Early Saver Close to Sailing Date

[kp221]

I recently put in an Early Saver form to drop my price to a guarantee price and give up my room. Carnival rep responded that the rate was for a lower category and I could not match. Now, I have a screenshot of the pseudo-booking that shows it was indeed a guarantee rate (not to mention there are no rooms available for the lower category, 6A, available on my sailing at this point). I've sent this to them and am waiting for a reply.

 

All this and we are quickly approaching my sailing date (9 days! Woohoo!!). This made me think, have any of you had any problems with price drops like this even closer to sailing date where you could not get the reply from Carnival in time? Or could not reply back, etc?

 

If so, how did you handle this? Could you print out a screenshot to take with you just in case your price drop didn't come through? Would they even honor this while you are already on the ship? Thanks in advance for any replies.

[serene56]

you have to take care of this before you leave.

 

a guarantee oceanview is BELOW what you have.

 

they could honor it but do not have to.

 

If all the oceanviews are gone then its more then likely you will not get the price reduction.

 

have you checked the price of a balcony gauarantee?

[CupCake3510404]

Hey, this is happening to me right now too! Maybe it was the same rep who didn't know what they were doing that answered our requests lol. I'm 7 days away and my cruise sold out today. I did not take a screen shot because I didn't know there would be a problem : ( wish I would have done that!

 

I posted my own thread about it and the people were really helpful. There is this section of the early saver faqs "The policy for existing Early Saver business is slightly different in that they can be protected to Super Saver and Instant Saver fares. Please note if existing Early Saver guests want to be protected to Super Saver or Instant Saver they will be required to forfeit the stateroom they selected and we will assign their stateroom at check in. "

 

I called them this morning and first the rep told me I couldn't price match to a lower category. I read her that paragraph and then she went to talk to someone from guest services. She came back and told me that I didn't specify in the comment section of the form that I would give up my cabin. I told her I had my copy of the price drop form in email and I did specify that in the comment section. Then she put the guest service lady on the phone. She told me to respond to the email because the person must have missed my comments. Now I'm waiting for a reply...

 

I can't imagine them telling us we can't have these price drops. They might say something if you didn't say you would give up your cabin in the comment section but nowhere on the website does it say this is necessary so I would argue against that anyways. I think 9 days out (7 for me) is enough time to get it figured out. Good luck!! Let us know the response you get!

[kp221]

Hey, this is happening to me right now too! Maybe it was the same rep who didn't know what they were doing that answered our requests lol. I'm 7 days away and my cruise sold out today. I did not take a screen shot because I didn't know there would be a problem : ( wish I would have done that!

 

I posted my own thread about it and the people were really helpful. There is this section of the early saver faqs "The policy for existing Early Saver business is slightly different in that they can be protected to Super Saver and Instant Saver fares. Please note if existing Early Saver guests want to be protected to Super Saver or Instant Saver they will be required to forfeit the stateroom they selected and we will assign their stateroom at check in. "

 

I called them this morning and first the rep told me I couldn't price match to a lower category. I read her that paragraph and then she went to talk to someone from guest services. She came back and told me that I didn't specify in the comment section of the form that I would give up my cabin. I told her I had my copy of the price drop form in email and I did specify that in the comment section. Then she put the guest service lady on the phone. She told me to respond to the email because the person must have missed my comments. Now I'm waiting for a reply...

 

I can't imagine them telling us we can't have these price drops. They might say something if you didn't say you would give up your cabin in the comment section but nowhere on the website does it say this is necessary so I would argue against that anyways. I think 9 days out (7 for me) is enough time to get it figured out. Good luck!! Let us know the response you get!

 

Yeah, I added the FAQ portion there to my request, but not the screenshot. So I sent back with the screenshot and I feel pretty confident that I'll get the drop. I hope you get yours too!

 

Next time, if there is a next time, I plan to put the FAQ in the comments with the acknowledgement that I am willing to go to guarantee and a link to IMGUR with my screenshot.

 

That's what I'm particularly curious about... If there is a next time, say the 2 business days before which would be the latest to do the drop, I wonder if it'll go through in time and if not what they would do about it. Also, I wonder what they'll do if I put in for it, they don't email back in time before I leave, and I notice the OBC isn't showing when on the ship. That is, if they can do anything about it.

 

It wouldn't matter to me so much, but if they are willing to offer the opportunity to submit for a drop that close to sail date, they should be willing to honor it.

[CupCake3510404]

Yeah I think if there are no problems generally a price drop only takes a day or two to get taken care of so normally they would honor a price drop so close. Also I think most cruises sell out, mine did today which makes me even more nervous about getting my price drop. But I have don't know what they do when there are issues that take longer to resolve. If mine isn't resolved by the time I get on the boat I'll probably just drop it because I don't want to be arguing with guest services to start my vacation : (