regent shore exc sold out

[cruiser941]

We just booked a 21 night cruise around South America in Dec. and was only able to book 2 shore excursions and waitlist 1 more.  Is this normal? It is a lot of money to spend on a cruise and not have any of the free shore excursions available.

[Flgreg]

I believe excursion bookings open 1 yr before the cruise. Someone will correct me if I'm wrong.

 

So....people who book early typically act fast.

 

Wait listing is sometimes available however on a Baltic cruise in 2019 we wait listed an excursion and it never opened. We're wait listed on an excursion on a transatlantic in November so we'll see if we're lucky this time.

[CJANDH]

Opening shore bookings a year out may not be the best strategy to keep customers happy. Many people cannot book that far out and will almost always find it hard to book a decent excursion after making their RSS booking 6 or 9 months out. Viking don't open their shore bookings until 3 months out. There is still a mad rush to book as soon as they open; but at least most pax get a shot.

[Pcardad]

You will find that you will get 95% of what you want as Regent will add capacity or people will drop out. Worst case, check with Destinations onboard or go to the theater at the appointed time and ask for leftover tickets - people ALWAYS no-show without turning their tickets back in.

[SWFLAOK]

Shore excursions are bookable on Regent by Concierge and higher suites 365 days out, while others can book 300 days out. Dining reservations are bookable by Concierge and higher suites 90 days out, while others can book 75 days out. We always book our cruise early, in Concierge or Penthouse, and book our excursions and dining as soon as they open. Since only a few high end suites have an unlimited number of dinner reservations available prior to the cruise, and most are limited to 1 reservation per restaurant, dinner is usually not a problem, but shore excursions do book fast.

The disadvantage of booking early is that we have already paid a big deposit by the time special offers become available, with lower fares or very low deposits. We've been told by Regent that taking advantage of those would require us to cancel our reservation and rebook, which could result in losing our suite, or other benefits we may have had from booking early. On our last cruise, we had a friend and a relative booked in 2 separate single cabins. If they wanted to rebook to get a last minute rate, they would have lost the single cabin discount that they had received when they booked, and paid 100 percent single supplement instead of 50 percent.

We have a Viking Ocean cruise coming up that we paid in full for last year. All summer, we have received the advertisement for 25 dollar deposit until the end of September for Viking Ocean Cruises. Our cruise is sold out, so it wouldn't have worked for us, but the same cruise 2 weeks later was still available. Since we already booked our own airfare, we didn't even consider cancelling our booked cruise and rebooking 2 weeks later. 

Viking Ocean opens their shore excursions based on your cabin category with the Owner's suite starting 107 days out,  Explorer suite at 97 days, Penthouse Junior suite at 87 days, and so on. Dinner reservations open 7 days after your excursions open, with a limit of 3 reservations for each restaurant for Explorer and Penthouse Junior suites, 2 each for Penthouse Veranda, 1 each for Deluxe Veranda, and no priority dinner reservations can be booked for Veranda suites until after boarding. We haven't been on Viking Ocean before, but enjoyed our Viking River cruise back in May of 2022. We had booked that cruise for May 2020,  and paid in full for it late in 2018 to get the 3 percent discount. Since Covid cancelled the cruise for 2020 and 2021, with no refund available, it wasn't a good investment.

[papaflamingo]

6 hours ago, cruiser941 said:

We just booked a 21 night cruise around South America in Dec. and was only able to book 2 shore excursions and waitlist 1 more.  Is this normal? It is a lot of money to spend on a cruise and not have any of the free shore excursions available.

If shore excursions are a deal breaker, and you are inside the booking time frame (i.e. less than 300 days out), you can get your TA to put a 7 day hold on the cruise.  Your TA should issue you a booking number and you can go into your account page, add the booking just like if you'd paid for it, and it will allow you to look at the shore excursions in each port under the "customize" button, just as if you are going to book the excursions.  You won't be able to book the excursions until you pay the deposit and actually book the cruise, but you can see what still has availability and decide if you still want the cruise. If so, then book it and make your selections.  If not, you can simply let the hold expire (or tell your TA you don't want to go). 

[RELS]

6 hours ago, cruiser941 said:

We just booked a 21 night cruise around South America in Dec. and was only able to book 2 shore excursions and waitlist 1 more.  Is this normal? It is a lot of money to spend on a cruise and not have any of the free shore excursions available.

