watched by local tour contractor used by Viking), walked to Hard Rock Cafe, and got a meal with drinks. American group got walked to closed ticketing counter and told to wait for hours to check-in on your own - no food, no drink, no luggage storage, few seats, just a person in a red shirt pointing at the closed ticketing counters. What a significant difference in how Viking treated us after this cruise. Shame on Viking.

It appears that current admins have a LOT of time on their hands and nothing better to do than act as traffic crossing guards.

Agree, original admin was much better and allowed interact. Current admins just close and remove a lot of stuff that isn't against any FB Group rules, just because 'admin' said so. Just very sad admins are so limiting of that FB Group.

Just don't disagree with current admins as they are quick to ban you from 'their' FB Group. Seen several 'banning' for minor comments and many posts removed as others have commented.

Thanks for all the info and posts. Looks great and can't wait until we board soon. I am confused by the temperature values - seem that F and C are being used as equals. 45 C is really hot and 45 F is mildly cold. Which is correct? From your previous post:

Has the process changed again? We just printed out blank form and wrote in the answers, then Doc reviewed and signed. Then just use your cellphone to take pictures of each page and upload those for Viking's review.

We'll see how it goes, but if we don't 'land' on Antarctica, there's many other luxury cruise lines that do 'Antarctica cruise only' for a lot less. I would expect an option to reschedule any Antarctica cruise which isn't allowed to 'land'. The landing are what Viking really markets and upcharges for.

If you want to see your Antarctica cruise passage (route in Antarctica), all ships are required to file post cruise reports with Secretariat of the Antarctic Treaty. You can review all cruise routes (stops, activities, etc.) on this site: https://www.ats.aq/index_e.html. Every Antarctica cruise is listed as reported by cruise line, down to kayaks and landings. I think that behind a controlled login wall, every landing or stop location is also controlled (like ports) in order to comply with limitations at each location (like normal port berth assignments). I also think that's why landing/stops change closer to actual cruise dates, as each cruise line tries to register their locations 'desires' and have to adjust if another ships is already 'assign' that location on that day. Can't have too many ships or passengers violating Antarctica Treaty Limitations (no one wants to be told they can land only to find out there's another ship already there and you can't stop). Great info. Plus you can clearly see if your cross Antarctica Circle on any cruise.

Hey, can Haven's concierge get you into Syn Normans like other entertainment venues? I seem to remember a previous comment about this - early in with reserved seating.

Wow, what a mess with Viking vouchers. Seems Viking makes the rules up as they go as none of these 'rules' or 'options' are printed on any voucher.

Posted in another forum is some 'new' information about Viking vouchers, at least new for me. > Poster cancelled a river cruise and lost all his vouchers (12k) and on a follow-up call to Viking stated: Poster was talking to Viking Customer Service agent who told him what I could and should (my word) have done was remove the vouchers from the cruise, wait couple of days, and then cancel. The vouchers would have been reinstated." > Poster also stated that Viking can remove vouchers. In his case, Viking removed a voucher from his previous original cruise, split it into two vouchers and then applied one of the split amounts. Viking did that because the voucher was more than the cruise fare (but it took me two or three calls for them to even tell me I could do that). Split only works if the voucher was for more than 10K. I have never heard about either of these 'unknown' Viking voucher rules. I know a lot of posters have lost voucher money because they can't spend enough on their cruise or just lost a voucher when they cancelled a cruise (like me). So these new 'unknow' Viking voucher rules come as a not so pleasant surprise.

You can only see shareholder OBC for your cruise on your cruise Guest Statement (page 3 under Gift Orders), not in your website account for that cruise. You can confirm your shareholder OBC by calling O. Shareholder OBC can only be used onboard, not for pre-cruise excursions or gratuities or other pre-cruise items.

As was posted earlier, Viking does it because Viking can. As many posts have clearly stated that Viking randomly enforces early payment of 12 to 18 months and allows some first time cruisers to have 6 month final payments. So these discrepancies just confirms that Viking does what Viking want to because Viking can. Viking would change final payment timeframe if more bookings were lost because of it.

What shows? Those were cut a long time ago...... or downsized to solo acts or game shows.

Does anyone think Viking will relax their final payment requirements with this influx of cost savings? Or maybe just offset current new ship costs and keep unpopular final payment business policy? Customer focus would adjust final payment policy, but the balance sheet bottom-line could be focus.

Sorry for your hassle and loss as Viking has become very inflexible recently. Viking's land based customer service is poor and not customer focused anymore. Many have experienced this, so you are not alone. Hope others learn from your experience and consider experiences like this when booking future cruises.

Huh?

Same thing happened to us when we contacted home office (Norway), just silence and no replies. At least Viking is being consistent there. Not like previous time several years ago when our phone couldn't ring any faster.

Viking's just spending all those advance cruise fares that have been collected recently. Viking has also started buying more TV ad time on numerous cable channels (more than just PBS).

Very true for Viking currently. As Viking uses cruise fares for several new ships (ocean ad river), hiring has not been successful in finding the best crews (recently a river passenger was told by GM to be 'patient' with their new crew and accept less than previous Viking experience). Viking 'supporters' and Viking marketing have painted extremely high expectations for new Viking cruisers, so when things don't go as expectations (based upon all those previous CC and other social media posted examples), complaints are loud and long especially since these new Viking cruisers paid so much extra for the Viking experience they researched on social media. Then you add in all the issues with land based customer service from voucher limitations to OBC limitations to Viking Air failures, and you get more loud and long complaints. As long as Viking sells our cruises, why stop to address these issues? We came to a similar conclusion and future cruise direction as Heidi13 a while back after repeated issues with Viking's customer service. It appears that profits now rules at Viking over customer satisfaction.

Sorry, but I totally disagree. Viking is not transparent many times and just puts up a stone wall when asked direct questions to explain Viking quirks, like cancelling ports, changing ships, Viking Air problems, changes to flights, changes to seats, voucher issues,... the list is long. Since Viking sells out their cruises, Viking really doesn't care to answer many questions when Viking changes your cruise or flights. Why should they? Like Viking just changed their final payment date from 12 months to 18 months for new bookings. No one knows why and Viking will not answer, even their top TAs don't know. I fear that something is going on within Viking causing Viking to need more hard money now.

Viking will never change what you agreed to pay (even before final payment); unlike many other cruise lines which will provide some form of credit even after final payment (you can search CC for many examples in the other forums). Seems that once Viking has your money, it's a done deal as (again) Viking has your money. Just something to remember the next time you book a cruise. As others will point out (in different ways), just stop looking at Viking's advertisements and you'll be happier.

Quote - I definitely wish I had more in hard-copy format right now. NCL could claim that they see things differently. But they might have a hard time ignoring my wife's original return ticket (that went unused). I suggest the use of chat when need to document discussions as you can get a transcript of chat to produce as info to NCL or airline. I have done that with LATAM and it works as it stopped all the 'he said, she said, they said' circle. Good luck.