33 days out- is it normal?

[cruz chic]

I guess my thought is, if these upgrades and freebies are really happening- and people post on here all the time they do- it would seem it would happen to us or someone we at least know personally at some point, but it hasn't.. It's like buying a lottery ticket, you by what you can afford and hope you win big!

 

Didn't mean to prick any feathers..............I guess I will just go back to reading posts instead of trying to ask intelligent questions.

 

Don't stop posting. There is always someone that is going to take offence no matter what.

[VTcruisenut]

Don't stop posting. There is always someone that is going to take offence no matter what.

thank you, but in all honesty, I joined Cruisecritic for all the great information shared. I guess I thought it would be OK to post some of my own questions. but I have been ridiculed (sp) or snarked at 3 times in the past week. Not so warm and fuzzy feeling anymore.................

[Friend100]

thank you, but in all honesty, I joined Cruisecritic for all the great information shared. I guess I thought it would be OK to post some of my own questions. but I have been ridiculed (sp) or snarked at 3 times in the past week. Not so warm and fuzzy feeling anymore.................

 

HAL cruisers are among the most sophisticated cruisers across all main cruiselines. And those selected ones that are serious posters on this board they are the most sophisticated among the sophisticated with lots of experience and lots of time to share their unlimited knowledge and opinion. :)

[VTcruisenut]

HAL cruisers are among the most sophisticated cruisers across all main cruiselines. And those selected ones that are serious posters on this board they are the most sophisticated among the sophisticated with lots of experience and lots of time to share their unlimited knowledge and opinion. :)

 

people don't have to be sophisticated to be kind and considerate. That is common courtesy and manners. I was brought up with "if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all" We all may not have hundreds of cruise days racked up and money to burn, we just want to ask questions that come up without being sniped at. Life is too short for negativity. Maybe I am sailing on the wrong cruise line.........................:eek:

[jbd2003]

Just looked at our cruise again- March 15th on Eurodam, Eastern Caribbean and it seems that there are plenty of cabins still available. I have noticed that the Roll Call for this cruise is pretty slow- is this normal that there are so many cabins available on a cruise that is 30-35 days out? What are the chances of being offered and upgrade if the ship is not full? This will be our 5th cruise on HAL and have never received a substantial upgrade or any OBC, so I am quite envious of those that do get them! Thank you for sharing your info!

I received a secret sale mailing from HAL and the cruise we are booked on Mar.7 was $200 lower on our suite. I called TA and had a choice of upgrading from a SY to a SS which I'm not sure its that much better, or $100 future cruise or $200 OBC. We were in a handicap at the very front of the ship which I was leary of because I do get seasick and now we are in the middle of the ship which I am happier with. Did we make the right choice from SY to SS or is there any difference?:confused:

[antique sailor]

AHOY SHIPMATES

 

My guess is that upgrades are distributed in one of the following fashions:

 

1) The guy who does this is named GARY. So, first, he upgrades everyone named GARY. His wife is named JEANNE, so, next, all the JEANNE'S get upgraded...and so on...

 

2) They put all of the booking numbers on dog biscuits and scatter them around the room...then they unleash several Maltese puppies and whichever biscuits they go to first get the upgrades.

 

3) They bring all of the bookings to Madame Olga's Psychic Readings on PORT Street in SEATTLE and she summons the spirit of the Captain of the Titanic and he tells her who the upgrades should go to.

 

4) The HAL JANITOR in charge of Marketing brings the list of bookings home and his 5 year old daughter goes "Eeny...Meeny...Miney...Mo" until all the upgrades AND upsell targets have been picked...

 

Yeah,........ I'm absolutely sure it's one of those .methods..........................IF Daughter is on a date....

..I have it on good authority that they use turtles. They put the cabin numbers on the backs of the turtles, then run races. Those turtles who cross the finish line get the cabins upgraded. That's why it sometimes takes so long to find out if you have an upgrade...some turtles are really slow.

