FCC or refund

[SusanMK]

Has anyone had an issue with Holland America issuing FCC or refunds. We had a 28 day cruise on March 21 that was canceled. We have not been able to contact Holland America guest relations because they just have a answering machine that tells you to email them. I did talk to my agent and he said it could be another 3 months. Our refund or credit is being held up and no-one can give me any answers. Has anyone else who was suppose to take the Oosterdam on March 21 received a refund/FCC. I find the lack of communication with the cruise line frustrating. I have emailed the cruise line numerous times with no answer. Does anyone have any suggestions?

[PROCRUISE]

3 minutes ago, SusanMK said:

Has anyone had an issue with Holland America issuing FCC or refunds. We had a 28 day cruise on March 21 that was canceled. We have not been able to contact Holland America guest relations because they just have a answering machine that tells you to email them. I did talk to my agent and he said it could be another 3 months. Our refund or credit is being held up and no-one can give me any answers. Has anyone else who was suppose to take the Oosterdam on March 21 received a refund/FCC. I find the lack of communication with the cruise line frustrating. I have emailed the cruise line numerous times with no answer. Does anyone have any suggestions?

 

Well, you can continue to wait and undoubtedly will receive your refund eventually!

Had a similar problem with a cancelled cruise. After 45 days I was told that it might indeed be another 60 days for the refund to appear on my credit card. Filed a dispute with CapitalOne and had my full refund, with NO conditions, in 24 hours. The choice is yours.

[kazu]

Refunds and FCC’s are taking longer, no question.  I have received my refund for my April 19th cruise which I cancelled on March 7th but I am still awaiting the FCC confirmation.

 

There have been lots of posts on other threads.  They are coming - their just doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the order they are processed IMO.

[iancal]

Why would anyone wait, wait, wait, and wait some more when they could just file a credit card dispute and have it resolved in days rather than months?

[KirkNC]

The credit card dispute does not really resolve it.  You get provisional credit but your real credit comes when HAL accepts it which is no faster then just waiting the regular route plus many cards have 60-90 day windows on chargebacks and I suspect most are well outside that.

[KirkNC]

2 hours ago, SusanMK said:

Has anyone had an issue with Holland America issuing FCC or refunds. We had a 28 day cruise on March 21 that was canceled. We have not been able to contact Holland America guest relations because they just have a answering machine that tells you to email them. I did talk to my agent and he said it could be another 3 months. Our refund or credit is being held up and no-one can give me any answers. Has anyone else who was suppose to take the Oosterdam on March 21 received a refund/FCC. I find the lack of communication with the cruise line frustrating. I have emailed the cruise line numerous times with no answer. Does anyone have any suggestions?

I am surprised that a March 21 cruise has not been refunded.  I think they are trying to go in order of cruise date.  I would insist my travel agent get and give me a better answer.  I think most with March sailings have been refunded.  We received our world cruise reimbursement (the cruise abruptly ended March 22nd) in the later part of May.

 

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

Edited June 18, 2020 by KirkNC

[iancal]

The credit card route has solved it for many who disputed early and often.  Sure, the dispute goes into a suspense account but the cruise line does not have very long to agree or disagree. Certainly not 90-120 days.  There are people on this forum who have had the issue settled within a week.

 

Timing depends on the card issuer.  And some are extended the time frame because of when you make final payment and when the cruise is cancelled.

 

 

Edited June 18, 2020 by iancal

[SilvertoGold]

18 minutes ago, KirkNC said:

I am surprised that a March 21 cruise has not been refunded.  I think they are trying to go in order of cruise date.  I would insist my travel agent get and give me a better answer.  I think most with March sailings have been refunded.  We received our world cruise reimbursement (the cruise abruptly ended March 22nd) in the later part of May.

 

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

 

Surprised?  March 15 hasn't been refunded to some on the cruise.   Any idea about your luggage?

[oaktreerb]

Our March 18th refund was credited to our credit card last weekend. ( appx June 7th ...time has lost all meaning during this pandemic) Maybe your refund will come this coming weekend.  HAL did not notify us, it just appeared as a credit and we were carefully monitoring our credit card for it to appear.  If you are waiting for a future cruise credit....they may be on a different refund schedule.

Edited June 18, 2020 by oaktreerb

[TriumphGuy]

Our experience was identical to Kazu's. Same dates, but different ships/itineraries. We received the credit card portion refund (50%) to our cards exactly 90 days after we cancelled. Still waiting for the FCC. I was told by our TA it would be a long wait before the FCC shows up. We're not booking another cruise until we see it. In all likelihood nobody's going anywhere this year anyway. I think it's doubtful even next Spring. We'll see...

[Shmoo here]

4 hours ago, SusanMK said:

Has anyone had an issue with Holland America issuing FCC or refunds. We had a 28 day cruise on March 21 that was canceled. We have not been able to contact Holland America guest relations because they just have a answering machine that tells you to email them. I did talk to my agent and he said it could be another 3 months. Our refund or credit is being held up and no-one can give me any answers. Has anyone else who was suppose to take the Oosterdam on March 21 received a refund/FCC. I find the lack of communication with the cruise line frustrating. I have emailed the cruise line numerous times with no answer. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Most refunds/FCC processing is coming thorough in about 90 days.  Some are longer, some shorter.  They just recently had a big surge in some of them, so, maybe they are starting to catch up to the masses of refunds they have to do.

[USN59-79]

I have received three FCCs for three cruises in February and March.  The problem is that the new cruises must be booked and sail by February 7, 2021 for the first two and March 12, 2021 for the third.  I kind of doubt that we will be sailing that early so their is a good chance that we will not be able to use them.

