Upgrades after final payment

[mvh]

I understand that NCL doesn't allow you to upgrade to a higher category if that category dropped below what you originally paid for a lower category after final payment , which makes no sense to me since they are not losing anything. Now I was told I couldn't change my cabin in the same category when I tried.  Has anyone experienced this? Is this a new policy?  Has anyone been able to upgrade to a higher cabin that is now cheaper than their original cabin, now that the ships are well below capacity and there are tons of rooms available? This just seems crazy that they wouldn't do what ever they can to make customers happy, at least until they start filling their ships?

[dad son team]

I called the other day about this.  I am past final payment and asked about upgrading since the fares have dropped and they agent gave me quotes for the upgrade

[AndyCapn]

I've changed my cabin (same category) twice since final payment for next month's cruise. No issue either time.

[mvh]

27 minutes ago, dad son team said:

I called the other day about this.  I am past final payment and asked about upgrading since the fares have dropped and they agent gave me quotes for the upgrade

They will let me upgrade if the price is higher than I originally paid and just pay the difference, but they won't let me move to a higher category if the price is now lower than what I paid.  Doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

[Funky Fusion FoodsJ]

28 minutes ago, mvh said:

They will let me upgrade if the price is higher than I originally paid and just pay the difference, but they won't let me move to a higher category if the price is now lower than what I paid.  Doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

From a business perspective, it makes perfect sense.  If they give the cabin to you then they have your cabin to sell which they'll get less money for than what they'd get if they fill the other vacancy.  

[mvh]

I get that, but the ship is only sailing at 50%. There are literally hundreds of open rooms that will not sell in the next week.  Just seems like good customer service, instead of pissing customers off. 

[julig22]

27 minutes ago, mvh said:

I get that, but the ship is only sailing at 50%. There are literally hundreds of open rooms that will not sell in the next week.  Just seems like good customer service, instead of pissing customers off. 

And there are also people bidding on upgrading to those open rooms.

They changed their upgrade policy last August.  Yes, in the past they would let you upgrade for no cost. Currently it appears that there has to be a cost difference, plus no upgrades at all if you took the airfare promo.

As my PCC told me, an upgrade after final payment is a courtesy, not an obligation.  Was I disappointed when I found out I couldn't upgrade like I'd done in the past - of course.  Pissed off because I can't get a better deal after the fact - no.  Not a matter of customer service, just a financially better business policy.

[bigrednole]

1 hour ago, mvh said:

I get that, but the ship is only sailing at 50%. There are literally hundreds of open rooms that will not sell in the next week.  Just seems like good customer service, instead of pissing customers off. 

Just curious how you could be pissed off. You are getting what you originally booked for what you agreed to pay. I get that there are better deals, but that was the risk you took booking so far out. You could have just waited it out in order to book and gamble that the prices would be lower. Chalk it up to experience and a lesson. Bid on an upgrade and see where it takes you. Otherwise, enjoy the cruise you have been looking at and booked for months.

[jkrislc]

14 hours ago, julig22 said:

And there are also people bidding on upgrading to those open rooms.

They changed their upgrade policy last August.  Yes, in the past they would let you upgrade for no cost. Currently it appears that there has to be a cost difference, plus no upgrades at all if you took the airfare promo.

As my PCC told me, an upgrade after final payment is a courtesy, not an obligation.  Was I disappointed when I found out I couldn't upgrade like I'd done in the past - of course.  Pissed off because I can't get a better deal after the fact - no.  Not a matter of customer service, just a financially better business policy.

I upgraded last week from an inside to a balcony on the Gem for $320 and kept all of my perks including the airfare after final payment. My wife likes midship cabins, so I wasn't willing to do a bid as I wanted to pick my cabin. My TA handled all of the details. 

[julig22]

27 minutes ago, jkrislc said:

I upgraded last week from an inside to a balcony on the Gem for $320 and kept all of my perks including the airfare after final payment. My wife likes midship cabins, so I wasn't willing to do a bid as I wanted to pick my cabin. My TA handled all of the details. 

Maybe they reconsidered - just repeating what I was told when I tried to upgrade my last cruise, and what others have experienced as well.

[MoCruiseFan]

17 hours ago, mvh said:

I get that, but the ship is only sailing at 50%. There are literally hundreds of open rooms that will not sell in the next week.  Just seems like good customer service, instead of pissing customers off. 

 

Stop choosing to be pissed off, problem goes away.