 

Press 1 for a n explanation in DUTCH

[cruz chic]

thank you, but in all honesty, I joined Cruisecritic for all the great information shared. I guess I thought it would be OK to post some of my own questions. but I have been ridiculed (sp) or snarked at 3 times in the past week. Not so warm and fuzzy feeling anymore.................

 

Join the club:D. There are some folks that just like to criticize anything I say. When I return the favour I get called out again. You are not the only one. There is lots of great info here but sometimes it gets a bit tiresome.

Edited February 8, 2015 by cruz chic

[cruz chic]

AHOY SHIPMATES

 

My guess is that upgrades are distributed in one of the following fashions:

 

1) The guy who does this is named GARY. So, first, he upgrades everyone named GARY. His wife is named JEANNE, so, next, all the JEANNE'S get upgraded...and so on...

 

2) They put all of the booking numbers on dog biscuits and scatter them around the room...then they unleash several Maltese puppies and whichever biscuits they go to first get the upgrades.

 

3) They bring all of the bookings to Madame Olga's Psychic Readings on PORT Street in SEATTLE and she summons the spirit of the Captain of the Titanic and he tells her who the upgrades should go to.

 

4) The HAL JANITOR in charge of Marketing brings the list of bookings home and his 5 year old daughter goes "Eeny...Meeny...Miney...Mo" until all the upgrades AND upsell targets have been picked...

 

Yeah,........ I'm absolutely sure it's one of those .methods..........................IF Daughter is on a date....

..I have it on good authority that they use turtles. They put the cabin numbers on the backs of the turtles, then run races. Those turtles who cross the finish line get the cabins upgraded. That's why it sometimes takes so long to find out if you have an upgrade...some turtles are really slow.

 

Press 1 for a n explanation in DUTCH

 

This is the most plausible explanation I've heard to date:D.

[bobbisailsolo]

I see nothing wrong with booking a guarantee, and if they want to move me from the aft to the mid section of the ship... why not? but I really dont care where i am so its worth just booking the guarantee. Ive never been moved from an inside to an outside, or a outside to a balcony. Being retired and single, I try to get the most for my money. I would love to be able to afford a suite, but its out of the question for me.

[IRL_Joanie]

AHOY SHIPMATES

 

My guess is that upgrades are distributed in one of the following fashions:

 

1) The guy who does this is named GARY. So, first, he upgrades everyone named GARY. His wife is named JEANNE, so, next, all the JEANNE'S get upgraded...and so on...

 

2) They put all of the booking numbers on dog biscuits and scatter them around the room...then they unleash several Maltese puppies and whichever biscuits they go to first get the upgrades.

 

3) They bring all of the bookings to Madame Olga's Psychic Readings on PORT Street in SEATTLE and she summons the spirit of the Captain of the Titanic and he tells her who the upgrades should go to.

 

4) The HAL JANITOR in charge of Marketing brings the list of bookings home and his 5 year old daughter goes "Eeny...Meeny...Miney...Mo" until all the upgrades AND upsell targets have been picked...

 

Yeah,........ I'm absolutely sure it's one of those .methods..........................IF Daughter is on a date....

..I have it on good authority that they use turtles. They put the cabin numbers on the backs of the turtles, then run races. Those turtles who cross the finish line get the cabins upgraded. That's why it sometimes takes so long to find out if you have an upgrade...some turtles are really slow.

 

Press 1 for a n explanation in DUTCH

 

 

Joanie

[two4me]

We always book guarantee. Always a surprise what room we get.

Adds to the cruise experience, for us anyways.:D

[aliaschief]

If you want an upgrade or upsell offer it behooves one to have your TA or Hal Rep know that you want to be placed on upgrade/upsell list for consideration.

Edited February 9, 2015 by aliaschief

[PathfinderEss]

I guess my thought is, if these upgrades and freebies are really happening- and people post on here all the time they do- it would seem it would happen to us or someone we at least know personally at some point, but it hasn't.. It's like buying a lottery ticket, you by what you can afford and hope you win big!

