IrieBajan54 Posted December 1, 2016 #26 Share Posted December 1, 2016 The risk (and its confirmed with the December offers) is they will take away the things that can save those of us that don't drink heavily any real money. They took away the free gratuities which would be something we would interested in and added something we would never use. Here's what they are offering now; 1) Family and Friends free-With only two of us traveling completely worthless 2) Unlimited Booze-The daily gratuity at 18% is more than if we purchased what we would normally drink, again completely useless 3) 3 or 4 specialty dining meals-We don't eat in them, we already paid for our meals in the MDR and paid the gratuities with the DSC and yet me paying 18% gratuities is a free offer?, again, still a worthless offer for me 4) Free Wi-Fi-Completely worthless, I vacation to get away from all that crap 5) $50 per port excursion credit-NCL excursions are twice the price you could get it on your own if you were inclined, somehow $50 towards a $100-$200 "cheap" excursion is costing more than its worth especially when most NCL excursions are close to $100 or more per person. Now, if you go in for this stuff great, it will benefit a lot of cruisers, just not my class of traveler. Overall, I couldn't agree more. As a solo, a guarantee cabin is always $200 and up cheaper than a similar SO-CALLED "free" choice cabin.... and because alcohol is very low on the totem pole, I go with the savings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dexddd Posted December 2, 2016 #27 Share Posted December 2, 2016 Apparently NCL IT Dept declared their site multi-language day. When going into look at prices, the promos show in French, English, and German (e.g. excursions in French, UDP in German, others in English). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckyinpa Posted December 2, 2016 #28 Share Posted December 2, 2016 Apparently NCL IT Dept declared their site multi-language day. When going into look at prices, the promos show in French, English, and German (e.g. excursions in French, UDP in German, others in English). i enjoyed trying to learn another language Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilsh75 Posted December 2, 2016 Author #29 Share Posted December 2, 2016 I did book on Nov30. It saved me 360$ compared to today .2 people grads and 100$ obc for holiday cruise . It's great to have insights Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare mking8288 Posted December 2, 2016 #30 Share Posted December 2, 2016 Great - that a real $360 savings in accounting. Yulp - the "tips" here on CC are typically fairly reliable and to be counted upon, especially about upcoming promo's - when it doubt, book on the 30th or 31st. and cancel if needed on the 1st. As for that multi-lingual display, Euro bookings (at least UK) have different terms & rules - no ?? I.T. must be half awake or did someone hack their sites, LOL :D or new marketing strategy (... JK) Oh mine, there are some crazy last minute prices for the month of December, including holiday sailings - airfares to get to some of the ports with these specials might cost more ... load up the minivan/suv and do the drive/park being an option for some. i.e. 8 nights down in the Caribs - GTY Balcony for 2, taxes & fees - no frills like "free" specialty dining or beverages, etc. - add daily service charges ... coming out to be less than $1,100 - and, apply one or two CruiseNext Certificate (which NCL should allow) if you have them/transfer/get them at a discount from someone selling ... save another $125 or $250. Stockholders might/should be able to request or get OBC ($100, I think ... don't "own") if there's time to get it processed - now, that's almost a steal. Not exactly what FDR was/is hoping for - especially for the slower winter season & the foreign currency exchange rates lately - but, these deals will help fill the ships to sail at/above capacity. Bermuda prices for next Spring is looking fairly "reasonable" at this point (what a surprise ...) but - the deal last month would've been better with the free gratuities. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dexddd Posted December 2, 2016 #31 Share Posted December 2, 2016 Great - that a real $360 savings in accounting. Yulp - the "tips" here on CC are typically fairly reliable and to be counted upon, especially about upcoming promo's - when it doubt, book on the 30th or 31st. and cancel if needed on the 1st. As for that multi-lingual display, Euro bookings (at least UK) have different terms & rules - no ?? I.T. must be half awake or did someone hack their sites, LOL :D or new marketing strategy (... JK) Oh mine, there are some crazy last minute prices for the month of December, including holiday sailings - airfares to get to some of the ports with these specials might cost more ... load up the minivan/suv and do the drive/park being an option for some. i.e. 8 nights down in the Caribs - GTY Balcony for 2, taxes & fees - no frills like "free" specialty dining or beverages, etc. - add daily service charges ... coming out to be less than $1,100 - and, apply one or two CruiseNext Certificate (which NCL should allow) if you have them/transfer/get them at a discount from someone selling ... save another $125 or $250. Stockholders might/should be able to request or get OBC ($100, I think ... don't "own") if there's time to get it processed - now, that's almost a steal. Not exactly what FDR was/is hoping for - especially for the slower winter season & the foreign currency exchange rates lately - but, these deals will help fill the ships to sail at/above capacity. Bermuda prices for next Spring is looking fairly "reasonable" at this point (what a surprise ...) but - the deal last month would've been better with the free gratuities. Our 8 day trip from San Juan to NYC has insides today at $199, balconies with a perk for either $349 or $379. