Explain the guarantee thing.....booked with princess directly

[only1deejay]

I booked via princess.com, I keep hearing about a guarantee booking and how it can be bad and all....doesn't princess want people to book directly with them??

and is their an advantage to doing so????

 

thanks. newbie.

[Shelly97060]

I booked via princess.com, I keep hearing about a guarantee booking and how it can be bad and all....doesn't princess want people to book directly with them??

and is their an advantage to doing so????

 

thanks. newbie.

 

Booking a guarantee means that you pay for a certain category of room, but do not select a specific cabin. Princess will issue you a room that is in the gty cat or above. The risk is that if you are particular, you may not like the location of the room they give you. There is also no guarantee that you will get a better room category than the one you paid for, so you should always book a gty in a category you wouldn't mind ending up with :) hope that helps.

[Pam in CA]

I booked via princess.com, I keep hearing about a guarantee booking and how it can be bad and all....doesn't princess want people to book directly with them??

and is their an advantage to doing so????

Sometimes a GTY is less expensive, sometimes, it isn't. Sometimes people book GTY's because that's the only category available. Sometimes, people book GTY's assuming they'll be upgraded; which, of course, is not the case. The ONLY thing guaranteed is a cabin is the category you booked, or better. You could be anywhere on the ship in the category you booked, or better. That means next to the service elevator, at the very front of the ship, or wherever. That's the chance you take and should book a GTY only if you'd be happy anywhere on the ship and are willing to accept whatever cabin Princess assigns.

 

Booking directly with Princess means you're paying the going rate for a cabin, whether it's a GTY or a specific cabin. You're paying "retail." Princess allows TA's to discount fares so you can almost always do better with a TA specializing in, and doing a high volume of, Princess bookings. It's been a very long time since I've booked directly with Princess for that reason.

[Working 2 Cruise]

Pam it is good to have you back! I understand that you j

had a wonderful safari. we would all love to j

hear about it. As to the Op I am one of those that does

book.

guarantee cabins. And it Really paid off on this cruise. I booked a category e and got a I received s balcony but this is very unusual.

[gerryl12]

We usually book a guarantee as we are not too fussy where we are on the ship. Once in a while we get an upgrade but don't count on it. On the cruise that we are going on in a couple of days we didn't get our cabin assigned until four days before sailing, but other times we knew months ahead.

The guarantee is just that a guaranteed cabin in the class you booked or higher. This gives the cruise line a chance to sell more cabins and you just fill in.

[snrlnd]

As stated above, a guarantee gives you the type of stateroom you booked, you just don't get to pick the particular room. It's basically the same way you book a hotel room. If you pick a hotel room with a balcony, you get a balcony. If you book garden view or pool view you get that. No difference with a cruise. You are guaranteed at least what you booked, sometime better. My experience is it is normally less expensive to book a guarantee and I personally don't care where I am on the ship as long as I get my balcony. My cruise next week I booked a balcony guarantee and was assigned the highest balcony category, which at the time of booking was around $200 more per person than the guarantee.

[Times Prince]

I booked via princess.com, I keep hearing about a guarantee booking and how it can be bad and all....doesn't princess want people to book directly with them??

and is their an advantage to doing so????

 

thanks. newbie.

You've got several questions here. Booking directly via Princess.com gives either brochure rate, or past passenger rate depending on whether you've sailed with Princess before. You have more direct control over your booking than if you went through a Travel Agency (TA), which can be a stress reliever if one wants full control. Otherwise booking through a TA with a discount can be less expensive. However once a TA is used, any communication, change, or payment must be through the TA.

 

We've booked both directly and through TA's. We're going through a good TA now and usually save the amount of taxes and fees, plus get an OBC when we book a BG balcony guarantee.

 

Guarantee bookings can be great or bad depending on whether one really cares about location on the ship. I see guarantees really working on balconies, where there are a very limited number of the lowest category (BF/BG) balcony cabin. The odds are that one would get an "upgrade" cabin assignment so they can keep advertising availability at that low price. Of course one could actually be assigned to that category, as mentioned below. The savings can be up to several $100 which you then have available for onboard expenses or excursions, vs. actually booking at a higher category. From our experience all balcony cabins are good, so location isn't critical to us. Being on the ship in a balcony at a price we can afford is critical.

[Cruisin Kay D]

You can book a guarantee with a Travel Agent OR with Princess directly.

[caribill]

For a specific category which has cabins available and also the guarantee option, the cost is exactly the same if you select a cabin or pick guarantee.

 

Sometimes there are no cabins available in a category, just a GTY. If this is the case, a GTY in that category would be less expensive than a specific cabin (or a GTY) in a higher category.

