pghflyer

I did notice all of the non-AARP community OBC offers (educator, military, healthcare) say only good for select 2023/ 2024 cruises in their T&Cs.....so not sure if these are ongoing programs and if you would get any benefit for 2025/2026/+ sailings.........

Thank you @RuthC so if I wanted a 25 night cruise (for example, which would have been a $300 certificate), I would owe the additional $200 per person to book with my existing certificate?..... or do they give me some flat credit for my $100 certificate and I owe a different balance for the cruise I select?

On 1/6/2023 at 3:55 AM, boeckli said:

Screenshot from my recent future cruise deposit

 

 

We bought one $100 future cruise deposit (FCD) each last year.....does this mean I cannot apply it to a cruise more than 21 days long?  

Anyone know of an automated way to monitor for availability of a particular cabin on a sailing? I know there are websites that can do this for airplane seats........

That is feasible in theory if they have openings on your selected tour & time, but on our sailing, the vast majority of excursions were sold-out prior to sailing and already had an established waitlist.......so the only safe way was to do it in person at the desk.

I just submitted (and instantly obtained) my AARP validation  today and the response email says to wait 3-day before booking...you think that is really necessary for a 2026 booking?  Hard to imagine they can't take care of that. 

Honestly the amount of promos are pretty impressive if they really do all stack / combine successfully.  I am looking at a 28-day 2026 and I could end up with:

• $400 OBC Mariner's Early Booking Bonus
• $200 AARP OBC
• $250 Shareholder OBC
• $150 Future Cruise Deposit OBC (balcony level)
• $xxx Travel Agent OBC

And then on top of that I can get 10% discount on my rate by paying with AARP Gift Cards....a little work to put it all together....but also a decent savings.

I was able to do the refund / apply OBC on the Noordam in Jan 2023, but they acted like it was a one-time exception and they were doing me a favor.

Been watching this one but right now wouldn't put any non-refundable money on anything going through that area before 2026 given the rate of cancellations and season modifications.

I appreciate the need to protest, but please don't misdirect your rage at the common working staff on the ship who had no say in what happened, and whom I am sure are having to deal with a lot of bad tempered passengers.   Now, if they are giving you bad service, that is another discussion..........

Not really, no need to bring up a many-year-old (Feb 2020) bad experience if a totally different crew is there today. We basically had multiple "meet the crew" events and the captain and head engineer made fun of passengers and bald-face lied multiple times about information that had already been released publicly by NCL Corporate (i.e. confirmed Azipod problems) . They skipped going around the Cape at the last minute when we were 10 minutes out (which may have been necessary, I am no nautical expert and wasn't privy to the reasons).  Just left a bad taste for many passengers.

Sorry for those of you impacted.  My worst cruise ever (which granted, is still pretty great :)) was also on NCL Star in South America about 3 years ago, makes me wonder if the same terrible Captain is in charge there today.

5 minutes ago, LilyT said:

Thanks for the update! Where can I find the generic NCL financial certification letter you submitted in place of a bank statement?

Regent sent a notice to their customers (see post #158 in this thread from moknows) and luckily Regent is owned by NCL so has their letterhead. That letter is what I used and they accepted with no additional financial requirements.

https://www.rssc.com/sites/default/files/2023-12/cruise-line-declaration.pdf

Jan 21 initial submission -> Jan 25 (+4 days) last new upload submitted -> Jan 30 approved in portal (+5 days) -> Feb 03 visa PDF email arrives (+4 days)

Agreed, that guide they put together is incredible and a great help for everyone.

I paid and started on Sunday January 21 and am marked approved as of today...so 9 days total.

None of my documents were questioned at all (I used the NCL generic financial attestation letter provided earlier in this thread, didn't submit any of my financial info). I submitted my latest (my fourth) photo on Thursday January 25 and just checked tonight and mine is showing approved (from USA). It seems for me (FWIW) that having someone take the picture so no indication of selfie, taking off my glasses, and whiting out the whole background (my previous background was a very very light gray) did the trick. I always had good resolution and clear photo. 

I used this site to achieve the white background:

https://www.photoroom.com/tools/white-background

Good luck all!

They do look there, I just put a new one there yesterday and had my rejection this morning.

I have probably uploaded 3-4 different pictures at this point. All rejected. They respond to me quickly every day with useless inconsistent generic messages "upload 2x2" "no selfie" "white background" "no glasses" "413x531 pixels"............

Uploading replacement documents is also very stupid and non-intuitive. You cannot simply replace or delete and re-upload.  If you do that, the form never lets you save and resubmits it for re-review. I have now just started putting my "new" replacement photos in the "Other Uploads" section at the bottom which will then allow me to re-save.

Yeah, unfortunately I found them to be the same as well. Seems just how most cruise lines operate.  Maybe someday someone will come disrupt this industry like Southwest did to airlines, but until then, just got to play the game.  Still, hope you have a wonderful cruise and don't let some price differences tarnish a great time.

Hmmm...so bottom line is (as most of us knew) NCL is not obligated to give us any changes after final payment.  Period. Any exception is a roll of the dice based on the agent, your variables, and the humidity over east coast of Bermuda.  It is a curious data point that they won't let you pay the difference of your package price and a higher category package price (if all things, such as BOGO air, are equal)........and are instead potentially quoting an upgrade price from the outsourced upgrade bidding tool.........but still pretty much how I think they have always operated most the time.

On 1/4/2024 at 7:09 PM, pkkl said:

NO BANK/ FINANCIAL STATEMENT REQUIRED!

Has this been removed from new applications now? I see it is still listed as a requirement on the eVISA page.

I wouldn't send the bank info in since it sounds like it is no longer required........but seems unlikely you would ever get your $$ back so I would definitely go ahead and get your visa as you just never know (I think it is 10-years right?) and wouldn't want to have to pay or do it again.

Here is an official post:

https://www.gov.br/turismo/pt-br/assuntos/noticias/exigencia-de-vistos-para-cidadaos-de-australia-canada-e-eua-e-adiada-para-abril-de-2024

Hmm so taking affect April 10th, they definitely haven't updated the VISA page, but I believe it. I wonder if they check VISAs at every port or just the airports (wouldn't be worth the risk but curious)........

Wow super impressed with Regent, luckily my future visit is on Norwegian so I am saving that affidavit for myself to spare the bank statement torture.  Thanks for sharing @moknows

The NCL direct booking website never has any true changes in their "sales".......BUT....there are definitely times when travel agents are given different promotion packages.  For example, a few times a year, ours has free gratuities along with their normal high OBC offerings.