 

Yes, it's normal. Keep checking to see if other excursions/wait lists open up.

 

When you board you will have chances to book excursions at the Destinations desk. Line up early and know what you want (bring the PDF that you downloaded marked up with your 1,2,3 choices). It's a bit of a free-for-all on embarkation day, but they're open late that day. Or, on the day of the excursion go to the meeting place (mostly this is the theater) at the appointed time and tell the Destinations team what you want, and they can often squeeze you in because there's always last minute no-shows.

[Scout16]

I would add that it is polite to turn your tickets in if you decide not to take a tour even if you are later than the return date on the ticket.  I also found with the Solo and Social group that you can turn your ticket in and have it go to a specified passenger if they are with you. 

[Techno123]

@cruiser941 the couple we are cruising with had a similar issue but only for one port. They managed to book the majority of the excursions they wanted but one (Okinawa) opened later. - a mix up with the IT and their booking hadn't gone through. There is absolutely nothing else available on-line at the moment except the shuttle into town. They have waitlisted for the Battle of Okinawa but it is very popular so they may not clear it but if not, the suggestions from those above will be followed.
 

However, your situation sounds much more of a pain. Are you saying there are only two you want to do still available or actually only two excursions in total? It sounds like the latter as you say 'not have any of the free excursions available'.

 

It would seem rather disingenuous of Regent to be selling cruises 2 to 3 months out which advertise 'our Included & Unlimited Shore Excursions guarantee your voyage will be like no other.' but then make hardly any excursions available to late bookers.

[piscean]

This week I booked  2 cruises for 2024… one June and another October.

i immediately booked shore excursions and was very concerned that our June cruise (9 months away) I couldn’t book our first choices 

14 days

3 waitlisted

3 wait lists full

Ive never experienced this on our many cruises with Regent

no problem with 2 Regent cruises this year

 

 

 

 

 

[cruiser941]

yes.  This is a very stressful way to start a vacation.

[Pcardad]

Posting this again because we don't want anyone to stress...

You will find that you will get 95% of what you want as Regent will add capacity or people will drop out. Worst case, check with Destinations onboard or go to the theater at the appointed time and ask for leftover tickets - people ALWAYS no-show without turning their tickets back in.

[Tsunami74]

On 9/22/2023 at 10:39 PM, papaflamingo said:

If shore excursions are a deal breaker, and you are inside the booking time frame (i.e. less than 300 days out), you can get your TA to put a 7 day hold on the cruise.  Your TA should issue you a booking number and you can go into your account page, add the booking just like if you'd paid for it, and it will allow you to look at the shore excursions in each port under the "customize" button, just as if you are going to book the excursions.  You won't be able to book the excursions until you pay the deposit and actually book the cruise, but you can see what still has availability and decide if you still want the cruise. If so, then book it and make your selections.  If not, you can simply let the hold expire (or tell your TA you don't want to go). 

Yes.   We usually book well out, but 2 times we were within one year.

We did what papaflamingo advises.  

One time, most of the "must see" (to us) excursions were sold out. So we cancelled that booking within the 7 day hold.

One time, almost all of the excursions we wanted were available, so we kept the booking and waitlisted for the other excursions.

Relatively easy way to not be disappointed in choices available.

[FLgemini]

If there is an excursion you really, really want to do and can't get in on the Regent option, sometimes you can recreate it (or enhance it) by doing it independently or by hiring a private driver/guide. 

[Snore42]

I'd highly suggest a private driver/guide for ports that are once in a lifetime type places.   We would never take a group tour to those type of places, that is far from our idea of luxury.  With a  private driver/guide, you don't have the same time restrictions at a stop, as you would a group tour and get a more personal experience.    Our TA has always booked the private tours for us, and if there was an issue with a tour, she has stood behind the booking and gotten us money back or a credit towards a future tour.   Regent is our current favorite cruise line, but the included excursions have little value to us, unless it's the Caribbean or other places we've been to previously.  

[cruiseluv]

On 9/22/2023 at 5:38 PM, CJANDH said:

Opening shore bookings a year out may not be the best strategy to keep customers happy. Many people cannot book that far out and will almost always find it hard to book a decent excursion after making their RSS booking 6 or 9 months out. Viking don't open their shore bookings until 3 months out. There is still a mad rush to book as soon as they open; but at least most pax get a shot.

Agree 100%. In a case like this the customer should be given an opt out and a credit. How can Regent still say “ free excursions “ when there are none to be had?

