Guarantee Balcony

[barbarah33]

I too have always booked guarantees when they are available on Princess and they have never let me down. For our Sapphire cruise to Hawaii this February we booked the AE guarantee and were given an AA. No complaints there at all!!

[balcony4air]

Just got our assignment this morning for our Feb. cruise on the Ruby. Went from BE on Baja to BB on Caribe. I take it that means a larger balcony?

 

Yes, it does, 9 ft deep vs. 5, so twice as big with room for 4 chairs, half covered, half very visible from above.

[CruiseUtopia]

One thing to be aware of with a guarantee: occasionally the price of your cruise will go DOWN, and you have to make a decision. For instance, if you book a category BE guarantee and are upgraded to BA, much celebration is in order. However, if the price of the cruise drops, as far as Princess is concerned, you no longer have a guarantee -- you have paid a ridiculously low fare for a BA. Even if a BE guarantee is half the price it previously was, the amount you paid is probably still lower than a BA. You may be given the choice to pay the lower fare and be thrown back into the guarantee pool, or pay the (now higher) price you already paid and stay in the BA.

[caviargal]

Today we booked a BB GTY for Dec. 22 sailing of the Grand. There are only a handful of cabins left on this sailing that would qualify for the GTY.

 

We had the option of an assigned cabin but there were only 2 balcony cabins left and I was not excited about either so decided to roll the dice. With only 13 days to go, I am interested to see when the cabin is assigned and what we end up with.

 

At this time, there are some inside cabins, a few mini suites and a couple of suites left. No balconies at all since this afternoon - they were all WL or SOLD OUT when I checked.

 

This will be interesting.:)

[Working 2 Cruise]

Today we booked a BB GTY for Dec. 22 sailing of the Grand. There are only a handful of cabins left on this sailing that would qualify for the GTY.

 

We had the option of an assigned cabin but there were only 2 balcony cabins left and I was not excited about either so decided to roll the dice. With only 13 days to go, I am interested to see when the cabin is assigned and what we end up with.

 

At this time, there are some inside cabins, a few mini suites and a couple of suites left. No balconies at all since this afternoon - they were all WL or SOLD OUT when I checked.

 

This will be interesting.:)

 

Please make sure to come back here and let us know!

[shofer]

We have had good luck so far with booking to BF guarantees and getting a BB one time and a BA the second. In 2008, we took our kids and their spouses on a family cruise and we booked 3 balcony guarantees and got 3 BB's on Aloha deck all in a row.

 

This year they wanted to give us a BA on the Lido deck and my traveling partner suffers from seasickness. Our TA called Princess about this and they reassigned us to Caribe deck!

 

Wish I could say that we really enjoyed that Caribe balcony but the furniture was so uncomfortable we only sat out there a few times.

 

I know the classifications are changing before our May cruise so we may end up with a BF after all. There will be quite a few more cabins. So we can only hope for an upgrade.

 

Sue

[jb008]

According to our TA, gty factors that all can be considered on the room assignment include special occasions for the trip, the booking agent, returning guest, and especially pixie dust. Her suggestion, and mine now too, book gty if you're willing to be anywhere in that class of cabin (interior, oceanview, balcony, etc) as you're paying less than the cheapest rate for the lowest guaranteed stateroom. Book direct if you're unwilling to "risk" where you'll be.

 

We're 2 for 2 on getting great rooms on gty (BB and now BA), and 1 for 1 on getting exactly what we booked when we booked a specific class (BB) of balcony and chose the room at time of booking.

 

My complete wild donkey guess is that booked BA passengers get first refusal on a discount paid upgrade to a mini-suite before assigning a gty passenger into a mini-suite. I'd further guess that Princess would rather upgrade a BA into a mini-suite and then "upgrade" a BG into a now available BA room. You can get two happy customers by upgrading the two sets of customers for the cost of just one true upgrade.

[TracieABD]

This has always worked in our favor. Right now we are sitting on an AE GTY for a sold out cruise. We are waiting for our assignment. :)

[Ariel35]

I got my assignment...a BC on the Aloha deck. Initially I got a BB on the riviera deck but asked it be changed.

[rdsqrl]

According to our TA, gty factors that all can be considered on the room assignment include special occasions for the trip, the booking agent, returning guest, and especially pixie dust. Her suggestion, and mine now too, book gty if you're willing to be anywhere in that class of cabin (interior, oceanview, balcony, etc) as you're paying less than the cheapest rate for the lowest guaranteed stateroom. Book direct if you're unwilling to "risk" where you'll be.

While I agree 100% with your final sentence, the previous sentence is incorrect on Princess. A guarantee cabin in any category costs the same as an assigned cabin; there is no generic pricing for a "guarantee any balcony" or "guarantee any inside" booking, the way there is on other (Royal Caribbean comes to mind) lines.

 

[jb008]

While I agree 100% with your final sentence, the previous sentence is incorrect on Princess. A guarantee cabin in any category costs the same as an assigned cabin; there is no generic pricing for a "guarantee any balcony" or "guarantee any inside" booking, the way there is on other (Royal Caribbean comes to mind) lines.

 

 

When we booked our guaranteed balcony, it was a little cheaper (~$10-15/pp) below an assigned balcony. I didn't save the numbers, but I remember my wife and I discussing whether it was worth the extra ~$30 to lock in a room, and we didn't have a strong preference on where we were located beyond that it was a balcony. <shrug> Might have been a function of our travel agent this time...? I feel like that's been the case on all three cruises we did with Princess (and I've never priced or paid for a cruise on RCCL so my only experience w/booking is for princess).

[Random Acts]

We did a guarantee balcony for the first time. We were a bitafraid to do it- but it turned out OK. Sailing today on the Island Princess in Baja 301. Not bad! Didn't get the cabin assignment until about 10 days prior to crise.

[caribill]

When we booked our guaranteed balcony, it was a little cheaper (~$10-15/pp) below an assigned balcony. I didn't save the numbers, but I remember my wife and I discussing whether it was worth the extra ~$30 to lock in a room, and we didn't have a strong preference on where we were located beyond that it was a balcony.

 

I suspect that the price with the GTY was for a lower category than the category your TA offered for an assigned cabin.

 

As others have posted, the price for an assigned cabin or a GTY is exactly the same for each category.

 

Did your TA say which categories the pricing was for?