Cabin booking getting more complicated mid November.

[racephoto]

While looking for info on possible upcoming Black Friday & Veterans Day sales I stumbled across this little tidbit. Seems like those choice cabins will now cost more. What a nightmare this rollout will be!! I wonder if this is why so many future sailing’s have had all their cabins changed to guarantee. 😞 Also, note the date that the system is going to go down. November 13th 8pm to Nov 14th 3pm. This should be just wonderful because I board on the 14th. What could possibly go wrong. 

B2B_PROMO_21-145-Stateroom-Categories-Ship_en_US.pdf B2B_PROMO_21-146-Stateroom-Categories-Experience_en_US.pdf B2B_PROMO_21-144-Stateroom-Occupancy-Ship_en_US.pdf B2B_PROMO_21-142-Experiences-Grid_en_US.pdf

[styles27]

Don’t they already do this with the Bella, Fantastica and Aurea “experiences”?

I agree with you this is most likely the reason they’ve taken everyone’s assigned room away later in the year and gave them guarantees. 
 

 

I’m glad they moved up my embarkation time on the 14th. Did you check yours?

 

 

[racephoto]

15 minutes ago, styles27 said:

Don’t they already do this with the Bella, Fantastica and Aurea “experiences”?

I agree with you this is most likely the reason they’ve taken everyone’s assigned room away later in the year and gave them guarantees. 
 

 

I’m glad they moved up my embarkation time on the 14th. Did you check yours?

 

 

I haven’t checked yet. I’ve been kind of busy prepping to leave on Sunday. I’m driving to the East Coast of Florida a week early because I’ve got a campsite on the beach for a few days.

[styles27]

3 minutes ago, racephoto said:

I haven’t checked yet. I’ve been kind of busy prepping to leave on Sunday. I’m driving to the East Coast of Florida a week early because I’ve got a campsite on the beach for a few days.

That sounds cool! We’re leaving this Sunday too. Staying on Siesta Key for a week then driving over to Port Canaveral early on the 14th. Just packed my stuff today 

Have you guys been having cool temps at night? Will a sweater and shawl type thing be enough or do we need something heavier?

Edited November 2, 2021 by styles27

[racephoto]

6 minutes ago, styles27 said:

Have you guys been having cool temps at night? Will a sweater and shawl type thing be enough or do we need something heavier?

i’m in Northwest Florida and it’s been getting down in the mid to low 50s at night. For most Floridians, that’s parka weather. 🙂 I am OK with a light jacket. 

[styles27]

2 minutes ago, racephoto said:

i’m in Northwest Florida and it’s been getting down in the mid to low 50s at night. For most Floridians, that’s parka weather. 🙂 I am OK with a light jacket. 

Wow that is chilly.
My MIL lives in Sun City Center about 30 min south of Tampa so I called her and said “mom trying to pack how cool is it at night?” She responded with “it’s freezing down here we put our heat on!” 😳

So I texted her sister who is 10 yrs younger and lives on the same street and she said “My ac is still on” 

So I’m thinking somewhere in the middle lol

[racephoto]

27 minutes ago, styles27 said:

Don’t they already do this with the Bella, Fantastica and Aurea “experiences”?

I agree with you this is most likely the reason they’ve taken everyone’s assigned room away later in the year and gave them guarantees. 
 

 

I’m glad they moved up my embarkation time on the 14th. Did you check yours?

 

Also, it sounds like they are implementing a lot more granular pricing, with different categories within each level of experience. Instead of now where a huge aft balcony cabin costs the same as a regular balcony cabin as long as they’re both fantastica, it sounds like the aft cabin is now going to cost more money. They also added an interesting tidbit in the PDF about experience levels  about Fantastica and aurea guests getting one ‘free cruise change’.

[racephoto]

Just now, styles27 said:

Wow that is chilly.
My MIL lives in Sun City Center about 30 min south of Tampa so I called her and said “mom trying to pack how cool is it at night?” She responded with “it’s freezing down here we put our heat on!” 😳

So I texted her sister who is 10 yrs younger and lives on the same street and she said “My ac is still on” 

So I’m thinking somewhere in the middle lol

My AC is on today, and my heat will be on tonight. 🙂 It’s that time of year. 

[styles27]

1 minute ago, racephoto said:

Also, it sounds like they are implementing a lot more granular pricing, with different categories within each level of experience. Instead of now where a huge aft balcony cabin costs the same as a regular balcony cabin as long as they’re both fantastica, it sounds like the aft cabin is now going to cost more money. They also added an interesting tidbit in the PDF about experience levels  about Fantastica and aurea guests getting one ‘free cruise change’.

As if their IT dept can handle a more complex booking process 🙄. This is going to be a hot mess when it rolls out. 
 

I don’t think we’ll book a January cruise with them this year. 

[styles27]

2 minutes ago, racephoto said:

My AC is on today, and my heat will be on tonight. 🙂 It’s that time of year. 

Okay so they’re not loopy lol

Here in New England once we switch over from a to heat there’s usually no going back. 

[racephoto]

36 minutes ago, styles27 said:

As if their IT dept can handle a more complex booking process 🙄. This is going to be a hot mess when it rolls out. 
 

I don’t think we’ll book a January cruise with them this year. 

