Ken at the beach

You never insure for taxes and fees on the cruise fare because those are refunded if you d not sail regardless of reason.

1. Yes to show reservations 2. You need to make reservations. They will not transfer over 3. Free beer and wine in suite lounge/coastal kitchen from 11 am. cocktail hour roughly 5-8 included mixed drinks. No longer limited to a set menu

for cruises less than 15 days. Can't be long before Royal follows. Dear Carnival Guest,We are looking forward to welcoming you on your upcoming Carnival cruise.Consistent with the evolving public health guidelines, we have continued to update our protocols over the last several weeks. In summary, vaccines, proof of vaccination, and testing for unvaccinated guests, are no longer required on cruises of 15 nights or less. However, we encourage all guests 5 years and older to take a pre-cruise test within three days of their cruise.For the most updated information, please visit Carnival.com and carefully read all pre-cruise Know Before You Go communications. Please note, a VeriFLY pass is no longer necessary for check-in.While the cruise industry continues its return to normal operations, our commitment to the health and safety of our guests and crew and the communities we serve remain our top priority. Please make sure you are fit to sail and in good health as you prepare for your cruise. Then we’ll do the rest to make sure you have a great vacation.

I'm not familiar with the ports in Europe as much. I know the route Oasis class does but could Icon do the route that Odyssey is doing or does Odyssey max out on ship size for some of those ports.

I also do not think the balcony wraps.

Perhaps your TA should send Vicki a suggestion.

Would have been nice if they had added complementary access to the Beach Club for GS and above or at least Star class

There are still some that can be booked with only 2. It's a mix. point was that Royal doesn't have a separate category for aft cabins like several other cruise lines do where they charge a premium.

Like I mentioned in other posts. They have been removed by Royal along with a lot of the other D4 staterooms in order t meet group space obligations. I was booking a few yesterday and I knew they were all available and then I went to book another cabin and they were gone. I booked another cabin in the same category and then had to call Royal and ask the agent to call revenue and get them to do the swap. It works for TA's, not sure of it will work for individuals.

Plenty of other ships with the large balcony aft cabins that are the exact same price as the side ones. That is one thing good about Royal is that they don't charge a premium for aft facing balcony cabins.

Booked many at the same price yesterday.

They are double occupancy cabins however As TA's block group space in the categories Royal pulls cabins from inventory to meet the group obligations.

Yes, the balcony description is for the other 99% of the cabins in the D4 category

14354 and 14356 are mine for March 8, 2025. Booked a few other afts yesterday for clients. Best deal on the ship IMO.

You don't need to have a refundable deposit to do either of those 2 things. Both can be done with a non refundable deposit. The only thing a refundable deposit gets you is the ability to cancel for a full refund of your deposit before final payment.

And I never mentioned that. All I was referring to was the price. What some TA's offer above and beyond that is of course extra. Nothing that I stated was untrue.

LOL, my eyes are barely good enough for the regular font.🤣

That is so far off base it's laughable

Well that's a meaningless statement and it actually is true at least by the rules set forth by Royal. There are a few agencies that do break the rules at times.

The commission rates paid by the cruise lines vary based on sales volume as does the marketing $ allocated.

I wish that were the reason they are hard to find. Most of them are unsold but have been removed from inventory along with a lot of other cabins in the same category. This is one of the categories that allows groups to be held. As TA's block group space Royal pulls an equivalent number of cabins from inventory so that they can honor the obligations to the groups that have been created. Unfortunately the afts tend to get removed form inventory. There are actually sailings that show a category as sold out but it can still be booed as a category (in this case D4) gty. They fill that gty with the cabins that they pulled earlier. This allows Royal to meet it's group obligations. If they left everything up for sale then anyone could book the cabins and there would be none left to meet the group requirements. This is why there are 180 and 120 day checkpoints at which Royal reviews all the groups and recalls group space if sales are slow. This gives them time to sell it

All the OBC unless it is the small group or early booking or promotional OBC that Royal offers comes out of the TA's commission. Every TA operates under a different business model. Big box stores have very little overhead as they operate from a call center or in some cases the agents work from home. They may be paid a low hourly wage plus a very small portion of the commission as they are really just order takers and not travel agents. The big box or discount on line TA's then have the room to be able to rebate part of their commission. Royal has strict rules on what can and can't be done with respect to this and limits the amount that can be offered and how it is offered. Smaller TA's that operate their own business may have a storefront and other operating costs so they can't afford to give up part of their commission. Independent TA's that work for large companies may only receive a small % of the commission after corporate and the franchisee (who also operates a storefront) take the majority leaving the TA with 30 to 40% of the initial commission. Pretty hard for a TA to match what the big box store is offering when they don't even make that much. There really are so many variable that it's not fair to expect that just because one set of TA's can do it that they all should be able to (that was just a general comment and not related to what you posted) With respect the the comment about JS's. Royal offers group space for balconies and below. Those rates are available through a TA who has access to the group space. These rates in addition to being refundable are also lower in the vast majority of cases that the non refundable rates that Royal offers. Junior suites and above are not offered in group space so the pricing that a TA has will be identical to the price Royal has.

On all ships other than Icon it is only doubles. Icon has a couple categories where group rates are available for triples and quads

Aft facing on deck 14 are D4 and are for 2 guests. Who would have thought that the aft balconies which have a larger balcony would be the cheapest balcony category.

If you have MTD there is no need to link dining. Linking reservations is only useful to get you seated at the same table when you have early or late dining. With MTD they don't save you a table until you show up and tell them how many are in your party.