About to go down the RCL IT rabbit hole...any advice?

[Familygoboston]

Sailing Allure in April and made my final payment last week because I knew I'd be busy on the due date (Tuesday). Have 2 linked reservations. While on the phone with C&A I canceled a shore excursion and Prohibition Party on one reservation (credited $220) and a shore excursion on the other (credited $150) and paid the final balance. I asked rep to send me updated invoices. Only one came through. I do have emails for each of the cancelations showing the credited amount on each res to be credited to my CC. I also went online and printed the invoice where it says $0 balance and have those- especially for the res that they didn't send the updated invoice.

Today I received an email saying my final payment is due. So when I checked my res this am (for entertainment) I looked at the invoice just to make sure that it was all paid off (They often send reminders for stuff you've already done:rolleyes:). Unfortunately, each res is now showing a balance due- one for $220 and the other for $150:mad: But the pre cruise planner shows both the Prohibition party and the excursion are not on our planner, they have been cancelled. So now I'm left to worry why they have added these exact charges back to my account, rather than crediting my credit card.

 

And more worrisome, I have to call tomorrow to see if this can be resolved before Tuesday, or it's very likely some automatic process will cancel our whole cruise- we will likely lose our cabins because this cruise is jam packed already.

 

Anyway, in the next 48 hours I am headed down the IT rabbit hole and I have no idea where this journey will take me... but I thought some of you may be interested in the journey and I'm hoping some of you who have already been on this long strange trip will have good advice. Hopefully it's a quick fix- but if you've been around a while, you can understand my concern!:eek:

[irishgal432]

If you booked with RCL call them today or better yet do a chat and email the message to yourself after it is done.

[cruisnseas]

They won't be cancelled. Don't bother with C&A, they can't fix it. You need Resolutions. Here's what happens:

 

When you book shorex and pre cruise planner items they are added to the cost of your booking (along with the payment you make at the time). Sometimes, when you cancel these over the phone it refunds the payment, cancels it in one system but that doesn't transfer over to the booking system and so in the booking system it looks like you still have it but in the pre-cruise system you don't.

 

Resolutions will add up all payments made towards the cruise (including pre-cruise and shorex), look at what you have on the cruise, look at what refunds were sent out and determine if there is really a balance due.

 

Now, if you booked this through a TA, your TA will need to make this call because it involves the finer details of payments and refunds. But I suggest you be on the call as well. This is often not something that can be fixed during the call but will be resolved via the back end

 

But again, it won't cancel. Just give them a call and let them take care of it.

[Familygoboston]

Thanks Irishgal- I save everything!

Cruisinseas- I will take your advice to try Resolutions first. Luckily, I do book and manage my own Reservations. I figured it was some incompatibility between systems. I already printed my setsail passes, and yet today both reservations are showing them as "incomplete". Are you certain it won't auto cancel my cruise? That would turn this adventure from a minor annoyance into a major complication. I've already paid everything but this bogus $370, but that's my biggest concern!

Is it worth trying Resolutions today, or are they only staffed on weekdays? I'm fearful of trying to resolve this over a weekend and getting the "weekend" shift if you know what I mean.

Thanks everyone for your help...will keep everyone posted.

[Beth C]

If it makes you feel any better about the lack of communication between systems... I got the "Your final payment is due" email today for only one of the five cabins we have booked for Hawaii. Of course it would be my room - the rest have been getting the oh your hawaiian vacation will be wonderful emails and I get the GIVE US OUR $$$ email :( lol

 

Final Payment isn't due until Feb 25th as stated in the email... :confused::confused:

[cruisnseas]

Thanks Irishgal- I save everything!

Cruisinseas- I will take your advice to try Resolutions first. Luckily, I do book and manage my own Reservations. I figured it was some incompatibility between systems. I already printed my setsail passes, and yet today both reservations are showing them as "incomplete". Are you certain it won't auto cancel my cruise? That would turn this adventure from a minor annoyance into a major complication. I've already paid everything but this bogus $370, but that's my biggest concern!

Is it worth trying Resolutions today, or are they only staffed on weekdays? I'm fearful of trying to resolve this over a weekend and getting the "weekend" shift if you know what I mean.

Thanks everyone for your help...will keep everyone posted.

 

Cruises that are more than 70% paid don't auto cancel. Resolutions is open on the weekends. I would call them today.