Yeah, and if anybody is looking at a future cruise and they have their eye on a primo cabin such as an aft balcony, they might wanna consider booking it before the change. I mean, I guess it’s possible that prices won’t go up, but I don’t know why you would introduce all this extra complication if you weren’t planning to make some extra money off of it. 

[Beamafar]

Other cruise lines do this so it was bound to happen that MSC would introduce this at some stage.  This is one of the results of them bringing people in from other companies to “improve” the product. 

[Fla Mike]

Wow, we were thinking, if this Nov cruise on Divina pans out, we might cancel our March cruise on Princess in favor of Meraviglia, but I hate to book something for fear of the dreaded guarantee...

 

Think we may sit for a while.

[racephoto]

It’s a bummer that there weren’t deck plans with the new categories on them. But I somehow suspect that what I found there wasn’t supposed to be out for public view either so I guess that was too much to ask.   One thing I did like about MSC was the simplicity of booking and changing cabins since there were really only a few categories. Oh well.

[KINGBOBOFTHENORTH]

My January 15th sailing in which I booked a Bella inside cabin still has the same cabin assignment.

[bafinegan]

25 minutes ago, KINGBOBOFTHENORTH said:

My January 15th sailing in which I booked a Bella inside cabin still has the same cabin assignment.

You're lucky.  My fantastica ocean view was changed to a guarantee weeks ago.

[racephoto]

4 hours ago, Fla Mike said:

Wow, we were thinking, if this Nov cruise on Divina pans out, we might cancel our March cruise on Princess in favor of Meraviglia, but I hate to book something for fear of the dreaded guarantee...

 

Think we may sit for a while.

Well, you could always book something now and just cancel it if things don’t go well.

[perakcruiser]

11 hours ago, styles27 said:

Don’t they already do this with the Bella, Fantastica and Aurea “experiences”?

 

Actually before MSC started that Bella and Fantastica (and Wellness, Aurea came later) thing, they had a much more complicated system with more different prices for same cabin types. 

 

To make it simpler they reduced to Bella and Fantastica. The main thing about Fantastica is basically higher decks (for some trange reason sometimes also Bella are located on a higher deck).

 

I am not surprised that they change now, as Fantastica is basically quite unattractive with the only real perks being the free photo, the extra Voyager points and some kids activities (room service for some is great, for most it´s useless). 

 

We always booked the available Bella cabin closest to the Buffet. Probably this will not be possible anymore without Fantastica. Let´s wait for the details. 

[racephoto]

Thanks for the info, I never looked into MSC until this year.  I’ve only looked at balconies on the Divina, but in that case it seemed like the Bella balconies were smaller and/or had steel railings. Under the new system, Aurea and Fantastica will get “one free cruise charge” but Bella will need to pay a fee. The free cruise change sounds kind of like a scaled down version of Cruseflex. “The free cruise change needs to be performed within 1 month before departure, for a cruise within 3 months from the original departure.” It definitely will be interesting to see how it all plays out.

[BermudaBound2014]

This was bound to happen. I'm surprised it has taken them so long.

[sidari]

6 hours ago, perakcruiser said:

 

Actually before MSC started that Bella and Fantastica (and Wellness, Aurea came later) thing, they had a much more complicated system with more different prices for same cabin types. 

 

To make it simpler they reduced to Bella and Fantastica. The main thing about Fantastica is basically higher decks (for some trange reason sometimes also Bella are located on a higher deck).

 

I am not surprised that they change now, as Fantastica is basically quite unattractive with the only real perks being the free photo, the extra Voyager points and some kids activities (room service for some is great, for most it´s useless). 

 

We always booked the available Bella cabin closest to the Buffet. Probably this will not be possible anymore without Fantastica. Let´s wait for the details. 

Prior to the current experiences the cabins were B1which became Bella, B2 Fantastica and B3 Aurea nothing complicated about it.

[Morgsmom]

Hmmm, they are taking away room service for Fantastica - only breakfast will be included

[sidari]

17 hours ago, Beamafar said:

Other cruise lines do this so it was bound to happen that MSC would introduce this at some stage.  This is one of the results of them bringing people in from other companies to “improve” the product. 

Where are the improvements Bea ? seems to have been all take away since these infiltrators were taken on. I mean Black card has now lost a few things during the start up like priority boarding and no fruit bowl, may as well go the whole hog and scrap it.

[sidari]

Looking at the list of new categories, what an absolute mess. MSC could not handle what they have now cannot wait for the fireworks when this starts.

[Beamafar]

1 minute ago, sidari said:

Where are the improvements Bea ? seems to have been all take away since these infiltrators were taken on. I mean Black card has now lost a few things during the start up like priority boarding and no fruit bowl, may as well go the whole hog and scrap it.

Totally agree.  The ‘gifts’ are a joke, at this stage, for regular Diamond cruisers.  The only perks are the use of a bathrobe,  a bottle of cheap bubbly and a limited menu in a speciality restaurant.  Oh, and a plate with 5 macaroons in place of chocolate strawberries.

 

We didn’t even receive them, with the bubbly,  til the last day of the cruise.  They can’t even be bothered to have them in the cabin on embarkation day as a welcoming sight.  At least on NCL, the bubbly was in the minibar in the cabin when we embarked.