Chosen GTY Balcony and Gotten a Bad Cabin?

[newmexicoNita]

On 7/19/2019 at 8:12 PM, stevendom57 said:

I am one of those people that shy away from ther GTY rooms, afraid of getting a crummy location right above the Cavern Club or under the pool deck. I see many fellow cruisers responding on this forum where they chose the GTY cabin and got a great cabin. What I don't hear are complains where they received a really crummy location. Surely someone has gotten a less than desirable cabin. Let's hear your horror stories.

Well crummy can mean a lot of different things, but here has been 2 examples of what we have experienced: We sailed the Jewel on her first cruise from London to America. We booked rather late, the ship was almost sold out and we took GTY. No, I won't say we got a terrible cabin. How can a brand new ship when no one has even used the cabin be terrible, but we were way down the hall at the front of the ship and on maybe deck 5 or 6. It was a bit inconvenient when on a 12 day cruise. No it didn't ruin our cruise by any means, but would have rather had a better location. Then we sailed another line a few years later, choose GTY and got a great cabin. It too was at the end of a hall and had an obstructed view, but the view was not bad at all. we could go right outside our cabin, walk about 2 steps to the outside and there were 2 lounges right there for us to enjoy total privacy. The cabin was larger than the standard cabins as well. Our friends we were traveling with got a better location, but not as nice cabin. So, it is hit or miss as to what you will get. We have used GTY other times and have had to problems. If you have a particular location you are better to pay a little extra and pick what you want: if you choose to save a few bucks, go with GTY. 

[2+2]

On 7/21/2019 at 8:35 AM, Homosassa said:

NCL is not holding out the cabins. 

 

However, travel agencies and other entities may have "reserved" (for want of a better word) blocks of rooms in each category to sell on their sites. Those cabins will not be released for open sale until final payment.

 

If you can't find a cabin that you want on the NCL website, check with various on line agencies that advertise that cruise and see what cabins they have available to sell.

 

Also the advice to look to see what cabins are left to book in a guarantee category is bad advice.  Cruise lines will upsell or upgrade full fare passengers to better cabins. Those empty cabins will now be available for full fare passengers to be upsold or upgraded to and, therefore, leaving their cabins available.

 

So, if you look on line and see that all cabins in your category are booked and only guarantees are available, do not assume that your balcony guarantee will turn into a the penthouse suite.

 

Before booking a guarantee rate, look at all the cabins in your category and decide if you will be happy being assigned the one that is least desirable in your opinion.

I  guess what I am talking about is this,  the cruise is seven months out, and the web site shows that there are only GTY balconies available . It doesn't say balconies are sold out, it says they are GTY . It is hard to believe that I would not be able to pick my balcony this early, as i am willing to pay to choose  my room. Also, most cruise line web sites show deck plans that clearly show the available rooms left. Easy to determine what rooms are left. 

[Warbird]

Booked two cruises on the NCL Sun with a GTY cabin and one time we got a cabin under the gym/weight room.  Around 11:00 PM at night a crew member (dancer) would be lifting weights and drop the weights on the floor.  It drove us nuts trying to go to sleep.  I went up and confronted him and it was like it went in one ear and out the other.  There was a sign posted on the door no activity after 10:00 PM.  I called the front desk and they said they would send security out to check on it.  I went back up to see if security actually came around which they did and it was quiet afterwards.  Same thing the next night or two and then it stopped.  It didn't ruin our vacation but it was just an annoyance for those few nights.

The other GTY cabin was next to a crew service entry to the side of our cabin.  Early in the morning you could hear the cabin steward prepare his cart with supplies for his daily activities.  I don't recall if we called the front desk or not.  Again, it was just an annoyance.  Has it stopped me from making a GTY reservation? No, in fact all my reservations start with an Inside GTY and I work up to a Balcony or better.

[EleventyBangBang]

Usually prefer to pick location, but one time we did do a GTY interior. 

 

Ship was RCI Anthem.  They put us directly under the kids pool area.  I figured this would be a nightmare, but actually we never heard a thing.  I suspect this is because we were in an interior, and that the balcony cabins across the hall probably got a lot more noise.  I had a balcony a couple decks below Spice20 on Getaway and it was quite noisy at all hours.