Postponing Final Payment for June or July Cruises?

[Eli_6]

Has anyone heard of Carnival doing this or been able to reach someone to find out if this is a possibility?  RCCL is pushing back the final payment deadline from 90 days to 60 days but Carnival doesn't appear to be doing the same.  

 

Reason I ask is that my husband and I are supposed to sail out of Dover, England in June on a European cruise.  I am not worried about getting the virus as much as being quarantined.  We can NOT be quarantined for 21 days. My husband owns his own medical practice and is the only physician in the practice with over 5,000 patients.  It was nearly impossible for him to even get coverage for the 9 night cruise. (It is a special occasion...my 40th birthday.) It would literally be disastrous if this happened for not just his business, but his patients because he is in a field where there is a shortage and patients can not just get into see another doctor or go without their meds or whatever if he was quarantined for three weeks.  He has a couple of nurse practitioners and has arranged coverage (at great expense and planning) for the trip, but this would not be possible if suddenly we were delayed for an additional three WEEKS!   Further, we have two young children.  It was nearly impossible to get childcare even for the cruise and we have had to divide up the time between my brother and in-laws.  Long story short: If this thing does not improve dramatically, I feel like we will have to cancel the cruise even though I really don't want to do this... especially considering Europe is having a lot more cases than we are over here and we would be flying into London.  My payment deadline is March 21st.  I would like to postpone this until we know more about how this is going to play out.  I have tried calling Carnival, but can't get through.  Wondering if anyone knows anything to this end.  Obviously, we are not within the April 3rd to May 31st "free cancel" offer.  I even thought about canceling my husband and taking my mother, but she's in the high-risk category!  She is almost 80, on Oxygen, has a partially paralyzed phrenic nerve and COPD so I actually don't want her getting this because she ends up with pneumonia just from a cold.  

 

Adding to all of this, too, is that I have $4500 tied up in plane tickets (business out there on the red eye and premium plus on the way back) and as of right now United is not willing to refund or give us the option of rescheduling.  This may change later.  I may also have some recourse with my credit card company, but I honestly have not looked into it yet because I would like to go on the cruise IF this thing blows over.

 

Oddly enough (and I have no clue how this happened other than I booked over the phone with Carnival and someone screwed up), it appears my husband has travel insurance on his cruise but it wasn't booked on mine. 🤔 I tried adding it just for me on the Carnival website and couldn't.  

 

Frankly, based on what my husband has read and what epidemiologists he knows are saying, all this quarantining isn't going to prevent it from spreading anyway. The cat is already out of the bag and some epidemiologists estimate that by this time next year as much as 40 percent of the population will have had it with most people (children and healthy individuals) never knowing they had it or just thinking they had a cold or something else.  It may even end up becoming endemic like the flu. (Hopefully, they will come up with a vaccine.) In fact, apparently part of the reason it is spreading is because kids have mild symptoms and are spreading it without knowing they have it.  And kids are probably among the worst (at least mine are) about not covering their mouths or washing hands appropriately. I have to stand over the top of mine and make them sing the birthday song twice while they soap their hands and scrub.  

 

Sorry this is so long.  Just basically "stream of thought" writing and trying to organize my thoughts on all of this.  It is such a bummer because originally we were going on the Mardis Gras TA for my 40th. We scrambled to replan everything...and now this !  We also were on one of the cancelled Vista sailings last summer cancelled only a week or so before we sailed. Starting to feel like I am cruise cursed.  

[firefly333]

I've only heard of pushing it back a few days, not for a month.

[hawkeye93]

All you can do is wait and see. Nothing post- may 31 has changed for carnival yet.


Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[Grillfish]

I'm in the same situation, sailing end of June out of Dover as well.  My final payment is due March 30th.  I'm waiting until that day to decide and see if they adjust their policy, hoping to hear something sooner.

[Eli_6]

10 minutes ago, Grillfish said:

I'm in the same situation, sailing end of June out of Dover as well.  My final payment is due March 30th.  I'm waiting until that day to decide and see if they adjust their policy, hoping to hear something sooner.

Through searching on the Carnival website, it does appear that we can get full refund minus deposit up until 56 days before the cruise. (I thought it was 90 so not sure if this changed recently or it was always like this. Or)  So, I guess we technically have until late April/early May to decide.  Obviously can't get anyone at Carnival. Phone lines aren't even working.

 

At this point so many people have canceled on my cruise that there are a ton of rooms open. I'm seriously considering that if I do go bringing my kids now just so if we were to be quarantined I won't have to worry about childcare or being separated from them for that long. 

 

I also worry about them closing some of the European ports since the outbreak is worse there and they have already completely shut down the entire country of Italy.