Cunard's Cancellations/Refunds Update 23rd April 2020

[majortom10]

5 minutes ago, sogne said:

We are advising for guests to allow up to 60 days for the refunds to be processed. This is due to the very high volumes of refunds for both Cunard, and our sister brand P&O Cruises, as all ship operations have now been paused until 31st July. Our office is also closed and therefore the workforce is working remotely with a reduced number of staff which is slowing down our usual procedures. We do apologise for any inconvenience this may cause, and we thank you for your patience at this time.

As you booked via travel agent, we are refunding directly back to you via a cheque, unless the money was paid to us directly- if this is the case the money will be refunded back to the form of payment.

Whilst we do not send our refund processed confirmations, please be assured your bookings are set up to be refunded and therefore this will happen.

If there is anything further we can assist with, please do let us know.

Kind Regards

 | Guest Relations

 

I received this this morning at 0930 UK time it is unsolicited and perhaps being sent to other UK  guests.I have not bombarded them with emails or phone calls each one of which could disrupt the refund process for others in order to reply to me. My OH  a retired banker states that 60 days will almost certainly be UK working days not calendar days. I shall just wait  fortunately I do not need the money although I realise not everyone may be this fortunate.
 

I am in the UK and been told by PM on Cunard's Facebook page that it is 60 calendar days and not working days from when you cancelled. We will wait and see.

[ToadOfToadHall]

I wonder if Cunard/Carnival actually have the IT capability to process bulk refunds ?

 

What I mean is, on any given cruise, there will always be a small number of cancellations/refund requests by passengers. So you ring up, tell them your booking details, they enter that manually on their computer, pull up your booking and hit the refund option.

 

But now they have to refund everyone on a cruise, one multiple ships, for multiple cruises. That's thousands and thousands of bookings to process. And when does a cruise ever get cancelled normally ? Almost never.

 

So when they specified their booking system, why would they need the requirement to batch refund because it wasn't a functional requirement that they ever envisaged needing ?

 

What you might therefore find is that their booking system simply does not have the software functionality to refund all bookings in one go and they have to manually do it one booking at a time. And that would then explain why it's taking so long and why some have had their refunds and others have not.

 

Or, alternatively, they are just not very keen on returning your money.

 

 

[seacruise9]

Hi,

 

Does anyone know if the 60 days begins running from the date that the refund was requested? On March 30 (the day that I received notice that my cruise was cancelled), I submitted a refund request for my Queen Victoria cruise that was scheduled to depart from Southampton on April 26. Does the 60 days begin on March 30 or April 26? 

 

Thanks,

 

Chuck

[ABoatNerd]

FYI

 

Check out the latest from HAL. Princess just announced similar.

 

Where does this leave Cunard - and the QM2 TA's?

[BlueRiband]

It doesn't look promising for any sailing in 2020.  My EB TA in January appears to be in jeopardy.  If they don't start sailing until 2021 (which we don't know) that would be cancelled.  The ship would be in Southampton and they're not going to do an empty WB over the Christmas and New Year holidays just to pick up passengers in New York.  The world voyage would start with those passengers being flown to Heathrow. 

[Roger88]

I am not surprised really. I am more surprised that they were hoping to start operation initially in May. I expect them to prolong this “stand-by” mode till September.. if not longer

[Windsurfboy]

60 days starts from day refund request 

[Bedruthen]

We cancelled our May and June transatlantic crossings. Cancelled both mid March and both refunded via our agent  within 30 days. So it can be done.

[astera]

Wow. I cannot believe this but we have just been treated like garbage by Cunard.

 

Unbelievable. Just weeks ago they pretended to try to help us, asked for hotel+flight receipts after dumping passengers off at Perth, and now they have told us that they don't owe us a cent because we should have thought about miracle insurance instead. As opposed to holding Cunard to account for dumping its passengers off...

 

This is such a surprise that it's hard to accept. All this time I thought that Cunard was a genuine operator that would never attempt to scam its very own customers... and yet here we are. This is a shameful experience, and completely unexpected.

