Something odd going on with RCI site.

[christodan]

A friend rang me to tell me they are going on a cruise with RCI in March. After the conversation I check out the cruise but cannot see the cruise on the RCI site. I try different browsers and still only get three cruises in March. So then I go through a TA site and lo and behold there it is, as well as others that haven't appeared on the RCI site. Anyone else experienced this?

[goodycruising]

There could be several things happening.

 

The RCI site has been having intermittent issues for years, and they have been coming thicker and faster since a big upgrade a few months ago.

 

TA sites will often have things as available but they get back to you after you submit your request, and on one popular site they say:"Cabin price & availability will be confirmed normally within 24 - 48 hours after the submission of a booking request." So that could mean anything. If I want a particular cabin I will not mess around with that sort of thing.

 

The sale currently running pretty much from April 2014 is stated to be ending on 25th Dec, but it has continually been extended, so it is actually possible they are doing some repricing on the RCI site.

 

Some sailings early next year have been getting promoted by RCI, and it is possible that pre-Christmas it has actually sold out completely.

 

The site is buggy, and it is certainly worth trying again every so often. Once you have a copy of your invoice in your email box, that is when you breath a sigh of relief and know you are booked. Not a good business practice. but for a company that apparently stated in their financial report that they are running on a average of 104% occupancy, they don't seem to be suffering.

 

If you want to book, maybe ring the TA where you can see availability and see what they say.

[Kiwi Kruzer]

With the cruise being so close , they may have also pulled it from the site while they confirm allocations of cabins and check on final payments. Could come back at either a discounted sale price to fill up vacant space , or an increased price if most of the cabins have been taken .

[Cruise ship fan]

Their computer systems are not that great and cruises regularly go off line. The cruise I am currently on even completely disappeared for months and we couldn't even add it to our cruises on their site. Which actually made making final payment quite difficult.

[Esilef]

Just booked a Jan 2016 cruise. I couldn't make payment. The website crashed and diverted to the us website with us prices..

 

I called up and the lady at Royal huffed when I mentioned my issues "yes we have been having issues for a while now".

 

If only she got paid everytime she needed to apologise for the website issues.....

[MicCanberra]

For a company that delivers a great product (the actual cruise), they sure make it hard to book them with their dodgy websites, X is the same and even a few other companies have had their own issues.:(