 

As others have pointed out, if you pick a GTY, you might be assigned any cabin in that or any high category.

 

Some lead in categories have very few (sometimes just two or four) cabins in that category. Although some people will end up in that category, most who book a GTY in that category will get a free upgrade to a higher category.

 

In most cases, such an upgrade is to the same type of cabin (inside to higher inside category, balcony to higher balcony category, etc.). In some cases the upgrade will be to a higher type category (example: outside to balcony).

 

When you book a specific cabin, you should be asked if you would be willing to accept an upgrade (see previous paragraph for what that could mean). If you say yes, you may be assigned to a higher category and not be notified in time to reject it if you do not like the new assignment, so if you pick a cabin and that is the location you want for sure, then have it marked you are not willing to accept an upgrade.

 

If you do have a cabin marked will not accept an upgrade, Princess may still offer one to you, but you will need to accept the new assignment or the change will not be made. Why would Princess do this? One reason is they know they can resell your cabin, but are having trouble selling higher category cabins.

 

By the way, a GTY is different from a waitlist. A GTY means you will get a cabin, even if the cabin is not known until the last minute. If the ship is oversold, others may be offered a bribe called a "move-over" offer to switch to a different cruise in order to make sure the GTYs can be honored.

 

A waitlist means there is no room available in that category at all. You will only make the sailing if you clear the waitlist which might or might not happen.

[rimau]

You can look at the deck plans and see where the type of cabin you are booking with the guarantee is and how many there are with that grade. On our last cruise we booked a balcony, lowest grade, which was a partially obscured all the way aft. There were 4 such cabins on the ship so I was reasonably confident in getting something else, which I did.

On one of our upcoming, we are going with a partially obstructed so we picked a particular cabin, as I would not want some in that category. We are hoping for an upgrade to an unobstructed, but I feel that is less likely to get upgraded from a specific cabin, although I am not sure it is true.

[geoherb]

We booked a BE guarantee for our next cruise and have received our assignment for a BE cabin--which is fine for us. I would not have minded an upgrade to a BB or BA on the Caribe Deck, but the BE we have is better than many BD, BC, BB, and even BA balconies for us. But we're not fussy when it comes to location, and at the time I booked this cruise, there were not any specific BE cabins available. It was only offered as a guarantee--which saved us around $100 per person if we had upgraded to a specific BD cabin.

[COMBOY]

No, Princess gladly accepts reservation from travel agents as well as direct bookings. No cruise line, airline or tour company could successful operate with just direct bookings. There is no real benefit of booking directly with the cruise lines other then you control the booking; not the travel agent. Just to note if something goes wrong (weather issues, flights, cancelled sailings , etc. you are your own travel agent and you will have to resolve it yourself vs a travel agent that has vast resources, travel knowledge and inside connections within the cruise line. Yes, things can and do go wrong and you have to resolve it on your own. Don't expect the cruise line to help. Now, regarding GYT bookings your actual room assignment might not be until you get to the pier (but most likely 2-3 weeks prior to departure). Since all the cabins are generally uniform in size, decorate and layout it really all comes down to cabin location in the cabin category you purchased. Clearly if you don't want to book a GTY if cabin location is going to be a problem (at the end of the corridor, next to the elevator, across from steward service center, on a low deck, etc. However, if you are assigned a cabin in a location you don't like you can always call Princess and see if a better location is available (no guarantees) but it never hurts to ask as cabins come open all the time due to cancellations, upgrades, etc. I think most people are quite happy with the cabin they are given. Here's a CC article about guaranteed bookings:

 

http://www.cruisecritic.com/articles.cfm?ID=337

[caribill]

On one of our upcoming, we are going with a partially obstructed so we picked a particular cabin, as I would not want some in that category. We are hoping for an upgrade to an unobstructed, but I feel that is less likely to get upgraded from a specific cabin, although.

 

If you are not in the highest partially obstruted view category, then you could be upgraded to a higher obstructed view category and find your self with a great view of the side of a tender.

[tacrum43]

Has anyone had a guarantee booking result in a lower category cabin? Would they oversell the ship?

 

I know it says that you're guaranteed the category you purchase or higher, but I seem to remember reading about someone who was forced to take a downgrade with only some sort of minimal compensation.

 

I'm booked on the Crown Princess in April in a category AD mini-suite guarantee. I was looking at the prices again recently, and all of the mini-suites except AA are now sold out for that cruise...I'm just thinking that maybe I shouldn't have done the guarantee.

[Pam in CA]

No, you won't be in a lower category. If necessary, they will upgrade someone; it could be you or it could be someone already booked in an AD. To me, the AD's are preferable to an AA as they are on Emerald deck aft, quiet and very private, unlike the AA-AC categories.