 

And I mean no offense but your last comment is incredibly ignorant of how staffing at call centers work. The hours someone works has no bearing on the quality of the employee. For a long time I worked weekends and for more than 2 years I was the top rate employee (productivity, guest survey results, quality reviews and sales). I chose to work weekends because I preferred dealing with weekend issues (day of sailing issues are far more interesting than someone just being generally upset about a policy or some such).

[ZoeyVictoria]

Could you possibly just pay the balance Monday night and wait a week or so for the refund? I would be afraid of losing the cabins, and willing to argue refunds later if necessary.

 

 

Edited to add: I called AT&T during the day Friday for a return mailing label for an item that did not work as promised. After spelling my email address four times (and I had to spell the word "me"), she told me that I needed to put both the prepaid label and the needs-postage label on the box, and that I could also use the prepaid postage-for-the-postal-service label to ship through UPS. Guess I should have called at night or during the weekend :)

[Familygoboston]

If it makes you feel any better about the lack of communication between systems... I got the "Your final payment is due" email today for only one of the five cabins we have booked for Hawaii. Of course it would be my room - the rest have been getting the oh your hawaiian vacation will be wonderful emails and I get the GIVE US OUR $$$ email

 

Final Payment isn't due until Feb 25th as stated in the email... :confused::confused:

 

We got the email a good month in advance...I suppose they worry some need to hang onto the next paycheck to "make it" so they feel the need to give folks a heads up (save your dough, you owe us!) ;) But I was surprised ( well not really:rolleyes:) to get the message AFTER I had already paid! Are you planning to pay for all 5 cabins? If so would like to pay for mine too?:p;)

[setsail]

They will not cancel your cruise, maybe the excursion and the PP, but that would be great, because you already did that.

[Familygoboston]

Cruises that are more than 70% paid don't auto cancel. Resolutions is open on the weekends. I would call them today.

 

And I mean no offense but your last comment is incredibly ignorant of how staffing at call centers work. The hours someone works has no bearing on the quality of the employee. For a long time I worked weekends and for more than 2 years I was the top rate employee (productivity, guest survey results, quality reviews and sales). I chose to work weekends because I preferred dealing with weekend issues (day of sailing issues are far more interesting than someone just being generally upset about a policy or some such).

 

I'm sure you were excellent, because your advice here is so helpful, it's too bad you don't work there any longer! Many places are understaffed on weekends and to get help they often need to encourage (force) the newest and least experienced employees into service in the weekends, often with less supervision. That's been my experience its most places, but I'm sure not everyone that works weekends falls into that category, or that every company operates that way!

I will try today Resolutions today, thanks for the advice!

Could you possibly just pay the balance Monday night and wait a week or so for the refund? I would be afraid of losing the cabins, and willing to argue refunds later if necessary.

DH wants to do this, it's not like we can't afford it, but I feel like if we pay it, it will be much harder to get it returned, and I wouldn't want it as ship board credit, we are unlikely to spend anywhere near that onboard. I'm going to call Resolutions today! Hopefully, they're will be a crack staffer on today and I will get it all settled!

[reney313]

I'm sure you were excellent, because your advice here is so helpful, it's too bad you don't work there any longer! Many places are understaffed on weekends and to get help they often need to encourage (force) the newest and least experienced employees into service in the weekends, often with less supervision. That's been my experience its most places, but I'm sure not everyone that works weekends falls into that category, or that every company operates that way!

I will try today Resolutions today, thanks for the advice!

 

Good luck today! I would be stressed too, because we all know it can sometimes only take a minor thing like this to set the stage for some disastrous results.

 

That being said, RE: call center staffing..I know the company I work for we have many of our best on weekends. We pay more for those working a % of their shift outside of M-F 8-5 hours and often those shifts with that pay increase go to the most tenured folks because of the pay. (10-20% shift differential). I'm not sure if that is the same with RCI, but it is common in call center environments.

[Familygoboston]

Called Royal Caribbean, there is no number for resolutions so I called the general number.

Talked to Osay (sp?) who I explained my situation to and asked if I could speak to the resolutions department. He said he could help me. He looked at my reservation and was completely bewildered and offered to transfer me to "Shore Excursions", I held for 20 minutes (I learned all about how relaxing my cruise will be:D) and then it rang, and I was disconnected before anyone answered.

I called back and ticked "4" for Shore Excursions and spoke to Sharon, who could at least see what had happened. She explained that it takes 2-5 days (I paid 6 days ago) for the "cancellation" to take effect and that eventually I will not "owe" this. She also reassured me they would not cancel the cruise!