[HAL4NOW]

14 minutes ago, USN59-79 said:

I have received three FCCs for three cruises in February and March.  The problem is that the new cruises must be booked and sail by February 7, 2021 for the first two and March 12, 2021 for the third.  I kind of doubt that we will be sailing that early so their is a good chance that we will not be able to use them.

My understanding is that the FCC needs to be used on a new booking within 12 months after being issued, but the cruise can be any time up until December 31, 2022.

[kazu]

5 hours ago, HAL4NOW said:

My understanding is that the FCC needs to be used on a new booking within 12 months after being issued, but the cruise can be any time up until December 31, 2022.

 

Not correct, sadly.
 

That’s one set of terms and conditions for FCC’s.  It is not the situation for all of them at all.  There are several different ones depending on how the cruise was cancelled, when, by whom, etc.  

 

 

[YXU AC*SE]

 

Complete FCC matrix with applicable dates / conditions.  Scott. 

 

Source:  https://gohal.com/app/uploads/2020/06/Cruise-Cancellation-Policy-Grid.pdf (will open in full screen view)

 

[kazu]

11 minutes ago, YXU AC*SE said:

 

Complete FCC matrix with applicable dates / conditions.  Scott. 

 

Source:  https://gohal.com/app/uploads/2020/06/Cruise-Cancellation-Policy-Grid.pdf (will open in full screen view)

 

 

Thanks Scott.  That’s helpful.

 

It seems they are missing at least one.  HAL offered people the opportunity to cancel certain cruises and receive whatever the penalty was as FCC and a refund for the non penalty portion.  I am in that group.

IIRC at the time it was stated we had to book by the end of December this year and sail by the end of 2021.  I haven’t received the official email yet.

[YXU AC*SE]

 

16 minutes ago, kazu said:

It seems they are missing at least one. 

 

I think you are describing 'Book with Confidence' -- I expect (or rather would hope) that as this is the training aid HAL is providing to their TA community it would be complete.     Scott. 

Edited June 19, 2020 by YXU AC*SE

[kazu]

3 minutes ago, YXU AC*SE said:

 

 

I think you are describing 'Book with Confidence' -- I expect (or rather would hope) that as this is the training aid HAL is providing to their TA community it would be complete.     Scott. 

 

Nope - not book with confidence.  That’s a horse of a different colour and I was not in that category.  We were subject to the standard terms and conditions.

Back around beginning of March, HAL posted an FCC offer for people who wanted to cancel their cruise due to covid, inability to travel, health concern whatever.  The penalty would be converted to FCC.  It was not book with confidence.  It was an offer they made trying to be “fair” knowing the uncertainty while they decided on cruises.

 

In retrospect, they were smart since a lot of people cancelled and got a portion of their refund in FCC.  Those that had their cruises cancelled got a full refund. 

[travelholics]

We are also in this group. It was the first offer made on March 6th and covered sailings between then and May 31st. The FCC must be booked by Dec 31, 2020 for use up to the end of 2021.

We were fortunate to receive our refund within days, but no sign of FCC

[YXU AC*SE]

This:

[StLouisCruisers]

I think that is the policy we cancelled our cruises under.  They were a June 6 and a June 20 B2B cruise.  We cancelled them ourselves on March 17 and HAL later cancelled them on April 14.  We were to get a small FCC and the remainder refunded.  Haven't received the FCC or the email regarding it yet.  We received the funds for the June 20 cruise but haven't heard a peep on the June 6 cruise.

[Primus]

18 hours ago, SusanMK said:

Has anyone had an issue with Holland America issuing FCC or refunds. We had a 28 day cruise on March 21 that was canceled. We have not been able to contact Holland America guest relations because they just have a answering machine that tells you to email them. I did talk to my agent and he said it could be another 3 months. Our refund or credit is being held up and no-one can give me any answers. Has anyone else who was suppose to take the Oosterdam on March 21 received a refund/FCC. I find the lack of communication with the cruise line frustrating. I have emailed the cruise line numerous times with no answer. Does anyone have any suggestions?

We were also on the Oosterdam March 21 cruise and selected the full refund option.  We received our final payment refund on June 2 and our deposit refund on June 6.  Shore excursion refunds were received in March.  Many others on this cruise have received their refunds as well according to posts on the roll call.

[HAL4NOW]

4 hours ago, kazu said:

 

Not correct, sadly.
 

That’s one set of terms and conditions for FCC’s.  It is not the situation for all of them at all.  There are several different ones depending on how the cruise was cancelled, when, by whom, etc.  

 

 

Thanks, Jacquie,

All of our cancellations were done by HAL (one in March, one in April and one in June) and we have not received any of the FCC on our account yet. I know that in the beginning a lot of different criteria for FCC came out from HAL. I think they have tried to make it more uniform, but their communication has not been exactly clear.

The chart that Scott shared gives a little clarification and does seem to put the sail by date the same (December 31, 2022), even though the book by date is dependent on when the FCC is received. At the rate HAL is processing the FCC's, I am wondering if I will have all of them by 2022.

I appreciate the work that you and Scott and Rich and others do on this forum. Your experience and dedication help the rest of us lurkers understand HAL more than we would without your input.

[USN59-79]

To clarify my posting, the book by and sail by dates are those listed in my Mariner's account.  I should also note that this wasn't an either/or FCC.  They refunded what we paid for the cruises and added 100% FCC to the first and 50% FCC for the next two.  So if I don't get to use the FCC, it is not a tragedy.

[JeffElizabeth]

Do you use a travel agent? We have a very good one. After Holland canceled our September Hawaii cruise, she got us booked on a Fall 2021 cruise on the Ryndam with awesome OBC.