Guaranteed is really guaranteed, right?

[twnkltoz]

We booked our Alaska cruise for this August, and "guaranteed" a category E OV room. We leave in 45 days and haven't been assigned a cabin. I'm getting a little nervous because there are only 7 OV rooms left and all the better categories or whatevery call them (balcony, suites, etc) are sold out. I really will be on this cruise, right?

[sonomaphil]

We booked our Alaska cruise for this August, and "guaranteed" a category E OV room. We leave in 45 days and haven't been assigned a cabin. I'm getting a little nervous because there are only 7 OV rooms left and all the better categories or whatevery call them (balcony, suites, etc) are sold out. I really will be on this cruise, right?

 

Yes, you will. You might not know your cabin assignment till the very last minute, maybe not until you're at the pier!

[zaandam_2]

the category of your gty will be the minimum you can receive. you may get something higher. no gaurantees on that though.

[Coral]

Yep - you are guaranteed on the ship in the category you booked.

[twnkltoz]

Thanks for putting my mind at ease!

[MercedMike]

Don't worry. The ships do this "guarantee" business so they can play with their inventory up to the last minute. Inventory can change daily, or more often. What happens is if they want to run a special to fill up the ship, they might offer Category E at a good price -- and then bump you up to a higher category for free, to open up the E's to sell. It is all screwy and depends on the marketing gurus whims. But you will get AT LEAST what you paid for, and sometimes something better, once in a long while something a lot better. Guarantees can be a good deal.

 

OR -- on rare occasions, the ships are actually oversold. In that case they start offering incentives to take a different ship or a different date. If you are flexible, you might get a great discount and on board credit to make a swap. If not, then you are still GUARANTEED your cabin -- they just have to keep sweetening the pot until somebody else takes the offer.

 

I have actually never heard of anybody getting involuntarily bumped out of a guarantee. So relax and have a GREAT cruise!;)

[twnkltoz]

Well, I can stop wondering. We were assigned our cabin yesterday, E319. This is the category I booked us in, so no upgrade this time. Looks like the ship is full now.

[geoherb]

Last December we sailed on the Sun Princess. I had booked us a last-minute guarantee in category I (inside, but not down in the bowels of the ship). We found out our cabin a few weeks before sailing.

 

When I got home, I discovered Princess had emailed me an incentive to change our cruise to another one. They were going to refund half our fare and put us in a balcony cabin. I'm sure that worked out well for whoever was able to take the offer, but I'm glad we went when we did (and that I did not read my email at the hotel).

[cruisequeen10]

Last year I cruised to Alaska on the HAL Zuiderdam. We had booked the guarantee lowest (cheapest) inside on the bottom deck. When it was one month before sailing and I still did not have cabin assignment, I too was starting to get nervous. Every week I would call HAL and they said they haven't assigned us a cabin yet. One week before sailing, I started to panic and phoned them again and said "I am on the ship right. Where is my cabin. One of the lifeboats". Then the night before sailing I had called again (by this time really panicing) and found out that we were upgraded to an outside on the bottom deck. The cabin was just down from the show lounge and under the casino. It was the best cabin assignment I have every received. Did not hear any noise coming from the show lounge or from the casino.

[hotmike98]

We have a mini-suite and an inside cabin for July 9 Island Princess northbound from Vancouver. We got out cabin assignment about three weeks before departure, upgraded on the mini-suite from AD to AA. Today Princess called and offered to upgrade the inside cabin to balcony, keep us in an AA category minisuite, pick up air cost changes (we booked air through Princess, with deviation fee, a first for us), guarantee bookings on all our pre-reserved excursions, and give us $500 per room on board credit, if we could switch to Coral Princess leaving July 30. Not as generous (as yet) as some I have read about here, but better than some others. Unfortunately, I moved several trial dates around for the time we have booked, wife has medical appointments, and the girls have volleyball and cheer camps. So we will probably decline when they open for business on Thursday, unless there is another date we can make work. The shipboard credit would have been nice. I did have a non Princess booking with Island Wings, so that would have been a problem as well. But there are lots of people with far worse problems that this, so I count my blessings.

[Coral]

Just an FYI - I have also received several offers from being bumped from the ship. I have received them "while I had a cabin assignment". So it doesn't matter if you have guaranttee status or if you have a cabin - Princess makes these offers to both types of people. If you choose not to take the offer, they just offer it to someone else and you can still cruise.

[twnkltoz]

Well, it looks like the whole ship is wait-listed now. They might make an offer to change dates, but we won't bite. Our whole family is going and everything's booked--hotel, flights, rental car.