[jkrislc]

On 12/9/2021 at 11:24 PM, julig22 said:

Maybe they reconsidered - just repeating what I was told when I tried to upgrade my last cruise, and what others have experienced as well.

I was just posting my experience. It wasn't an attempt to contradict you.

 

Perhaps my TA got lucky and found someone who could/would do it. It's also likely that I paid more for my upgrade than I would have if I simply put in a low bid. However, as I stated in my original post, location matters and I'm not willing to leave that to chance.

[Keene33]

Hello, I am new to this forum and can't believe all that I've learned in a short time.

We have only gone on 5 cruises as a family but now, with kids in college, we will have more time to do things on our own.

 

Anyway, I'm a bit confused for when I call NCL and ask to upgrade my room by just paying the difference and was told that they couldn't for sometimes fares go up?

 

Needless to say, with prices going down for Feb cruise, it is still quite a bit more than what I could bid at a minimum upgrade but would like to know what is factual.

 

If not, I'm happy with the room we have but the price differential now makes it reasonable.

 

Let me know if if I should just wait to see if bid is accepted or if I should call again for maybe my Cruise Consultant didn't have the proper facts.

 

Thanks!

[julig22]

3 minutes ago, Thain said:

Hello, I am new to this forum and can't believe all that I've learned in a short time.

We have only gone on 5 cruises as a family but now, with kids in college, we will have more time to do things on our own.

 

Anyway, I'm a bit confused for when I call NCL and ask to upgrade my room by just paying the difference and was told that they couldn't for sometimes fares go up?

 

Needless to say, with prices going down for Feb cruise, it is still quite a bit more than what I could bid at a minimum upgrade but would like to know what is factual.

 

If not, I'm happy with the room we have but the price differential now makes it reasonable.

 

Let me know if if I should just wait to see if bid is accepted or if I should call again for maybe my Cruise Consultant didn't have the proper facts.

 

Thanks!

If you read through the posts you will see that at the present time, upgrades are more complicated than they were in the past - and some are reporting past experiences, so keep that in mind.  Also, a TA might have some flexibility, hard to say.  But generally speaking, most are finding they can only get an upgrade if it costs more than what they have and if you took the airfare promo you cannot upgrade except with a bid.

[vacation44]

44 minutes ago, Thain said:

Hello, I am new to this forum and can't believe all that I've learned in a short time.

We have only gone on 5 cruises as a family but now, with kids in college, we will have more time to do things on our own.

 

Anyway, I'm a bit confused for when I call NCL and ask to upgrade my room by just paying the difference and was told that they couldn't for sometimes fares go up?

 

Needless to say, with prices going down for Feb cruise, it is still quite a bit more than what I could bid at a minimum upgrade but would like to know what is factual.

 

If not, I'm happy with the room we have but the price differential now makes it reasonable.

 

Let me know if if I should just wait to see if bid is accepted or if I should call again for maybe my Cruise Consultant didn't have the proper facts.

 

Thanks!

I would call back and try again.   I was able to upgrade our February 12th cruise a few weeks back.   They were happy to take my money .

[Brian V]

Lol, I didn't have to ask - this past week got an email out of the blue letting us know that we had been upgraded to a club balcony from a standard balcony.

Checked and it is actually a much better location for us, closer to midships on deck 11 where the original cabin was about 10 doors from the extreme aft on deck 11.

No explanation of why, and we didn't bid on anything? Wonder if this is happening to anyone else...

Hope we get the extra perks as well 🙂

Edited January 3, 2022 by Brian V

[swanee4]

I tried to add free at sea to the same category I have and got four different prices to do it. I wasn’t able to get anyone to explain the pricing of the cabins. This is the third cruise rescheduled on my original purchase. There is no order to how the prices are quoted. One shows advertised discount as a credit,  one shows only my FCC and 25 credit plus 20% discount credits and one shows a dollar amount discount. Does anyone know the secret to the pricing shown on an invoice?I don’t understand why it would cost $600 to add free at sea to the same cabin level.

[ggTexasGal]

3 hours ago, swanee4 said:

I tried to add free at sea to the same category I have and got four different prices to do it. I wasn’t able to get anyone to explain the pricing of the cabins. This is the third cruise rescheduled on my original purchase. There is no order to how the prices are quoted. One shows advertised discount as a credit,  one shows only my FCC and 25 credit plus 20% discount credits and one shows a dollar amount discount. Does anyone know the secret to the pricing shown on an invoice? I don’t understand why it would cost $600 to add free at sea to the same cabin level.

