Cruise Charter Questions

[travelplus]

Lets say you book a cruise in good faith and booked non-refundable airline tickets and hotels that cannot be cancelled and the cruise line charters the cruise with little warning would Royal be responsible for refunding all your money or paying you to fly to a comparable cruise and cover everything?

 

Can you take the Charter company to court over lost charges. I mean an airline could swap a plane, a hotel can move you. Could Royal just substitute another ship doing the same itinerary?

 

What recourse does one have? I've read about companies chartering cruises but when they displace the customers who have booked who would you go after if everything was booked with your credit card. Hotwire is strict about canceling hotels and Consolidator Tickets cannot be canceled. Could Royal force these companies to cancel or could you go after your credit card company and show them that your cruise was canceled for a charter against your will.

 

How would you be able to be switched to another cruise without forking over another cent?

 

Thanks

[avazah]

This sounds like a perfect reason to book travel insurance.

[Clarea]

Lets say you book a cruise in good faith and booked non-refundable airline tickets and hotels that cannot be cancelled and the cruise line charters the cruise with little warning would Royal be responsible for refunding all your money or paying you to fly to a comparable cruise and cover everything?

 

Can you take the Charter company to court over lost charges. I mean an airline could swap a plane, a hotel can move you. Could Royal just substitute another ship doing the same itinerary?

 

What recourse does one have? I've read about companies chartering cruises but when they displace the customers who have booked who would you go after if everything was booked with your credit card. Hotwire is strict about canceling hotels and Consolidator Tickets cannot be canceled. Could Royal force these companies to cancel or could you go after your credit card company and show them that your cruise was canceled for a charter against your will.

 

How would you be able to be switched to another cruise without forking over another cent?

 

Thanks

Royal is only responsible for refunding funds you spent with them. However, I've read that in many of these types of situations, they have provided some money to cover changes to non-Royal travel arrangements.

[Paulxyz2004]

Lets say you book a cruise in good faith and booked non-refundable airline tickets and hotels that cannot be cancelled and the cruise line charters the cruise with little warning would Royal be responsible for refunding all your money or paying you to fly to a comparable cruise and cover everything? No they wouldn´t. Ij you have just booked a cruise with them, that´s what they will cover. They might give you some amount of comensation as a gesture of Goodwill.

 

Can you take the Charter company to court over lost charges. ROFL, I highly doubt it, as you have no contractual relation to the charter Company at all. The charter Company has nothing to do with the cruiselines Clients and have no Business to care about other than their contract with the cruiseline. I mean an airline could swap a plane, a hotel can move you. Could Royal just substitute another ship doing the same itinerary? In theory they could, practically they just don´t have empty ships Floating around for this and even if they had they´d Need Docking space in the ports.

 

What recourse does one have? Not much. I've read about companies chartering cruises but when they displace the customers who have booked who would you go after if everything was booked with your credit card. The only place for you to go is the place you have a contract with - the cruiseline. Hotwire is strict about canceling hotels and Consolidator Tickets cannot be canceled. Could Royal force these companies to cancel Nope, your bookings with These companies are non-related to your cruise or could you go after your credit card company and show them that your cruise was canceled for a charter against your will. What should your Credit Card Company do? This is not any Kind of fraud. You booked different things with your credit Card and one of the items (the cruise) was cancelled and refunded - end of Story for them. It´s the risk you take booking as a package with non-refundable parts.

 

How would you be able to be switched to another cruise without forking over another cent?

 

Thanks

 

It all depends on how much compensation for your inconvenience the cruiseline is willing to pay you and how flexible you are in re-booking another trip, which of course includes availability of alternative Options. It´s probably doable, but by far not guaranteed.

[wwcruisers]

OP, I agree with what others have said.

-- If you have a TA, let them help you;

-- If not, contact the various providers, to see what they can do for you;

-- Read the fine print in your trip insurance policy to see what it covers (hopefully you do have trip insurance).