[candle in the wind]

On 5/5/2020 at 3:25 PM, majortom10 said:

We have cruise on QM2 in October balance due in June, not going to pay, convinced that cruise will not happen and Cunard just want an interest free loan off me.

I am late to the party as I only just read this, but I phoned Cunard a couple of weeks ago as the balance on the September voyage I had booked was due in the middle of May and I was told the payment deadline had been moved ahead to the middle of July. It was made clear if I had not cancelled by that date the very next day would start as a 50% penalty. [I had given them my CC to take the balance on the payment day]. I don't know if this information is of any use to you, I don't imagine it is only being done for this particular QM2 voyage.

[bluemarble]

Not really cruise-related, but it might be of some general interest to this forum that another (former) Cunard ship has now also suspended operations. This report is from the Long Beach, California Press-Telegram.

 

Queen Mary suspends operations amid coronavirus pandemic

 

I guess I wasn't aware that the Queen Mary Hotel had remained open as a hotel until now.

[ExArkie]

10 hours ago, candle in the wind said:

I am late to the party as I only just read this, but I phoned Cunard a couple of weeks ago as the balance on the September voyage I had booked was due in the middle of May and I was told the payment deadline had been moved ahead to the middle of July. It was made clear if I had not cancelled by that date the very next day would start as a 50% penalty. [I had given them my CC to take the balance on the payment day]. I don't know if this information is of any use to you, I don't imagine it is only being done for this particular QM2 voyage.

It appears to be something that no one ever bothered to mention. I ran into the same thing with a booking for which final payment was a couple of weeks ago. There are a few posts back and forth in the closed cancellations thread, starting with post #1442 on page 58.

 

Bottom line - it appears that, while the final payment date moved from 120 days to 60 days before sailing, the penalty phase still begins at 120 days.

[majortom10]

49 minutes ago, ExArkie said:

It appears to be something that no one ever bothered to mention. I ran into the same thing with a booking for which final payment was a couple of weeks ago. There are a few posts back and forth in the closed cancellations thread, starting with post #1442 on page 58.

 

Bottom line - it appears that, while the final payment date moved from 120 days to 60 days before sailing, the penalty phase still begins at 120 days.

To my knowledge it is only in US in the UK as far as I am aware they still want balance at 90 days. Rather upset that those in US who have cruises booked in September can delay their final balance until June whereas we have one booked in October but Cunard still expect final balance payment in June. Totally unfair.

[Windsurfboy]

18 hours ago, astera said:

Wow. I cannot believe this but we have just been treated like garbage by Cunard.

 

Unbelievable. Just weeks ago they pretended to try to help us, asked for hotel+flight receipts after dumping passengers off at Perth, and now they have told us that they don't owe us a cent because we should have thought about miracle insurance instead. As opposed to holding Cunard to account for dumping its passengers off...

 

This is such a surprise that it's hard to accept. All this time I thought that Cunard was a genuine operator that would never attempt to scam its very own customers... and yet here we are. This is a shameful experience, and completely unexpected.

 

I had a similar experience but the other way round, Cunard at first told me to go to my insurance company to claim airfare. However after contacting insurance company  when I sent cunard a copy of letter from the insurance company that said it was Cunards duty to reimburse me not them Cunard agreed to pay for airfare. Will let you know if/when it arrives.

[si_boy]

2 hours ago, majortom10 said:

To my knowledge it is only in US in the UK as far as I am aware they still want balance at 90 days. Rather upset that those in US who have cruises booked in September can delay their final balance until June whereas we have one booked in October but Cunard still expect final balance payment in June. Totally unfair.

Am in UK and just checked, balance for October 2020 cruise that we are booked on is still due in July, 90 days before sets sail.

[majortom10]

1 hour ago, si_boy said:

Am in UK and just checked, balance for October 2020 cruise that we are booked on is still due in July, 90 days before sets sail.

I sail on 2nd October and my balance is due 27th June. What date is yours in October towards the beginning or the end. In the US if you have a cruise booked up to 30th September Cunard have reduced their final balance date to 60 days but have not done the same for UK cruisers.

