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Bidding on an upgrade


babs135
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2 minutes ago, Winifred 22 said:

How far out from sailing Is it ?  When they allocate all the guarantee cabins out you see a huge shift in availability. I have been caught out before tracking cabins the see them all disappear 

Ooh good idea. Around 50 days 

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@Host Hattie not sure if it’s going to irk you but can you collate recent upgrade posts in here?

 

Ok so RESULT!

 

Upgraded from deluxe inside in QV to a BB balcony.

 

Min bid: £160

Max: £560

 

We bid at £380. Currently just under 50 days out from sailing and bid when we were 80 days out.

 

i call this is a very good result and am over the moon with it. 

 

 

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12 minutes ago, Host Hattie said:

Congratulations on your successful bid.

I'm not sure what you're asking me to do.

thankyou 🤗
 

There’s a lot of generic upgrade threads. Might it not be an idea to put this as a sticky and group them together? 

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We booked a sheltered balcony for an upcoming crossing. Bidded $230 (the minimum) and got a deck 8 balcony room. 

 

Not entirely sure if it's an improvement but we were trying to get out of our original room with a connecting door, so I guess we will count it as an upgrade. 

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8 hours ago, DreamingOfSunnyDays said:

thankyou 🤗
 

There’s a lot of generic upgrade threads. Might it not be an idea to put this as a sticky and group them together? 


@Host Hattie, they’re asking to merge upgrade threads. 👍

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I am now three day before sailing date on the QM2- just yesterday I got the Mail that my upgrade bits have both been declined. Well I just offered the minimum- so all good- and I am perfectly fine with my sheltered balcony on deck 6 for the double crossing.

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6 hours ago, leyland1989 said:

We booked a sheltered balcony for an upcoming crossing. Bidded $230 (the minimum) and got a deck 8 balcony room. 

 

Not entirely sure if it's an improvement but we were trying to get out of our original room with a connecting door, so I guess we will count it as an upgrade. 

I would count that as a win to avoid a cabin with a connecting door to be honest. 

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  • 1 month later...

We've just received an offer to upgrade from a Q2 to a Q1. However, when I checked Cunard's website, the Q1s are showing sold out. This seems strange to me - anyone else have experience of this and, if so, did you make an offer which was accepted? We booked through a travel agent by the way, not direct.

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1 hour ago, DaisyUK said:

We've just received an offer to upgrade from a Q2 to a Q1. However, when I checked Cunard's website, the Q1s are showing sold out. This seems strange to me - anyone else have experience of this and, if so, did you make an offer which was accepted? We booked through a travel agent by the way, not direct.

They offer all the upgrades. There are often/always last minute cancellations. 
 

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Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, DaisyUK said:

We've just received an offer to upgrade from a Q2 to a Q1. However, when I checked Cunard's website, the Q1s are showing sold out. This seems strange to me - anyone else have experience of this and, if so, did you make an offer which was accepted? We booked through a travel agent by the way, not direct.

Have a look at posts 220 and 221. Cunard doesn't put all inventory up for sale, in order to manipulate pricing. It's similar to airlines offering upgrades on services which are seemingly overbooked - monetizing your late inventory and no-shows (etc) is big business. 

Edited by Pushpit
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19 minutes ago, Pushpit said:

Have a look at posts 220 and 221. Cunard doesn't put all inventory up for sale, in order to manipulate pricing. It's similar to airlines offering upgrades on services which are seemingly overbooked - monetizing your late inventory and no-shows (etc) is big business. 

Interesting, I had missed those 2 posts so thanks for pointing them out. Still odd though given that there are only 2x Q1s.

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38 minutes ago, Pushpit said:

Have a look at posts 220 and 221. Cunard doesn't put all inventory up for sale, in order to manipulate pricing. It's similar to airlines offering upgrades on services which are seemingly overbooked - monetizing your late inventory and no-shows (etc) is big business. 


P&O U.K. do the same. It looks like there is very little availability, or even sell outs in certain grades, only for a new batch to be released a few weeks later! I suspect that all cruise lines do this. Hotels do the same. In fact there’s an advert on TV at the moment that exposes this!

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Posted (edited)
27 minutes ago, DaisyUK said:

Interesting, I had missed those 2 posts so thanks for pointing them out. Still odd though given that there are only 2x Q1s.

And, honestly, if you are in the Q1/Q2 market, wouldn’t you have booked the one you wanted in the first place?

Edited by exlondoner
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Just now, Selbourne said:


P&O U.K. do the same. It looks like there is very little availability, or even sell outs in certain grades, only for a new batch to be released a few weeks later! I suspect that all cruise lines do this. Hotels do the same. In fact there’s an advert on TV at the moment that exposes this!