 

But, if you are seeking legal advice (and it sounds like you are), you need to consult an attorney, who specializes in this type of law. If you come to a travel and leisure chat room seeking legal free advice, you are likely to get it -- and it will be worth every penny you paid! :rolleyes:

[LizzieandLuke]

I was scheduled on the Disney Dream the end of August 2014 for 4 days. We were going to go on the Dream for 4 and WDW for 4. Disney Chartered our cruise and I found out on the Boards:eek: a few weeks ago. I booked the cruise when the initial bookings were released and had a great rate.

 

I wanted to cruise the week earlier. I have 2 kids in school - 1 who just can't miss school and a hubby who can't take off in Sept. Disney was going to charge the full summer rate which was $800 more (only 7 if you count the generous on board credit). I complained to anyone who listen. I wrote letters, emails everything to no avail. I did book through a travel agent who is also a close friend and they to did everything they could.

 

We are now planning on going on the Freedom the same week. The cruise is more expensive because its 7 days but everything comes out cheaper since I won't pay for the park. I think it may have even worked out for the best and am getting very excited for our cruise, but my blood still boils when I think about the way Disney treated us.

 

The whole chartering the cruise thing stinks. They should hold a cruise to charter and then make it available to the public if the charter falls through - not the other way around. The cruise industry is selling the same product 2x. I think that is morally wrong.

[Merion_Mom]

Lets say you book a cruise in good faith and booked non-refundable airline tickets and hotels that cannot be cancelled and the cruise line charters the cruise with little warning would Royal be responsible for refunding all your money or paying you to fly to a comparable cruise and cover everything?

 

Can you take the Charter company to court over lost charges. I mean an airline could swap a plane, a hotel can move you. Could Royal just substitute another ship doing the same itinerary?

 

What recourse does one have? I've read about companies chartering cruises but when they displace the customers who have booked who would you go after if everything was booked with your credit card. Hotwire is strict about canceling hotels and Consolidator Tickets cannot be canceled. Could Royal force these companies to cancel or could you go after your credit card company and show them that your cruise was canceled for a charter against your will.

 

How would you be able to be switched to another cruise without forking over another cent?

 

Thanks

 

Has this actually happened to you, or is this just a hypothetical question?

[Daghis]

Royal is only responsible for refunding funds you spent with them. However, I've read that in many of these types of situations, they have provided some money to cover changes to non-Royal travel arrangements.

Bob is right, but it looks like it may actually be worse. If you look at the "Cruise/Cruisetour Ticket Contract" it says:

6. CANCELLATION, DEVIATION OR SUBSTITUTION BY CARRIER:

a) Carrier may for any reason at any time and without prior notice, cancel, advance, postpone or deviate from any scheduled sailing, port of call, destination, lodging or any activity on or off the Vessel, or substitute another vessel or port of call, destination, lodging or activity. Carrier shall not be liable for any claim whatsoever by Passenger, including but not limited to loss, compensation or refund, by reason of such cancellation, advancement, postponement, substitution or deviation.

If I'm reading this right, they reserve the right to cancel the cruise and not refund your money. That'd be a very poor business decision and I'm positive that they wouldn't do that, but that's what it says in the fine print.

[wwcruisers]

The whole chartering the cruise thing stinks. They should hold a cruise to charter and then make it available to the public if the charter falls through - not the other way around. The cruise industry is selling the same product 2x. I think that is morally wrong.

 

I totally agree -- but, realistically speaking, you can lose your cruise to any number of changes, this far out. :(

 

Several years ago, we booked Serenade of the Seas, with a group of friends. We're scattered all over the US and Canada, and only a couple of us are retired. So, we had picked our cruise date over a year in advance, and had secured vacation days, etc.. About a month later, I was watching for price drops, when suddenly our cruise appeared with "NA"'s across the board! :eek:

 

We called (and called and called) the RC booking reps, as well as the C&A desk, trying to get answers. All they would tell us was that the booking process had been temporarily halted, "for inventory control purposes". After two weeks of this nonsense, they finally admitted that the cruise was being canceled, for a last-minute dry dock. RC was in the process of retrofitting its Radiance Class ships with fuel-efficient auxiliary engines.