Edited May 8, 2020 by majortom10

[si_boy]

3 minutes ago, majortom10 said:

I sail on 2nd October and my balance is due 27th June. What date is yours in October towards the beginning or the end. In the US if you have a cruise booked up to 30th September Cunard have reduced their final balance date to 60 days but have not done the same for UK cruisers.

Departs 25 October, balance due 27 July.

[majortom10]

54 minutes ago, si_boy said:

Departs 25 October, balance due 27 July.

Dont you think its unfair that in the UK we have to pay balance 90 days before cruise when in US they have changed it due to Coronavirus and told them they no longer have to pay 90 days you can pay balance at 60 days  before your cruise.

Edited May 8, 2020 by majortom10

[si_boy]

21 minutes ago, majortom10 said:

Dont you think its unfair that in the UK we have to pay balance 90 days before cruise when in US they have changed it due to Coronavirus and told them they no longer have to pay 90 days you can pay balance at 60 days  before your cruise.

Completely agree and for the time being no guarantee the cruise will happen, even in October.

[macsford]

14 hours ago, majortom10 said:

Dont you think its unfair that in the UK we have to pay balance 90 days before cruise when in US they have changed it due to Coronavirus and told them they no longer have to pay 90 days you can pay balance at 60 days  before your cruise.

 I totally agree. We have booked 4 September TA to New York then second week onboard to Quebec. 

Even if this goes ahead which is very unlikely we would not want to go. 

We either have to pay the balance by 6 June and hope it is cancelled or commit to transferring to next year to avoid losing our deposit. 

If the balance was due at 60 days there would be a much clearer picture and probably a cancellation notice with the option of a refund.

Whilst we will go next year if it seems safe to do so, we would prefer to make that decision in our own time. 

 

[babs135]

17 hours ago, majortom10 said:

I sail on 2nd October and my balance is due 27th June. What date is yours in October towards the beginning or the end. In the US if you have a cruise booked up to 30th September Cunard have reduced their final balance date to 60 days but have not done the same for UK cruisers.

Interesting. We also are due to sail on the 2nd October but our balance is due to be paid by the 18th June!!   It's now a week since we contacted our travel agent re transferring the cruise to next year but we've heard nothing, not even an acknowledgement.  I know they are busy but it's so frustrating.  If we miss out next year that's it as the 2022 dates I suspect will not work for us.

[lindylooellalouise]

Hi we are sailing on the Queen Mary 2 on 2nd October and our balance is to be paid by June 6th not sure what to do, and we are still awaiting our refunds for 2  other cancelled cruises really reluctant to pay any more monies to any cruise companies,we also have 4 cruises booked for 2021 so it’s difficult to fit in any more surely they will extend to 2022 for people to transfer their cruises.

[majortom10]

2 hours ago, lindylooellalouise said:

Hi we are sailing on the Queen Mary 2 on 2nd October and our balance is to be paid by June 6th not sure what to do, and we are still awaiting our refunds for 2  other cancelled cruises really reluctant to pay any more monies to any cruise companies,we also have 4 cruises booked for 2021 so it’s difficult to fit in any more surely they will extend to 2022 for people to transfer their cruises.

We are due to sail on 2nd October on QM2 for 28 nts and thought our balance was due early on 27th June but 6th June seems excessively early. We have no intention of paying our balance.

[Clagmeister]

On 5/6/2020 at 11:41 AM, majortom10 said:

I am in the UK and been told by PM on Cunard's Facebook page that it is 60 calendar days and not working days from when you cancelled. We will wait and see.

I had an email a couple of days ago responding to a follow up of my cancellation refund agreed on 16 Mar. It said that they were still within the 45 days settlement date because the 45 days are working days and exclude weekend and bank holidays. I have not seen the refund yet and by my reckoning this ought to be with me by the 22 May. That would be beyond 60 calendar days and certainly longer than the original 7 to 10 days that I was told at cancellation. But we live in difficult times and forbearance has become our byword. 

[morrfran]

Here in the US, for the past 2-3 years, the balance has been due 4 months prior to cruise date. At least on those I've booked.