 

Then Sharon called me back (which was very proactive) and explained that she noticed that the reason that they had a balance was because the system had credited our credit card TWICE for these charges, so in order for RCL to get them back we'd need to PAY THEM the difference. I asked how that happened while my DH was looking up our CC statement. She said it's a problem with their systems communication with one another, sometimes duplication happen. DH found our statement and low and behold they only credited us ONCE for the cancelled excursions (on Jan 23rd) not twice. So I was certainly not going to pay them now! Sharon suggested I wait a few days to see if the duplicate "credit" shows up later and then I can call back and "pay" to make RCL whole again. She again reassured me that we would not have our cruise cancelled.

 

So we wait and watch. If the erroneous duplicate credit shows up on my card, I will call and pay the balance obvioulsy, but if it doesn't show up as duplicate on my credit card, then we get the next exciting chapter...stay tuned!

[Familygoboston]

Good luck today! I would be stressed too, because we all know it can sometimes only take a minor thing like this to set the stage for some disastrous results.

 

That being said, RE: call center staffing..I know the company I work for we have many of our best on weekends. We pay more for those working a % of their shift outside of M-F 8-5 hours and often those shifts with that pay increase go to the most tenured folks because of the pay. (10-20% shift differential). I'm not sure if that is the same with RCI, but it is common in call center environments.

 

Well, That's good to know! Sharon was very helpful and proactive, I find almost everyone from RCL wants to help, but their system is so complicated that they really can't! Of course I didn't expect her to remove these charges...her system is telling her that they doubled credited us, and she can't see that my bill has only one set of credits on it. But not really sure how I can "prove" that I was not credited twice unless I show them my statement, and even then that's easily altered from their pov, right? Actually the very best thing that would make this go away easy would be for the second credit to show up and for me to pay them again. It's the simplest option. Lets see if it works that way.

[cruisnseas]

Oh hell. I was afraid of this. Shore ex cannot help you. They will just be contacting Resolutions.

 

I strongly suggest another call and a demand to talk to Resolutions. And you are right, there is no direct dial into them.

 

Paying it vs. not paying it won't make a difference in regards to getting your credit.

 

Talk to Resolutions directly. If they can't see what is going on demand their supervisor. This can be hard to do since Resolution supervisors aren't really in the business of dealing directly with customers but they can if need be.

[Familygoboston]

So it's worse than we thought, eh, Doc?;)

Thanks again for your help, Cruisinseas, if in the next few days the second set of credited shore excursions and PP doesn't show up on my CC statement, I will have to call. Any suggestions to get to Resolutions? Should I tell them I've already talked with other departments already and they can't solve the problem? Any magic words that work?

As dumb as it seems, if it double credited that would be the easiest way out of this, my fear is that wont happen, it's been 4 days since the first credit showed. My DH sorted the whole statement by the company billing/crediting, and there were no other credits from RCL on any other days, just one big charge for the final payment.

[cruisnseas]

So it's worse than we thought, eh, Doc?;)

Thanks again for your help, Cruisinseas, if in the next few days the second set of credited shore excursions and PP doesn't show up on my CC statement, I will have to call. Any suggestions to get to Resolutions? Should I tell them I've already talked with other departments already and they can't solve the problem? Any magic words that work?

As dumb as it seems, if it double credited that would be the easiest way out of this, my fear is that wont happen, it's been 4 days since the first credit showed. My DH sorted the whole statement by the company billing/crediting, and there were no other credits from RCL on any other days, just one big charge for the final payment.

 

When you call regualr reservations tell them you want to speak to Resolutions, you've already spoken to Shore Excursions and they didn't help. Say you will only accept Resolutions. You do need to give up your booking number. The agent will probably try to help you (it is their job, afterall) be polite but firm. Resolutions. If all else fails, ask for a supervisor since this is...you guessed it!...Resolutions.

[Familygoboston]

Thanks Cruisinseas, I will have to do that because no "double credit" has come through on or CC, they only credited it once and they took the correct amount for the final payment. I won't have time to do that today, so I'm banking on the fact that it's mostly paid and they won't cancel and I'll try to call tomorrow.

Also, It's very odd how in one place they show you the "total package price" including any pre paid shorex's or packages, but obvioulsy one doesn't "owe" that anymore since it was pre paid with ones CC previously.