 

They did give us a small amount of OBC, but it didn't come close to compensating us for all the aggravation our group went through to change our plans and find another date. We ended up booking the same ship, three weeks later (immediately after dry-dock). Oh, and -- surprise, surprise, the rates were higher for that cruise. :rolleyes:

[travelplus]

This is just a hypothetical question. The reason I'm asking this is I have read about the cruiselines chartering their boats and was wondering what recourse do people have.

 

In my opinion we as customers should not be forced to purchase our airline fares with the cruiseline. You can find better deals shopping around. Again its not our fault that the cruiseline decided to cancel our cruise for a charter. Now I can see an act of god canceling it for safety reasons fine my safety is important.

 

Second I believe a cruise line should have reserve cruise ships just for charters. There should be some law in place stating that a charter can only be booked from the outset and not once it has been sold to the general public.

 

In fact I think there should be a cruise line that is just for charters with the features they are looking for.

 

On an airplane they do not cancel a flight so a sports team can fly. They book them on a plane that is not flying.

 

There should be a rule for consolidators that they have to refund the ticket with proof that the transportation going from Point-B-C has been cancelled due to a charter. Its not an act of God its' an act of a cruiseline cancelling a cruise so rich people can go on their own boat leaving those that have worked so hard to save up for the cruise and took time off from work to do so.

 

I think Chris Elliott and Alexandar Anolik both in travel law would agree that the cruiseline must cough up any additional expenses or offer a full refund with travel insurance or not. Credit cards secure your payment so they should be able to refund you the money as some premium cards offer it as part of the booking. Whats' the point of paying with a credit card and then paying more to insure that? I thought that is the entire reason to book with a credit card so that if the cruise is cancelled you can go and get a refund as the service was not provided. You could prove with a letter from your employer that these are the only dates you have off and this cruise was the one that met your needs. I think the FDIC should require that all credit cards offer Travel Insurance free of charge to their cardholders and anyone who is booked on the same card.

I appreciate reading your comments and I agree with you how disappointing it is to learn that your cruise was chartered after you planned and booked the cruise.

[Merion_Mom]

This is ridiculous on so many levels. :rolleyes:

[hellsop]

This is just a hypothetical question. The reason I'm asking this is I have read about the cruiselines chartering their boats and was wondering what recourse do people have.

 

In my opinion we as customers should not be forced to purchase our airline fares with the cruiseline. You can find better deals shopping around. Again its not our fault that the cruiseline decided to cancel our cruise for a charter. Now I can see an act of god canceling it for safety reasons fine my safety is important.

 

You've got lots of other options: You could simply not book airfare until much closer to the date of travel. I've never heard of a cruise line chartering after final payment date, and that's months out from the point at which you'll be actually traveling. And part of why ChoiceAir isn't the best fare out there is that the CruiseLine (or rather their insurers) are assuming the risk instead of you.

 

Second I believe a cruise line should have reserve cruise ships just for charters. There should be some law in place stating that a charter can only be booked from the outset and not once it has been sold to the general public.

 

In fact I think there should be a cruise line that is just for charters with the features they are looking for.

 

That's not going to happen. What should they do with them when they're not being use for charters? Sell you cruises on them? How's that different from now?

 

On an airplane they do not cancel a flight so a sports team can fly. They book them on a plane that is not flying.

 

You think not? I've had flights cancelled out from underneath me, for mysterious, untraceable reasons, weeks ahead of the time the flight would actually leave. I've frequently had flights change times by a small amount of time forward or back, an hour or two mostly, or what was a non-stop flight become a longer one-stop flight on the same plane elsewhere, and I could be easily convinced those were changes made to accommodate other planes being used for charters or a leg added to a normal route for some one-flight transportation.

[Mark_K]

This is ridiculous on so many levels. :rolleyes:

I agree.

 

 

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