Help! Handicapped cabin assigned, not acceptable

[Shogun]

Hi All

 

Just of the Emerald, we had an older than average cruiser mix on board,

 

crew were amazing offering assistance when ever needed,

 

head waiters taking the arm of an old lady unsteady on her feet and walking her to her table,

 

to crew holding an umbrella so passenger could hold the hand rail on the gang way.

 

 

 

yours Shogun

[GUT2407]

Is there braile on the cabin door door?

 

I've seen it on some ships.

[shastatroy]

Just got off a cruise after staying in a HC balcony cabin, besides a suite it is the best cabin I have ever had. I hope I am unlucky enough to get one one my next cruise!

[finucane]

Even though we never stayed in any stateroom less than a balcony we understood that an obst. view was the only avail. Our travel agent then told us we could be upgraded but never mentioned H/C cabin.

We have seen H/C cabins before and found the large bathroom and sink in the mattress very unacceptable. We did not have a good feeling about these rooms.

We didnt realise that paying extra on gty would include H/C cabins, we were pretty much ready to settle with an obstructed being the lowest we could get. although not a H/C.

 

I hear ya beamer8, I feel your pain!

My wife is a paraplegic so obviously she is confined to her chair, cannot walk or stand, we have been doing this now for 25 years with the cruise industry. We are grateful we can cruise because of the accommodations but you are right. With the exception of more square footage we would gladly take a smaller cabin to avoid the issues you mentioned, those are true concerns.

More times than not an accessible cabin is roomier but the drawbacks are they are usually a lesser room for the following reasons:

1-locaton

2-bathrooms are usually molded because shower water runs the entire bathroom floor, especially while at sea

3-bathrooms and living area usually have a tinge of urine odor which is unavoidable due to medical conditions associated with paraplegia, most times to the point of nausea.

The cruise lines do there best but it is an impossible task, once its in the carpet, tile, etc., it is there to stay.

4-the cabins are generally in a state of dings and dents from wheelchairs and scooters.

5-mattresses? Never understood the excessive mattress sinking in these cabins, I know they do put plastic liners on them for incontinence issues, the sinking I never figured out.

There is a host of other issues that go with an accessible cabin but more minor than the above.

So again, unless it is a brand new ship your most likely to have issues like you have mentioned so I do understand your concern. A larger cabin no way makes up for the issues, no way. We have had 30 some accessible cabins in the 25 sailing years and 90+% of them have had my described issues but we have no choice, you and able bodied passengers do so I hope you got it ironed out. I would so wish we could take a "smaller cabin" to avoid the problems, YOU ARE 100% correct in your concerns...

Best of luck...

[finucane]

Just got off a cruise after staying in a HC balcony cabin, besides a suite it is the best cabin I have ever had. I hope I am unlucky enough to get one one my next cruise!

 

George and Dorthy, you got lucky...

Dont count on what you wish for:D

 

See on our Panama Cruise, come on by our cabin and you'll see what I told beamer8 about, guaranteed...

 

See ya in December...:cool:

[moki'smommy]

My daughter has a progressive, debilitating disease. She needs an HA cabin or she can't cruise. Yes, one time we "bumped" an able bodied person from an HA cabin (they had booked gty and gotten it as an assignment). The husband "saw" the wheelchair and literally came down the hall to check out either us or the cabin that they didn't get. He was miffed at losing the extra space! The next day, the wife saw me around the ship and came over to apologize for his rudeness.

 

Another crazy experience--we booked a cruise 18 months in advance and were "wait listed" for an HA cabin as none were available. It got to the week that final payments were due and as we still couldn't get the HA, we gave up our reservation. You guessed it--one week later, all 4 of the HA balcony cabins were on the web site as "available." The cruise line refused to sell one to us at our previous rate; they would have been happy to sell it at the new, increased price. We suggested they take a hike. I don't know what happened--were people holding these cabins in hopes of cruising and didn't give them up till the last day? Or ????

 

You are right that HA cabins tend to be in worse repair than standard cabins as the walls and moldings are routinely run into by wheelchairs, scooters, or whatever. I have not noticed the smell issues mentioned above--frankly, if the place smelled bad, I'd be talking to housekeeping about a "deep cleaning" on day 1. And if the mattress was bad, we'd be discussing that too! Never had a problem with it, and I hope our upcoming Princess cruise isn't the first time.

 

HA cabins are a trade off. They are always larger than a standard cabin of the same category. However, they are often missing features in order to allow for the necessary HA adjustments.

 

Booking GTY means "you take what you get." OP, you have no cause for complaint--you agreed to take whatever you were assigned.

[ChiefBoats]

Unfortunately we booked our cruise late on the Princess Coral panama canal.

We booked a Gty cabin.

Today we were assigned a handicapped cabin and we absolutely do not want it. There were only obstructed view cabins available which we had to accept. We paid extra for an upgrade should one become avail. We sail in 7 days and now got the assignment. What if any are we legally bound to accept this HC cabin?:mad:

Accepting an obstructed view and now a handicapped cabin, how can we get out of this?????:confused:

 

I'm not sure what the problem is? The handicapped cabins have more room and the baths are larger. The obstructed view normally means that you just can't look down at the balconies below. Your view straight out is not blocked.

 

However, I'm not sure what can be done if there are limited cabins left available. One solution for the next time is to book early and pick the cabin you want. Don't let Princess pick it for you. We never do that and always get what we want. In fact we never let them upgrade us since the upgrade is never where we want to be.

 

This will be our 16th cruise with Princess and we always use a TA who makes sure we get what we want. In fact we have booked the Coral for the canal next November which will be our second time on that itinerary.