[Stevesan]

It should be noted that princess isn't the lone Ranger when it comes to offering "guarantee" bookings. All the mid-market cruise lines do it.

[robtulipe]

Here's my take on guarantee bookings.

The cruiseline doesn't need to have an actual cabin in the category of cabin they are offering a guarantee in, they simply need to have one in an higher category that they can assign to that gty booking. IMO cruise lines basically use guaranties to a tool to sell out a cruise by offering a lower cost category of cabin that they don't have or have very limited availability of so they can sell higher, more available category of cabins without having to lower the price of the actual higher category being assigned to the gty booking. In reality they can offer many different priced categories when they may actually only have cabin available in one, the highest category being offered. When all cabins are spoken for in that higher category all categories are no longer promoted.

The client gets a lower price in exchange for allowing the cruise line the flexibility of what cabin they assign you as long as the assigned cabin is at or higher than the guarantee category. Also those who have selected and paid for their cabin are much less likely to want to change to a lower category gty or class of cabin gty hoping for an expected upgrade as there is the possibility of actually being assigned a cabin in the actual category booked. That's why, for most cruiselines, guarantees typically show up just after the final payment date after which it cost $ to cancel a booking because you are in the penalty phase so booking tend to be firmer after that date and most cruise lines policies doesn't allow for price adjustment after the final payment date.

The cruise lines could also just have a new booking only sale like RC's and X's Tuesday Special Event Sale or Princess' Flash Specials but this tends to upset those who have current bookings at a higher price since they can see their actual category being offered at a lower price that can't be used to adjust the price they paid.

[caribill]

That's why, for most cruiselines, guarantees typically show up just after the final payment date after which it cost $ to cancel a booking.

 

I have booked a GTY on Princess months in advance of final payment and have received a cabin assignment within an hour of booking.

 

I have also done the same and not received an assignment until within the last two weeks before the cruise.

[caribill]

I know it says that you're guaranteed the category you purchase or higher, but I seem to remember reading about someone who was forced to take a downgrade with only some sort of minimal compensation.

 

I remember postings about this having generous, not minimal, compensation.

[pcsanity]

One thing I did not see mentioned, once Princess assigns you a cabin, say you book a BG GTY, and you get a BC cabin assignment....you can ask to move to any other open cabin in the BC Category. Sometimes this gives you a LITTLE flexibility in what part of the ship your in, or an ability to move from a questionable cabin. That being said, dont expect a lot of choice!

 

Thus far we have not been disapointed in our GTY cabins.

[robtulipe]

I have booked a GTY on Princess months in advance of final payment and have received a cabin assignment within an hour of booking.

Yes, with Princess you can select a guarantee option anytime when booking a category so that why I wrote most cruiselines in that part. Typically with RC and X, the two other cruise lines I generally book with, guarantees show up close to the final payment date.

[robtulipe]

I initially wrote that statement for an RC board post and had saved it as a word document so I modified it, for copying and pasting here, to make it application.

I'm surprised that Princess would assign a cabin that quickly for an guarantee booked that far in advance as it seems reduce the usefulness of the guarantee booking to them. Most Princess early guarantee bookings I read about on CC aren't assigned cabins quickly. Pam in CA recently mentioned that she has a gty booked out far in advance and she checks her personalizer about once a month to see if her cabin has been assigned.

Then again if someone can ask for a guarantee anytime, Princess could have many of this type of bookings and if they have lots of availability in that the category, it probably makes sense to assign some cabins but I suspect no great upgrades are given. Our best upgrades for assigned cabins have been when the assignment has been done close to the embarkation date.

[pmd98052]

We had our cabin assigned a month or so back for the March 2012 Sapphire sailing....

[robtulipe]

We had our cabin assigned a month or so back for the March 2012 Sapphire sailing....

How did you make out re cabin assignment?

Did you get upgraded to another class of cabins or was it only a higher category in the same class of cabins?

Our early received upgrades, since we've always had a upgrade for the nine gty bookings we've done, never got great upgrades. The best upgrades for us, as into a higher class of cabins, were for the guarantees we had to wait until close to the cruise date for the assignment. Just checking out my theory re upgrades vs when received.

For our last cruise we got a midship balcony assigned four days prior to embarkation for our lowest category inside gty booking

[geoherb]

For our two most recent obstructed view guarantees, we received unobstructed view cabins. In one instance, we found out our assignment four days before the cruise. In the other, we got our assignment before the final payment date.

 

Our next cruise is in five and a half weeks. I found out our cabin assignment last week. This time we're getting exactly what we paid for--a BE balcony.