NCL has pricing tiers, so your term "cabin level" might be a part of the equation problem.

For example, not all balconies are "the same cabin level."  You would need to know that a B1 is an AFT FACING BALCONY and is priced higher than other balcony rooms.  There are "Family Balcony",  "Large Balcony", and so on. 

The rooms that do not include "Free at Sea" are "generally" listed as "?X" (BX for balcony, OX for Oceanview, and so on).

In addition to the "category" it could easily cost $600 to "add Free at Sea" to a booking based on the number of occupants & the perks selected (or not) from the Free at Sea.  Anyway, if you are trying to upgrade a room that was listed as a "Sail Away" fare (and did NOT include Free at Sea" originally) you should expect to see the price go up several to quite a few hundred dollars depending on # of passengers, category, and length of cruise!

Edited January 4, 2022 by ggTexasGal
added a correction

[kenzie]

Gutted as I booked two haven cabins yesterday via CAS and today each has dropped $1000, would I have any options?

[callmebetty]

5 hours ago, kenzie said:

Gutted as I booked two haven cabins yesterday via CAS and today each has dropped $1000, would I have any options?

Call CAS and ask them to update the pricing. Are you beyond final payment date? Did you pay to upgrade or were you comped a Haven? We are a few weeks from final payment and they adjusted our 3rd passenger fare to reflect the current promo. Sometimes CAS is a little more lenient than the standard line.

[kenzie]

8 hours ago, callmebetty said:

Call CAS and ask them to update the pricing. Are you beyond final payment date? Did you pay to upgrade or were you comped a Haven? We are a few weeks from final payment and they adjusted our 3rd passenger fare to reflect the current promo. Sometimes CAS is a little more lenient than the standard line.

Final was last Thursday, I will ring them later when they open and see what if anything they will do, just my luck with really bad timing.

 

[kenzie]

11 hours ago, kenzie said:

Final was last Thursday, I will ring them later when they open and see what if anything they will do, just my luck with really bad timing.

 

Update - rang and first spoke to a man who bluntly told me that the cost of my cruise was $2k more, that CAS pricing did not reflect the price I saw on NCL website, I was getting nowhere with him so I said thank you, hung up and rang again - got through to a lovely lady who allowed me to upgrade from Haven penthouse to 2 bed however the problem was that the cost of that was less than I had paid and you have to pay at least a dollar more, I suggested including the upgraded alcohol package, which I would have bought anyway and she said yes that will do it, so result upgraded cabin, upgraded alcohol package all for $90. Now hope the cruise goes ahead end Feb 

[vacation44]

1 hour ago, kenzie said:

Update - rang and first spoke to a man who bluntly told me that the cost of my cruise was $2k more, that CAS pricing did not reflect the price I saw on NCL website, I was getting nowhere with him so I said thank you, hung up and rang again - got through to a lovely lady who allowed me to upgrade from Haven penthouse to 2 bed however the problem was that the cost of that was less than I had paid and you have to pay at least a dollar more, I suggested including the upgraded alcohol package, which I would have bought anyway and she said yes that will do it, so result upgraded cabin, upgraded alcohol package all for $90. Now hope the cruise goes ahead end Feb 

Great upgrade!  Thank you for sharing your experience  and have a great cruise.

[Diann24]

On 12/9/2021 at 11:37 AM, julig22 said:

And there are also people bidding on upgrading to those open rooms.

They changed their upgrade policy last August.  Yes, in the past they would let you upgrade for no cost. Currently it appears that there has to be a cost difference, plus no upgrades at all if you took the airfare promo.

As my PCC told me, an upgrade after final payment is a courtesy, not an obligation.  Was I disappointed when I found out I couldn't upgrade like I'd done in the past - of course.  Pissed off because I can't get a better deal after the fact - no.  Not a matter of customer service, just a financially better business policy.

 

I know that this post was a while ago, but I saw that you mentioned that no upgrades if you booked the airfare promo.  Do you know if this is still the rule?

 

 

 

[julig22]

3 hours ago, Diann24 said:

 

I know that this post was a while ago, but I saw that you mentioned that no upgrades if you booked the airfare promo.  Do you know if this is still the rule?

 

 

 

I haven't seen any new info, so I assume it hasn't changed.  I was denied FCC a few months back because of the airfare promo, even though the promo was still available. From my experience, it can easily be the luck of the draw, so no harm in asking and just hope you get an engaged employee rather than a robot that rubber stamps no instead of actually looking at the reservation.