Deals with Viking WITHOUT Air Travel?

[garycarla]

Seems like all/most of their pricing options include air, or air credit.

 

What if we want to book our own air.  How do you find pricing for that?

 

 

[prim8keeper]

When looking at dates and pricing there should be a column that just list the cruise fare and then one that says air fare. For you the cruise fare would be the price you want to look at. The price of the two combined would be the price if you wanted to book the cruise and include air fare. It may be easiest just to call and talking to a Viking rep as they are happy to answer any questions. We just recently booked a cruise without air as the city we wanted to fly too was included in those allowed for deviations with the air plus upgrade.

 

Edited October 31, 2019 by prim8keeper

[Carol From California]

2 hours ago, garycarla said:

Seems like all/most of their pricing options include air, or air credit.

 

What if we want to book our own air.  How do you find pricing for that?

 

 

We never take the air. We always do our own. If air is included they should give you a credit for doing it on your own.

[Peregrina651]

4 hours ago, Carol From California said:

We never take the air. We always do our own. If air is included they should give you a credit for doing it on your own.

 

But it rarely is included. Viking, in most cases, packages cruise and air as separate line items and as separate offers, even if it is free air.

 

As for whether to go with Viking air at booking, I almost always do because I know that I can cancel it (up to x many days prior to sailing) if I find a better deal booking on my own.  It gives me options. For our next two cruises, I was able to beat the Viking price on flights and booked my own flights. However, when the deal was free economy air, I booked with Viking because even with the deviation fee for arriving early, it was still cheaper than I could get on my own.

[Carol From California]

1 minute ago, Peregrina651 said:

 

But it rarely is included. Viking, in most cases, packages cruise and air as separate line items and as separate offers, even if it is free air.

 

As for whether to go with Viking air at booking, I almost always do because I know that I can cancel it (up to x many days prior to sailing) if I find a better deal booking on my own.  It gives me options. For our next two cruises, I was able to beat the Viking price on flights and booked my own flights. However, when the deal was free economy air, I booked with Viking because even with the deviation fee for arriving early, it was still cheaper than I could get on my own.

We usually book with our miles and always fly business class so we never take the air.

[ElaynaB]

We booked Alaska for July 2020 and took the air package along with air plus so we could pick our own flights and upgrade to business class.  When I called air plus I was told that they could not book us in business class and I would have to do that on my own.  Viking refunded both the air portion and the air plus fee with no problems and I booked my own flights. I then sent my flight info to Viking and booked transfers through them to and from the airports.  

I was unable to get a reason for their inability to book us in business and had no problems doing this when we traveled to Europe with them earlier this year.  Perhaps it has something to do with a domestic flight rather than an international one.

Regardless, it was no big deal to book my own flights and like I said I was refunded for both the air and air plus portions.

[theduffys]

9 hours ago, ElaynaB said:

We booked Alaska for July 2020 and took the air package along with air plus so we could pick our own flights and upgrade to business class.  When I called air plus I was told that they could not book us in business class and I would have to do that on my own.  Viking refunded both the air portion and the air plus fee with no problems and I booked my own flights. I then sent my flight info to Viking and booked transfers through them to and from the airports.  

I was unable to get a reason for their inability to book us in business and had no problems doing this when we traveled to Europe with them earlier this year.  Perhaps it has something to do with a domestic flight rather than an international one.

Regardless, it was no big deal to book my own flights and like I said I was refunded for both the air and air plus portions.

We are flying to Barcelona in 10 days. When we booked our cruise last May, we were given free air and I paid for air plus so that we could upgrade to Business Class.  After researching all possible flights, I called Viking to request Cleveland to Newark to Barcelona. I was told that all their contracted seats on the Newark flight were already taken, even though United showed many seats left. We were then booked Cleveland to Dulles to Munich to Barcelona  with only 70 min layovers in both DC and Munich.  I stewed about it for awhile and then called Viking air and explained my concerns. the lovely young lady told me that ,while the Munich stop would not be a problem, she was also concerned about the Dulles stop. She asked me to hold on for a bit and when she came back she confirmed that we would now be on the Newark flight. I love the service at Viking.

[CCWineLover]

On 11/1/2019 at 2:38 PM, theduffys said:

We are flying to Barcelona in 10 days. When we booked our cruise last May, we were given free air and I paid for air plus so that we could upgrade to Business Class.

Nicely done!

 

However - I have read multiple different posts now with different versions of what works with Viking Air.  Some people say Viking told them if they wanted Business Class they'd have to book air on their own.  Others like you, say that you used Viking Air Plus and then got upgraded to Business Class. 

Perhaps it is in the particulars - did Viking actually procurr your upgraded Biz seats (sounds like it if they did the routing and ticketing) ?    Did they have a specific "add-on" Biz class fare?  Did you use miles, but still bound to the Viking routing?

 

Does anyone have any particular breakdown of the rules Viking follows for people who want to fly buiness class, but may or may not be able to use Viking Air?     Sure sounds like different experiences abound and that there don't apppear to be any specific rules or guidelines - unique case for everyone.

