Cruise line air

[grandgeezer]

We are seriously thinking about booking a transatlantic in November which include air from Phoenix. We have never cruised Oceania before so we are looking for some inside info on the air portion. Do they use flights you would book on your own, with good flight times and short durations? We don't want to stuck on a second class air line that flies "red eyes and takes all day to get to your destination. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

[StanandJim]

We are seriously thinking about booking a transatlantic in November which include air from Phoenix. We have never cruised Oceania before so we are looking for some inside info on the air portion. Do they use flights you would book on your own, with good flight times and short durations? We don't want to stuck on a second class air line that flies "red eyes and takes all day to get to your destination. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

 

They use regularly scheduled Airlines, except in cases where chartered flights are more practicable (to Polynesia, for example), and although they do consider flight duration or layover times, their primary consideration is in getting you from home to the ship in plenty of time. Dependent on flight schedules from your area, this may or may not be an easy call.

 

If you can live with the above description, then you will be fine with Oceania Air exactly as it is offered.

 

If however, you would prefer to have more control over your flight options, Oceania offers a Flight Deviation process whereby you would have the option of choosing flights for yourself.

 

This process involves paying a $175 per person fee to Oceania, and then dickering with them as to which flights suite you best. If the flight which you prefer is more costly than the one which Oceania would have used to get you there, then you may need to subsidize the difference in fares, but the good news is that the Deviation Fee does not become nonrefundable until you ACCEPT A ROUTE, so the choice of paying extra charges or not is always in the passengers hands.

 

Hope that this helped, enjoy your planning!

[arima22]

Welcome to CC Oceania! If you use the search function, upper right, you will find many discussions on this topic. Here is one of them:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2125719&highlight=deviation

 

Basically, if you use the air deviation system, pay the $175 fee, you can choose your own date of flight and airline. Sometimes your choice will be included in the Oceania air, sometimes you may have to pay extra. Of course, flight class upgrades are extra, unless there is an Oceania special offer on the specific cruise, and sometimes the airline will not accept your personal upgrade based on the Oceania discount fare.

[m1k2s3]

I don't know if this helps but I'll share my experience. We're booked for a cruise in May 2015 - Venice to Barcelona. We booked it last year. It never occurred to me to consider booking our flights separately until I did some reading here so I was a little anxious about what our flights would ultimately be. I knew we would need to fly out of Toronto and that it would likely be an overnight flight. I just heard this week, we fly Toronto to Philadelphia ( 90 minute layover) then Philadelphia to Venice. On the way back, we have a direct flight from Barcelona to Toronto. So I'm ok with that as even if we got a direct flight from Toronto to Venice it would have been an overnight and about the same flight time (8 1/2 hrs)

 

Having said all that, I checked flights about three weeks ago ( I know, should never do that) and there was a direct flight from Toronto to Venice at a pretty good rate. Although paying the flight deviation fees plus the cost of the flight would probably ended up costing about the same as what we've got.

[sitraveler]

Air Canada is trying to get more of the US business. I flew from Istanbul on my own money and plans with them. I am sailing from Istanbul and Viking booked me with AC too. I'm not surprised you found good rates from Toronto.

You have to check out Oceania's costs vs your own to find out what works out better.

[YoHoHo]

Air Canada is trying to get more of the US business. I flew from Istanbul on my own money and plans with them. I am sailing from Istanbul and Viking booked me with AC too. I'm not surprised you found good rates from Toronto.

You have to check out Oceania's costs vs your own to find out what works out better.

Just with out for A/Cs Rouge.

 

sitraveller has good advice. Simply price it out, with the $350 devîation unless you are okay with taking the risk of flying in on embarkation day (don't know if you're crossing starts in Miami or Barcelona or ? but flying to Europe especially needs to have an extra day).

 

Being as O flies in on the day of, which is not acceptable to most on CC, when I price their cruises I just add the $350 fee to the offered price when considering a cruise.

 

Transoceanic is where O's consolidated pricing is hard to beat. Buy the deviation, pay extra, if any, to get the flights you went, and enjoy the vacation.

 

When you price it out after you get over the sticker shock of the cost booking the transatlantic one way fare you have to consider the savings vs. control of your own booking.

 

Your TA can help you with the air deviation through O. I think it can be a lot of work for them, I know I have spent a lot of my TAs time on that especially compared with a cruise booking where they make their living, but all part of the service.

[DOJO466]

What everyone says here about booking the deviation (added $175 per person) is good info. Flying domestically their air is horrible but if you are going overseas take the deviation, find your own flight choices, contact. Your TA and go from there. I would not let O have free rein booking my flights.

