"Guaranteed" Balcony rate- Your experience with what they selected for you

[SailBreakaway]

Hey guys. Booking yet another cruise on the a breakaway, however this time we were thinking of rolling the dice with the "Guaranteed" balcony rate, the one where it's cheaper by a little bit but they pick the balcony two nights prior to sailing. You can either get one with a balcony that looks at a wall, or get a leftover primo room.

 

Quite simply, what's been your experience with this? What kind of room have they chosen for you? If I know the odds ahead of time it will help me decide whether I roll or not. I'll leave the blind and random luck for the slot machine on board!

 

Thanks!!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[kismet618]

I have only done "GTY" once, for our upcoming Escape cruise. I gave up our BA Balcony, for an MB GTY. I figured worse case scenario would be a mid-ship mini-suite. That's exactly what we got: mid-ship mini-suite 12202. Couldn't be happier. Good Luck

[valleyvillage]

One experience, ended up with room right by the anchor-dropping mechanism. THAT will get your attention!

If you upgrade yourself, as did the previous poster, you are going to get something better than your balcony. If you go with GTY in the same category, you are saying, in effect, I will accept the WORST room in this category.

I have read of amazing upgrades thru GTY, don't have any proof, but in general, you are, as you say, rolling the dice. Look at the deck plans, find the absolute worst room and ask yourself, if I get that, will it be ok?

Then, if you should beat the odds, terrific!

[gpb11]

The usual advice for a guarantee room remains the same as always: Look at all the possible rooms they might assign you and decide if you're willing to pay the non-GTY rate to guarantee you don't get that room.

 

We did a GTY balcony on our Star sailing last week. Ended up with a B3 and we were very happy with the room.

[GORDONCHICK]

We upgraded a few months before our sailing. We'd been in an inside, but we thought for AK, any balcony would be great. We were assigned a balcony right by the elevators. The only down side was that if the door to our cabin was open, anyone standing at the elevators could see into our room. It was worth the money, and we'd do it again for that cruise but probably not for the Caribbean.

 

The icing on the cake was that we also got UDP with the balcony, so it was like winning a couple hundred $$ at the slot machines.

Edited October 26, 2015 by GORDONCHICK

[cot427]

The only time I did a GTY was on the Breakaway 2-night CTN earlier this year. Would I do it again? No. But was it worth it for only 2 nights. Yes.

 

I was assigned a cabin very far forward. Combined with rough seas, I felt the ship the entire 2 night cruise. Granted, I could feel the ship in other public areas slightly for the cruise as well, but it was way too far forward for me.

 

Like others said, if you're okay with absolutely anywhere and the price difference is great, go for it.

[AZ ParrotHead]

Quite simply, what's been your experience with this? What kind of room have they chosen for you?

 

Booked 2 GTYs on the Getaway for Nov 29. Ended up with Midship cabins on Deck 8 near the Waterfront. We are ok with the location (for my parents' cabins)

 

Ended up moving our cabin up to a MS GTY. We were assigned 11282 (highest "regular" mini-suite. A much better choice for us (we like quiet).

[trish1c]

We haven't sailed Breakaway. Every time we have done a balcony gty we got one of the obstructed view balconies, that have metal sides. We don't mind the obstructions. Some people hate them. I did not like being that far forward (6 cabins from the very front) sailing home to NY in rough seas because the bow really bounced around. :(

 

We did a minisuite gty this past January on Epic & got an awesome cabin.

 

We did an OV gty on our last trip on the Gem & got a handicapped cabin which I hated because the roll in nature of the bathroom also allowed all of the shower water to flow out of the bathroom door & soak the carpet in the cabin. The thought of how much mold must be under there really grossed me out.

[pnm655]

We typically book a gty room. It helps if the ship is close to sailing because there are fewer rooms left so you can get a better idea of what you might get. In September we booked a gty obstructed oceanview on Tuesday for a Friday departure.

 

You must be flexible with rooms because you are stuck with what you get assigned. If you have specific preferences a gty might not work for you.

 

The best deal we ever got was we booked a gty inside on the 10 day Canada and got a family balcony. That was in 2010 with a different CEO.

Edited October 26, 2015 by pnm655

[Criticname]

I've booked more GTY cabins then i have picked my own cabin.

 

At least 3 of the times we have gone from an interior guarantee to a balcony, once even a mini suite.

 

I've never had a bad cabin yet so for me I'll keep going this route

[PATRLR]

We did a guarantee balcony on Dawn this past August. We got a mid ship mini suite.

 

FWIW, I thought they had two classes of guarantee balcony - one that could be obstructed view and one that would not be obstructed. We chose the latter because an obstructed balcony would defeat the purpose, in our opinion.

[gpb11]

I wonder if it may depend on the ship. As best I could tell there were no "obstructed" balconies on the Star, but some of them are "cove" balconies. We did a BX that showed up a obstructed GTY but ended up with a B3 non-cove balcony on deck 9.

[jmsnyc]

What does B3 mean on the Getaway, its a family balcony, got 12750 - seems ok location, deck 1/4 towards front, near passageway but not elevators, looks like cabins above

Edited March 1, 2016 by jmsnyc

[SuiteCruisin14]

We only did a GTY cabin once on a 4 day cruise. Ended up in a regular balcony and everything was fine. At first we did not like the balcony because it was contained and only had a front clear panel. Turned out, the rain we had made the cover useful.

As others have said, be sure you are willing to take the worst cabin and be happy with it.

 

Lynda