Keep you posted!

[cruisnseas]

Good luck! Resolutions is a tough but good group. Just always stay calm with them - they don't like hysterics :D - and understand that this won't be a "one call fix" and you'll be fine.

[Familygoboston]

Thanks!~ I always stay calm...I get much further with, "but I don't understand, can you explain to me?" rather than demanding stuff! Plus I recognize this mess is not the problem of the reps, but the IT system. What did my mother always say?, you get more flies with honey.;)

[reney313]

Thanks!~ I always stay calm...I get much further with, "but I don't understand, can you explain to me?" rather than demanding stuff! Plus I recognize this mess is not the problem of the reps, but the IT system. What did my mother always say?, you get more flies with honey.;)

 

Very true. I agree with the other posters..resolutions is the only group that can likely help. I thought someone had a direct # to them, but maybe not.

 

Again, good luck. Someone will be able to figure this out. If they did double credit the shore excursions, they should have showed up at the same time, or at least within a day of each other. I can't imagine it taking this long for the second credit to go through.

[Familygoboston]

So I placed a call to Thomas at 10:20 AM, who politely explained I needed to talk to Resolutions at the CVP (Certified Vacation Planners).

 

He passed me onto Claudia who listened to my problem again and agreed we needed to talk to Resolutions. Claudia put me on hold at 10:30 AM and checked back with me until she got through to Nicole in Resolutions. At 11:15 AM I spoke with Nicole who explained how it was that I was double credited for the cancelled items:

 

She acknowledged this happens "often" when cancelling something at the same time as paying the final payment. It is very difficult for the consumer to "see" what they see on the invoices. Here is what happened. When Jason cancelled my items, they were removed from the total I owed as a final payment immediately. So I paid a final payment that already included a credit for the canceled items. Then Jason put through a credit on my credit card- thereby making it so I had been credited twice and in fact do owe them the additional monies.

 

Of course it is "their error" and according to Nicole it can be avoided by not cancelling anything a few days before or a few days after final payment. She also said that anytime any of us "buy" something online, we should then call the call center and ask them to send a new "Guest Booking Copy" and not rely on the one you can see online (which never looks like the "Guest Booking Copy" they send)

 

So here is my take away...the IT rabbit hole exists, the CS folks have varying knowledge of this particular issue, I think Donna was trying to explain this on Sunday, when she called back, but it still wasn't something I could "see" on the invoice I had. But Resolutions knows about it and can explain it, even though it takes an hour or more on hold, and even though no one at Royal has fixed it (yet). SO the error happens, then they correct it by adding more charges to your account after you've payed final, with no explanation and if you question it they will politely answer your questions and acknowledge it's their error, but that you still owe it.

 

Probably not how they wrote it up in the "How to Run an Efficient Business that Builds Loyalty and Confidence in your Customers" manual, but there it is!!

 

Thanks everyone for your advice...Resolutions was definitely needed!:D

[ZoeyVictoria]

I am glad your problem is solved (or at least explained). This morning I checked my account and found a much simpler but similar issue. I cancelled lunch for two at Gionanni's, at $15 pp or a total of $30. There are two refunds on my RCI Visa this morning; one for $30 and one for $15. Am I going to call them to get them to take back the extra $15? No. Am I going to be irritated when the correction ($15 charge) shows up in a future billing period? Oh, yes. Not because I want to cheat RCI out of $15, but because they ought to be able to do a simple $30 refund correctly the first time.

[cruisnseas]

And trust that they will correct it in the future if caught, Zoey. They have a jenky system but it is next to impossible to change (cost-wise and down-time required).

[Familygoboston]

Good luck, Zoey! I know I had once benefitted from something (very small) that I couldn't explain, and I never said anything because it hardly seemed worth the hour in the phone. Not long after that they made a mistake in their favor. I sailed Oasis and they only credited me for 6 nights, not 7 in C&A. When I called I was told they couldn't fix it and "it doesn't really matter, you have 80 points and are diamond anyway":eek: So I wasn't about to bring up the small item in my favor!

Since then I have a very tenuous relationship with RCL- if it's convenient and cheap for me to sail them, I will, but it's certainly not due to any "loyalty" on my part.

 

I hear what you are saying Cruisin Seas- at this point the lost productivity of them solving all these little problems is less disruptive to THEM than taking the system down to really solve or correct them. And every year the problems compound and in the software more and more little incompatibilities develop. :(