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare mking8288 Posted December 2, 2016 #32 Share Posted December 2, 2016 Our 8 day trip from San Juan to NYC has insides today at $199, balconies with a perk for either $349 or $379. I saw that, another NCL email popped up a short while ago from PCC - even for the Holidays, as low as $59 daily out of NY - wow. Choice of Sailaway with no frills for GTY cabins or select the "Freebies" with higher rates for the same categories ... just need to do some online work to smartly compare prices. Are you thinking of doing one, extending it :D - LOL. Regardless, all pack & ready to go - have a great & safe one and based on the weather forecast now, promised - no winter blizzard in NYC as disembarkation welcome. One of my BIL/SIL & friends are onboard BA now doing 14 days, spoke to him on Tuesday while they docked in Old San Juan - joking about staying onboard with the deals, going to look into getting/using 2 CruiseRewards to bring the costs down lower more, ha ha. We are out of vacation time for 2016 & just made plans for New Year's Day Brunch, woohoo. Frank must be on vacation these days and/or doing all he/they can as Q4 is now less than 30 days out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckyinpa Posted December 2, 2016 #33 Share Posted December 2, 2016 I saw that, another NCL email popped up a short while ago from PCC - even for the Holidays, as low as $59 daily out of NY - wow. Choice of Sailaway with no frills for GTY cabins or select the "Freebies" with higher rates for the same categories ... just need to do some online work to smartly compare prices. . how do you get on that mailing list for 59 bucks. i have to admit, i hate the idea of GTY but for 59 a nite, i would deal with it to be back on the BA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare mking8288 Posted December 2, 2016 #34 Share Posted December 2, 2016 (edited) how do you get on that mailing list for 59 bucks. i have to admit, i hate the idea of GTY but for 59 a nite, i would deal with it to be back on the BA. Coming straight from the horse's mouth, directly from NCL - check your email/spam mail folder, you should be getting them almost daily ... with the PCC contact info if assigned. If not, re-check your MyNCL account to see if there's something missing ... unless you OPT out of email marketing. Note - inventories limited, they might have a handful of unsold or released cabins to fill up. At those prices, if you can go last minute, why worry about a GTY assignment of the stateroom - location/deck on the BA (granted, it was a very, very long walk last year for us ... got a free upgrade from OV to "BC" on deck 10). They won't dump you down on Deck 4 (JK - that's off limits & crews only). sent from Nexus 5X on Nougat 7.0 via Tapatalk, VPN secured Edited December 2, 2016 by mking8288 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dexddd Posted December 2, 2016 #35 Share Posted December 2, 2016 I saw that, another NCL email popped up a short while ago from PCC - even for the Holidays, as low as $59 daily out of NY - wow. Choice of Sailaway with no frills for GTY cabins or select the "Freebies" with higher rates for the same categories ... just need to do some online work to smartly compare prices. Are you thinking of doing one, extending it :D - LOL. Regardless, all pack & ready to go - have a great & safe one and based on the weather forecast now, promised - no winter blizzard in NYC as disembarkation welcome. One of my BIL/SIL & friends are onboard BA now doing 14 days, spoke to him on Tuesday while they docked in Old San Juan - joking about staying onboard with the deals, going to look into getting/using 2 CruiseRewards to bring the costs down lower more, ha ha. We are out of vacation time for 2016 & just made plans for New Year's Day Brunch, woohoo. Frank must be on vacation these days and/or doing all he/they can as Q4 is now less than 30 days out. Thanks. Will be packing this weekend leaving Friday to San Juan for a couple days. I think I had the balcony pricing wrong - think it was $649 and $679 with a perk but you could get an inside for $379 with the UBP or one of the other offers. I got the email right after I posted that - our sailing is the first one showing the $25/day fare. I went through the best site I could find to easily see how many rooms across all categories were open and I came up with 140. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
littlelulu01 Posted December 3, 2016 #36 Share Posted December 3, 2016 Wasn't trying to be rude, and I am very happy that all those who posted were correct. I can still take advantage of the offer. As I am new to NCL (not to cruising), I just wasn't sure how people knew that the offer was not ending and they were confident it was just changing slightly. I did not realize that this particular offer has been in place for quite some time and the 'ends November 30' was only a pressure tactic to get people to book. The DSC perk was very rarely previously offered. I think only a couple times since NCL started offering these choice perks. This last time it was offered it actually was on offer for more than a month for the first time. The DSC perk is by far the most valuable to us. That's actual $ we don't have to give NCL. That's a nice savings for our next 14 night sailing. I still find it absurd that if in a suite the alcohol pkg is built into the fare yet as someone who doesn't drink alcohol, my drinks (specialty coffees and water bottles) aren't included. There really should be some type of alternative package perk offer for a non drinker. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ousie Posted December 3, 2016 #37 Share Posted December 3, 2016 New to the forum so not sure if I'm posting correctly. I am bothered that....you are now paying extra for a stateroom with free at sea deals...£400 on a balcony stateroom on Feb Canary cruise. That's a lot for 2people! (2nd dining package offered on balconies only 4 bookings on 12 night) Choose a guaranteed balcony , no deals and the price is cheaper....is this Free at sea still free? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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