[BenMurphy]

Hi

we sailed trans Atlantic from Portugal into New York on Regatta a couple of years back. Our travel agent found it cheaper for us to book return NY/Manchester and simply not use the return portion (we live in Manchester U.K).

When will the airlines end this madness?

Regards,

Josie

 

BTW we always get our own air fare as Oceania want to route us through London.

[LHT28]

Our travel agent found it cheaper for us to book return NY/Manchester and simply not use the return portion (we live in Manchester U.K).

 

I would be careful offering that advice

you may have been lucky sometimes the airlines will charge for a OW after the fact

If your TA booked this they can be "charged Back" for the difference in fare

 

 

just saying

[Acrusa]

Our last cruise this past January,we booked our own air.JFK to Miami then Lima to JFk.All nonstop.The cost was $706.00 Pp Round trip.Oceania offered us a $600.00 air credit.The flights cost us $103.00pp.

[Honeymooner2006]

We sailed on O's "sister line" Regent in 2011. We had a suite and got the free business class upgrade. LAX to Athens was on KLM, which was nice. Istanbul to LAX was on Air France before their planes were converted to a real business class (there were three in our row instead of two). The KLM flight was awesome. The Air France, not so much. There was one layover each direction. On the way in, it was Amsterdam and on the way out it was Paris.

 

If you want to know which airlines they are using, I'd call them and ask.

Edited March 13, 2015 by Honeymooner2006

[LHT28]

Our last cruise this past January,we booked our own air.JFK to Miami then Lima to JFk.All nonstop.The cost was $706.00 Pp Round trip.Oceania offered us a $600.00 air credit.The flights cost us $103.00pp.

 

A good way to look at it :D

[LHT28]

We sailed on O's "sister line" Regent in 2011. We had a suite and got the free business class upgrade. LAX to Athens was on KLM, which was nice. Istanbul to LAX was on Air France before their planes were converted to a real business class (there were three in our row instead of two). The KLM flight was awesome. The Air France, not so much. There was one layover each direction. On the way in, it was Amsterdam and on the way out it was Paris.

 

If you want to know which airlines they are using, I'd call them and ask.

 

Unlikely they are going to tell you what airline you will be on unless you pay the deviation fee

 

Regent is NOT Oceania

[Honeymooner2006]

Unlikely they are going to tell you what airline you will be on unless you pay the deviation fee

 

Regent is NOT Oceania

 

They are not the same but I am nearly 100% positive that the same home office staff works both lines. (The person who made our O reservation had an RSSC e-mail address.) Besides, if they can get a better discount from the airlines by combining their bookings, why wouldn't they? It's all about the margins.

 

Although it might be unlikely that they will tell you which airlines they will use without paying the deviation fee, it can't hurt to spend five minutes to call and find out for sure whether they will or won't. I have never tried. Have you? If so, what was your experience?

[LHT28]

They are not the same but I am nearly 100% positive that the same home office staff works both lines. (The person who made our O reservation had an RSSC e-mail address.) Besides, if they can get a better discount from the airlines by combining their bookings, why wouldn't they? It's all about the margins.

 

Although it might be unlikely that they will tell you which airlines they will use without paying the deviation fee, it can't hurt to spend five minutes to call and find out for sure whether they will or won't. I have never tried. Have you? If so, what was your experience?

 

I did not say they did not share resources but I do not believe they are going to give you the airline routing for your cruise

They may say they have contracts with UA, AA, BA AF, KLM but will not tell you what one you will be getting

 

YMMV

Edited March 13, 2015 by LHT28

[Honeymooner2006]

I did not say they did not share resources but I do not believe they are going to give you the airline routing for your cruise

They may say they have contracts with UA, AA, BA AF, KLM but will not tell you what one you will be getting

 

YMMV

 

OIC. We are talking around each other. I said "If you want to know which *airlines* they are using, I'd call them and ask."

 

I never said specific routes. The OP was asking about the kinds of airlines they use (among other things like flight length). This is part of the sales process and the airlines they frequently use is something I'm sure they would share as a result.

 

Anyway, it looks like we agree on this after all, whether you want to or not.

[zoncom]

My cabin mate and I are on Shanghai-LA in April. She is from Boise;I am from Aspen. They had a terrible flight plan for her so she booked her own air. I requested Singapore Air 6 mos. out. They never followed up and it was either SINs toilet seat or UA. Took UA. She saved $400 by doing her own flights. I saved $400 by using Os air. So do your research cause you never can tell.