Cabin availability on princess.com vs OTA

[runchadrun]

Longtime RCCL cruiser, first time Princess cruiser here.

 

I'm putting together a cruise for 3 couples on the Regal for next July and we would like to have adjacent cabins, each booked separately. We were able to get 2 adjacent cabins through our favorite online travel agency, but the third cabin doesn't show up with them even though it shows up as available on princess.com. This seems to be the case with 3 different OTAs (I assume they all use the same backend reservation system). All 3 cabins are the same category (BE on deck 11).

 

I told my friend that he should just book that directly through Princess and then transfer it to the OTA to get the additional OBC, which is a significant amount for this cruise. I'd rather have him avoid that hassle, though.

 

I'm wondering if this is normal for Princess, that some cabins, either particular ones or a particular overall quantity, are available only through them?

[Haboob]

Longtime RCCL cruiser, first time Princess cruiser here.

 

I'm putting together a cruise for 3 couples on the Regal for next July and we would like to have adjacent cabins, each booked separately. We were able to get 2 adjacent cabins through our favorite online travel agency, but the third cabin doesn't show up with them even though it shows up as available on princess.com. This seems to be the case with 3 different OTAs (I assume they all use the same backend reservation system). All 3 cabins are the same category (BE on deck 11).

 

I told my friend that he should just book that directly through Princess and then transfer it to the OTA to get the additional OBC, which is a significant amount for this cruise. I'd rather have him avoid that hassle, though.

 

I'm wondering if this is normal for Princess, that some cabins, either particular ones or a particular overall quantity, are available only through them?

 

My guess, repeat: guess, is that your OTA doesn't post real-time updates to their website.

 

I just had an interesting experience picking a stateroom off princess.com, giving its number to a bricks&mortar TA

by phone while she repeated the number to Princess on her other ear's phone. They told her "posted", she told

me "posted", I refreshed my screen and it flipped to "SOLD".

[moki'smommy]

I had a situation where my TA couldn't "see" a price that I found for a cabin, even though I screen shotted it and sent it to her. Princess also claimed to not be able to find it. So I put a hold on it thru princess.com, then notified TA of the hold number and she was able to book it for me.