 

Didn't mean to prick any feathers..............I guess I will just go back to reading posts instead of trying to ask intelligent questions.

 

Nothing wrong with your question, but I will say out of over 40 some cruises we have maybe gotten 2 at the most upgrade or up sell offers and our friends that cruise have not gotten many upgrade offers either. It may seem that lots of CCer's have gotten offers but in actuality they are far and few apart. I do wish you luck in your endeavors to get an upgrade offer.

[cruz chic]

Nothing wrong with your question, but I will say out of over 40 some cruises we have maybe gotten 2 at the most upgrade or up sell offers and our friends that cruise have not gotten many upgrade offers either. It may seem that lots of CCer's have gotten offers but in actuality they are far and few apart. I do wish you luck in your endeavors to get an upgrade offer.

 

Upgrades are much more common when you book a guarantee. I've been upgraded on most of my cruises. Usually that means within the same category. Since I've started booking with Hal, I regularly see upsells. I used to rarely see them when I booked thru a ta.

[iancal]

We usually book inside the final payment window, always a verandah, and often a gty.

 

Two years ago we booked a Carnival Caribbean cruise seven days from sailing-guarantee balcony. TA told us that there were only two balcony cabins showing available. We assumed that we would get one of them.

 

Did not happen,. Three days later we got our assignment. It was a primo balcony cabin-highest category and, in our opinion, the best location. This has happened to us on Celebrity a number of times when we were assigned extended balcony cabins. We had a similar experience this past October on an RCI cruise.

Good results on HAL as well.

 

Never been able to figure it out and we no longer even bother trying. We are just very happy to get a verandah cabin on a good ship at a great price. We are trying to do this now for a March cruise in Australia/NZ/SE Asia. No luck so far. We have never had a real upgrade, ie from a verandah to suite but we attribute this to booking inside the final payment window.

Edited February 9, 2015 by iancal

[PathfinderEss]

Upgrades are much more common when you book a guarantee. I've been upgraded on most of my cruises. Usually that means within the same category. Since I've started booking with Hal, I regularly see upsells. I used to rarely see them when I booked thru a ta.

 

You might be right as I have never booked thru a PCC, always use a TA.

[galensgrl]

If you want an upgrade or upsell offer it behooves one to have your TA or Hal Rep know that you want to be placed on upgrade/upsell list for consideration.

 

This is true! When we booked our HAL aft cabin almost a year ago, through HAL directly, there was an option to click if we were open to getting an upgrade. I chose "Yes" until my husband let me know he wanted the aft cabin we booked and not another one elsewhere on the ship. I actually called HAL the next day to make sure we aren't offered an upgrade, why should they waste time contacting us when there are others that would love to have an upgrade if possible?

 

Lorie

[VTcruisenut]

Well I called HAL two days ago to ask some questions and was told that as of the 9th - there were still "plenty of cabins in every category available for the March 15th sailing" and that we would receive our guarantee cabin assignment approximately 7 days before sailing. I asked about the pricing going down on the cruise before and after ours, and was told that the prices change, but that if our price did go down, I could call in and request on OBC for the difference in cost. FYI

[InTheWASide]

Stated policy is that you will have your assignment between "0-7 days prior to departure" so yes... very normal at 33 days out.

[HokiePoq]

You are much more likely to get an upgrade if you have a guarantee reservation. We have gotten upgrades on all 9 of our GTY bookings and only one upsell offer on the 8 chosen cabins.

 

 

Glad to hear this...had forgotten we'd gotten an upgrade on a HAL guarantee on the one cruise we've ever had to cancel (auto accident). Only guarantee, only upgrade. We have a guarantee on our upcoming HAL cruise so I can hope! Upgrade fairy has never called us on any line we've booked. I often wonder if that's because we've used online TAs who might not pass along the offers if and when they get them.