Gripe about "Family" Staterooms on Epic & FOS

[ToddlerMom]

This is annoying to me. On both ships, apparently if you have more than 2 people in your cabin you are restricted to the "Family" cabins which of course cost more. Square footage is the same. The only difference appears to be that the "Family" staterooms have pull down berths.

 

You're already paying more to include a 3rd person in the cabin. Why do they force you to choose a more expensive cabin to begin with?

 

And how can they justify charging more simply for having a pull down berth?

 

I've been looking at all of the sales today and see some nice sales on the Epic BUT the Family staterooms aren't marked down. Looks like there are less of the family staterooms available and since families are limited to those cabins, they don't need to mark them down.

 

It looks like on the other NCL ships, families aren't restricted to the Family cabins.

[cb at sea]

It avoid having more passengers onboard than lifeboat capacity, they will only let you book cabins that have bedding for every "soul" in that cabin...even if you plan on co-sleeping with your child, there must be a bed of some sort for said child! And, because there are more beds than lifeboat capacity, not all cabins with additional beds will be allowed to have more than 2 people....

I guess they do this because folks like to choose their locations on a ship, and therefore, not all cabins will be utilized as they are furnished...??

[cantw8togo]

I would call and speak to someone in person if this is something that you are interested in. I was just looking on the NCL website and when I put in four occupants, only the family balconies came up, but when I put in two occupants, the standard large balcony which lists that it can accommodate four people came up.

 

We sailed on the Epic last year with the four of us in a standard, large cabin. The cabin was one of the er... coziest that we have been in, but it is still quite nice. We picked a cabin that was close to one of the humps and it had a much larger balcony, albeit angled balcony and it was the same price as others with much smaller balconies in the same category. You have to look at the deck plans carefully (sometimes with a magnifying glass,) as they are not advertised as having bigger balconies. As well, if you can get a cabin where the bed is closer to the balcony door (the wave in the room is bigger nearest the balcony on the deck plan,) then the cabin seems much bigger than the other layout. One other note about the ship, of the five that we have been on, the Epic felt the least like we were at sea. There are very few places to see the ocean from a lower deck and even from your balcony, you are looking straight down onto the lifeboats. The food and entertainment is top notch, but the ambience is anything but nautical.

 

As well, many of the "family balcony" cabins are located near the kids club, although our standard large balcony was also in the vicinity too. I would study the deck plans carefully and then call and speak to someone directly.