NewSalty

No, still more than a year out. I'm sure if I'd pushed, they'd have refunded. This way was easier for them... not a problem

Update for future reference... Oceania did indeed cancel the pre-paid drink package, but credited as additional deposit on the 2 sale cruises. Not a problem as we have no intentions of cancelling, but a refund would have been preferable. Not complaining though, saved $4.5K all told!

Not penalty - August 2024. But the "non-refundable" statement on the shopping page is "un-adorned" (i.e., not in legalese) - and doesn't offer any outs. I can easily see an inexperienced somebody reading it as an absolute, and saying "nyet". I think the legalese AMHunt posted above seems to cover it, but I doubt the customer folks are up to speed on that application of the clause...

As do I, I'm just hoping somebody has had the experience, so that I can use that if Big O doesn't want to play ball...

I plan to, but wanted to see if others had done this before I call O. The chances of getting the wrong answer from one of the customer folks are not insignificant...

Bought the package separate from OLife. We're actually "cancelling" the original cruise - it was a Grand Voyage (or whatever term they use...) of 2 segments. The 2 segments were on the summer sale, the combination wasn't!

I've searched this forum, and haven't seen an answer to this one: So we have an upcoming cruise where it will behoove us to switch to Simply More. (yes, it's on the Summer Sale list...) The problem is that I pre-purchased the House Select package a while back, and won't need it under Simply More. The online shopping page states that the package is non-refundable, but I cannot believe that that applies if one is (in essence) - cancelling the cruise to which the package applies. Has anybody had experience with this before?

We disembarked from a Viking cruise back in November 2022, and yes, the place was definitively daunting in many ways. The hikes to and from the ship would be the joy of any marathoner, the maze of pickup/dropoff points would keep any lab rat well occupied, and precious little signage to help. We ran the gauntlet 3 times (overnight port), trying to keep an eye out for where we'd eventually have to meet our WelcomePickups driver, to no avail. Luckily, we ran into an employee (in the middle of nowhere) who spoke English and walked way out of her way to show us where to meet the transfer driver. (Of course, we had to agree to purchase a carpet...)

So one topic I haven't seen discussed (i.e., speculated on...) is the inherent discount associated with taking the O-Life excursions package. Under the current system, this allows you to select X excursions of up to $199 for $100 each. Especially when considering that these selections counted towards the Y excursions needed to qualify for the 25% excursion discount, this was the best (ONLY?) part of the O-Life deal that made sense. (Flatbush Flyer, feel free to chip in here!) Has anyone seen anything to indicate if the $X00 of included excursion credit per cruise offers any sort of similar discounting? (JanCruz, it's now your turn to chine in!)

Recent Sirena TA had daily trivia, putting competitions, shuffleboard competitions, ping-pong, bingo, name that tune contests, a voyage-long at scavenger hunt, plus the aforementioned county fair. Most awarded the all-so-important O-Points, which you get to trade in for bling at the end of the cruise. There were other non-O Point activities everyday as well such as bridge and mah-jong (I think). Speakers were so-so (one was down sick for most of the cruise.). I'm sure there's stuff I'm forgetting, but in any case, PLENTY to keep you occupied!

Our feelings exactly. One other benefit to consider is that the O-Life excursions count towards the total needed to qualify for the 25% discount on excursions.

We did a TA on the Oceania Sirena (same R-class as the AZ ships) this April, Aruba to the Canaries. As flat and sunshiney as you could hope for. Not much of a test of the ship's tendencies in rough water.

On our recent Sirena cruise to Portugal, we were able to get 100 Euros in cash at the reception desk, and have it charged against our onboard account. There was a 3% or 4% charge for this, but that included the currency exchange fee. Since we settled the account with a cash-back card that nets me 4.5% in the end, it was a no-brainer.

Well, by comparison, $100 back is better than $0 back, which is what you get (for an "included" excursion) when Viking cancels a port. (You still paid something for that excursion, it's just a part of your fare...) As for never taking OLife OBC, I couldn't agree with you more. I guess some people just don't really understand their finances.

I wasn't actually upgrading, I was just following the buzz because I have several upcoming cruises that I was planning to buy the house select package on. Luckily, when it went down to $29.95, I pre-purchased for all those cruises, figuring prices were only going to go up from there!

One semi-minor point about cancelled ports and the YWYW discount - on our recent Marina cruise, we had two ports and associated excursions cancelled. Both were OLife excursions, and would have disqualified our YWYW discount, but the excursions desk told us that "Oceania-cancelled" excursions would NOT have that effect. So we maintained our discount on the separately purchased excursions, despite opting for the $200 pp SBC. And much to my surprise, the SBC was refundable, even to the point that they gave us actual cash back!

It was $40 for a few weeks while they sorted out their pricing (i.e. price increases) For some reason, they dropped the house select package to $29.95 if bought pre-cruise, while raising the prestige packed to $69.95. (thus the $40 upgrade). Then a few weeks later, they dumped the pre-cruise discount, raising house select back to $39.95, restoring the upgrade to $30. The only reason I can think of for this might be the people currently cruising while they were raising prices - there was a lot of noise on there boards.

One other thing to consider is excursions and tendering... With half as many people to get ashore and/or on buses, the R-class ships don't overwhelm the small ports as much.

I will add that Azamara was very accomodating - we had a very tight connection to a ferry in the port, and got out much sooner than I would have expected. (Unfortunately, the ferry ended up being cancelled at the last second - the Greek ferries are notorius!)

Thanks... I'd hope that the CD would be in the know? Can't imagine why the cabins wouldn't be showing online. Enjoy the rest of your trip, we'll wave to you on the way down from Santiago!

Different cruise. The one in question starts in Santiago and ends in Buenos Aires.

Excursions open for booking 365 days prior to sailing. (At least for Oceanview cabins...)

770 seems unlikely - until about 2 days ago, the website showed all categories as WAITLIST. There's some availability showing now, but I can't imagine ~500 passengers chickening out in that timeframe. But hope springs... I'd love the ship to be that empty. What was your source?

It looks like you guys are getting a little bit of the "Shake" on your northward passage?