The upgrades they offer are, at that point in time, often hypothetical. If none become available, no one gets an upgrade. 

 

On H415 all QG options were available as upgrades to bid on, including Q1 which is only 2 suites I think.... QG was at that point showing sold out. Doesn't mean someone won't cancel in the final 8 weeks or whatever

 

As a Carnival shareholder I approve of this process, rather than giving away free upgrades, nice as they'd be...

 

You may be referring to Dynamic Pricing which hotels have been doing probably since before the birth of the internet and before. I've booked hotels when I've seen concerts announced (but before tickets go on sale) in Oslo, Dublin, Manchester. Just after tickets go on sale, hotel prices can double. Cruise lines dynamic price - BC can often be almost as expensive as PG if there is little availability.

 

Taylor Swift and Springsteen through Ticketmaster have recently also used dynamic pricing though i think this was more in the US

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27 minutes ago, DaisyUK said:

Interesting, I had missed those 2 posts so thanks for pointing them out. Still odd though given that there are only 2x Q1s.

Yes, but there's no obligation for Cunard to fulfil any bid, so there's no harm in putting them up for bidding. Maybe 5% of the time one comes free - and they get money for it, rather than giving a Q2 a free upgrade

 

It's a free hit for Cunard; there doesn't have to be availability 8 weeks out from the cruise.

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10 minutes ago, exlondoner said:

And, honestly, if you are in the Q1/Q2 market, wouldn’t you have booked the one you wanted in the first place?

No, because there was/is no availability!

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6 minutes ago, DaisyUK said:

No, because there was/is no availability!

I agree.

There are very few 1s and 2 s and on most itineraries, they get booked out quickly. However, they do occasionally become available, as we found out last May when we bagged a 1 up from our booked 2 after being told the previous year there wasn’t a chance we’d get one as the waitlist was already, long.

Not to be discouraged, I looked almost every day to see if one became available, and it did and I booked it so wait lists, mean nothing. Chance it seems, does.

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12 minutes ago, DaisyUK said:

No, because there was/is no availability!

Hang in there but I don’t think you’ll be disappointed with a 2 if that’s what you have booked.

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20 minutes ago, buchanan101 said:

You may be referring to Dynamic Pricing which hotels have been doing probably since before the birth of the internet and before


No, I’m not referring to dynamic pricing. Cruise lines do that as well! I was referring to showing limited or no availability in certain grades to encourage bookings when, in fact, there is plenty of other availability which is released later once those cabins are booked. Both cruise lines and hotels use both tactics. 

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5 minutes ago, Victoria2 said:

Hang in there but I don’t think you’ll be disappointed with a 2 if that’s what you have booked.

Oh yes, it will be fine either way😊

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1 minute ago, Selbourne said:


No, I’m not referring to dynamic pricing. Cruise lines do that as well! I was referring to showing limited or no availability in certain grades to encourage bookings when, in fact, there is plenty of other availability which is released later once those cabins are booked. Both cruise lines and hotels use both tactics. 

Ok, sorry. But the “release” could be cabins that people have bought upgrades from (I’ve done that before), or from people who have cancelled (Cunard clientele demographic is one that can unfortunately get ill. Both my partners and my mothers are old and ill - we could be cancelling at short notice).

 

Who knows? 

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6 minutes ago, buchanan101 said:

Ok, sorry. But the “release” could be cabins that people have bought upgrades from (I’ve done that before), or from people who have cancelled (Cunard clientele demographic is one that can unfortunately get ill. Both my partners and my mothers are old and ill - we could be cancelling at short notice).

 

Who knows? 


Yes, cancellations can happen at any time, especially around balance due dates, and upgrade schemes certainly throw up availability, but we are talking about a deliberate ploy that cruise lines, hotels and airlines all use, which is to deliberately show limited availability in order to panic people into booking when, in fact, there is loads more availability. As cabins sell, more will magically appear!

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1 minute ago, Selbourne said:


Yes, cancellations can happen at any time, especially around balance due dates, and upgrade schemes certainly throw up availability, but we are talking about a deliberate ploy that cruise lines, hotels and airlines all use, which is to deliberately show limited availability in order to panic people into booking when, in fact, there is loads more availability. As cabins sell, more will magically appear!

Is it illegal though?

 

Hotels is the easy one - book cancellable rates; I always do and sometimes rebook cheaper (Hilton at the cricket ground in Southampton before H415 case in point, new Hilton Tapestry in York for this August BH), though with hotels probably indistinguishable from dynamic pricing as unlike cruise ships you can't see a plan of free rooms

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