Edited November 3, 2019 by CCWineLover

[theduffys]

3 hours ago, CCWineLover said:

Nicely done!

 

However - I have read multiple different posts now with different versions of what works with Viking Air.  Some people say Viking told them if they wanted Business Class they'd have to book air on their own.  Others like you, say that you used Viking Air Plus and then got upgraded to Business Class. 

Perhaps it is in the particulars - did Viking actually procurr your upgraded Biz seats (sounds like it if they did the routing and ticketing) ?    Did they have a specific "add-on" Biz class fare?  Did you use miles, but still bound to the Viking routing?

 

Does anyone have any particular breakdown of the rules Viking follows for people who want to fly buiness class, but may or may not be able to use Viking Air?     Sure sounds like different experiences abound and that there don't apppear to be any specific rules or guidelines - unique case for everyone.

Yes, we did pay extra for the business upgrade. We knew that going in. We were subject to their routing and that is why we were so happy to get the routing we wanted. My point in posting was to say that, while it is frequently possible to request a specific routing for business class, it would seem that Viking contracts for a specific number of business seats on a specific flight.  So, the earlier the better.

[CCWineLover]

1 hour ago, theduffys said:

Yes, we did pay extra for the business upgrade. We knew that going in. We were subject to their routing and that is why we were so happy to get the routing we wanted. My point in posting was to say that, while it is frequently possible to request a specific routing for business class, it would seem that Viking contracts for a specific number of business seats on a specific flight.  So, the earlier the better.

Thank you so much.

We had been under the impression that Viking booked you in air fare classes in economy that didn't allow for Business Class upgrades.  It is good to know that at least in your case, it was indeed possible to fly business class with Viking.   That had been the primary reason we never used Viking Air - since we had at one time been told you couldn't do business class if you used Viking Air.  So perhaps that policy has changed for the better now!

[Cyber Kat]

2 hours ago, CCWineLover said:

Thank you so much.

We had been under the impression that Viking booked you in air fare classes in economy that didn't allow for Business Class upgrades.  It is good to know that at least in your case, it was indeed possible to fly business class with Viking.   That had been the primary reason we never used Viking Air - since we had at one time been told you couldn't do business class if you used Viking Air.  So perhaps that policy has changed for the better now!

Both times we did business class with Viking Air and we used Air Plus to get the flights we wanted.  On our 2 other cruises we booked our own flights - once to San Juan and this last time to Montreal because we only needed a one way flight as we were ending in NYC. 
 

Though we haven’t picked our flights yet we have business class to Oslo for our cruise next fall. 

[vnb2003]

On 11/3/2019 at 9:51 PM, CCWineLover said:

Thank you so much.

We had been under the impression that Viking booked you in air fare classes in economy that didn't allow for Business Class upgrades.  It is good to know that at least in your case, it was indeed possible to fly business class with Viking.   That had been the primary reason we never used Viking Air - since we had at one time been told you couldn't do business class if you used Viking Air.  So perhaps that policy has changed for the better now!

CCWineLover,

Viking quotes $1,999.00 to upgrade to business. You can find this info in Viking Air section on MVJ. We found out that this is the “from” price and the upgrade might cost more depending on the cruise, countries, number of seats, etc, 🥂 

 

[benjaminnicholas]

What I like most about Viking's air-inclusive option is that they almost always use fare buckets that allow higher-level elites to upgrade the ticket with their airline at no cost.

 

Just did this with the upcoming Iconic Med iten.  DFW-LHR-BCN and FCO-MAD-DFW.  Bumped them all up on AA.  Earning full mileage and EQD.  For us, this was a no-brainer to take, especially with end of year elite mileage earning coming up.

[OnTheJourney]

On 10/31/2019 at 10:15 AM, prim8keeper said:

When looking at dates and pricing there should be a column that just list the cruise fare and then one that says air fare. For you the cruise fare would be the price you want to look at. The price of the two combined would be the price if you wanted to book the cruise and include air fare. It may be easiest just to call and talking to a Viking rep as they are happy to answer any questions. We just recently booked a cruise without air as the city we wanted to fly too was included in those allowed for deviations with the air plus upgrade.

 

Similar to the documentation you receive after booking a trip, just have one of their agents put together a quote for you based on a particular sailing date and tell them to include whatever class of air you want from whatever airport you prefer. They'll be happy to do that - at least the agent I work with is. 

Edited November 9, 2019 by OnTheJourney

[OnTheJourney]

On 10/31/2019 at 8:57 AM, garycarla said:

Seems like all/most of their pricing options include air, or air credit.

 

What if we want to book our own air.  How do you find pricing for that?

 

 

 

 I've hardly ever used a cruise line (or any travel company for that matter) to add air. For our last Viking trip, I just told the agent to deduct the air prices from the quote, and then I booked my own through expedia. For an upcoming trip, I might do air through them, however, since I want to make sure I use the full amount of voucher money that was issued to us. 

Edited November 9, 2019 by OnTheJourney