[cruiseluv]

On 9/23/2023 at 9:37 AM, Techno123 said:

@cruiser941 the couple we are cruising with had a similar issue but only for one port. They managed to book the majority of the excursions they wanted but one (Okinawa) opened later. - a mix up with the IT and their booking hadn't gone through. There is absolutely nothing else available on-line at the moment except the shuttle into town. They have waitlisted for the Battle of Okinawa but it is very popular so they may not clear it but if not, the suggestions from those above will be followed.
 

However, your situation sounds much more of a pain. Are you saying there are only two you want to do still available or actually only two excursions in total? It sounds like the latter as you say 'not have any of the free excursions available'.

 

It would seem rather disingenuous of Regent to be selling cruises 2 to 3 months out which advertise 'our Included & Unlimited Shore Excursions guarantee your voyage will be like no other.' but then make hardly any excursions available to late bookers.

100% agree with your last comment. Sounds like deceiving advertising to me

[jhenry1]

Just like on our Bridgetown cruise they are saying. Free pre cruise hotel, free transfers,and free air and none of these were truly offered when we booked the Feb cruise for 2024 in May of 2023.

False advertising.

[PaulaJK]

On 9/24/2023 at 10:30 AM, Pcardad said:

Posting this again because we don't want anyone to stress...

You will find that you will get 95% of what you want as Regent will add capacity or people will drop out. Worst case, check with Destinations onboard or go to the theater at the appointed time and ask for leftover tickets - people ALWAYS no-show without turning their tickets back in.

We sailed Mariner in Med & TA in Aug/Sept ‘23. We booked a handful of months ahead and were shut out of 95% of desired tours. We waitlisted when applicable; not all are. No waitlist cleared and seemingly, no additional capacity was added…so our 95% quite went the other way. I don’t know whether this was bad luck or a reflection of changes in R. I like papaflamingo’s suggestion and will try it for our next booking. We are not willing to bolt out of bed early am, dress, breakfast, etc and then go to the theater to wait IF.

[Dolebludger]

It is unfortunate that Regent is having so much trouble lining up good, reliable land services in many ports. As we live in a tourist location, we are well aware that labor to work in service jobs is hard to find, in many places. But I would advise Regent to stop advertising “free unlimited shore excursions” and free hotel and transfers” because it (and we) know these things aren’t deliverable in many locations.

[ChatKat in Ca.]

In October all the tours were booked except for a couple bus/shopping tours.  We cancelled most of them and stayed onboard ship.  Very poor quality tours.  While the onboard experience is decent, the tour situation is very sadly lacking.

[papaflamingo]

4 hours ago, Dolebludger said:

But I would advise Regent to stop advertising “free unlimited shore excursions” and free hotel and transfers” because it (and we) know these things aren’t deliverable in many locations.

How would you suggest they market their product?  We have 5 cruises booked through 2025 and there are excursions offered in each port and there is no limit on how many we can book. So apparently there are "free unlimited shore excursions." 

[fizzy]

8 hours ago, papaflamingo said:

How would you suggest they market their product?  We have 5 cruises booked through 2025 and there are excursions offered in each port and there is no limit on how many we can book. So apparently there are "free unlimited shore excursions." 

If you have always looked forward to the innovative ways that the culinary team prepares your favorite chicken dishes and you don't mind paying the premium Regent prices.... would you be unhappy if once onboard you were told that there were only chicken nuggets available.... and well, there is chicken available? You can have as many chicken nuggets as you want.

[papaflamingo]

1 hour ago, fizzy said:

If you have always looked forward to the innovative ways that the culinary team prepares your favorite chicken dishes and you don't mind paying the premium Regent prices.... would you be unhappy if once onboard you were told that there were only chicken nuggets available.... and well, there is chicken available? You can have as many chicken nuggets as you want.

That is a ridiculous analogy.  Again, we have done 84 days on Regent, just cancelled a 22 night  cruise for Covid, and have 5 more booked and I have NEVER had a problem getting shore excursions.  And the only "limitation" is the departure time of the ship and/or the "closeness" of the tours.  So in my experience they are actually delivering on their promises.  In other words, the "favorite chicken dish" is always available.  

Edited October 9, 2023 by papaflamingo

[fizzy]

1 hour ago, papaflamingo said:

That is a ridiculous analogy.  

Interesting comment. I consider the source.