HAL is dirty and crooked

[Janet76]

1 hour ago, npcl said:

Almost 2 months in, pretty much zero on the refunds.  Nope the workload excuse doesn't fly.

Yup, workload excuse doesn’t fly as they were ready to take our deposit when we called to rebook. Yes we did not rebook. 

[Nymich]

2 minutes ago, Janet76 said:

Yup, workload excuse doesn’t fly as they were ready to take our deposit when we called to rebook. Yes we did not rebook. 

It is kind of unreal when I hear this excuse.  They do not have a single Ship in the water.  It is not a workload problem.  

[Captain Ricky]

7 minutes ago, Nymich said:

It is kind of unreal when I hear this excuse.  They do not have a single Ship in the water.  It is not a workload problem.  

They have several ships in the water taking staff and crew home.  That has to be their first concern, including communicating with staff, staff family, hotels where they are to quarantine etc.   I wonder if they are aren't stumbling trying to figure out the message as things keep changing.  Their communications with us on the ship was terrible.

 

BTW, we got credit on our card last week for unspent balance, the un-taken tours, and the unused port fees on the interrupted Amsterdam Grand World.  They told us 60 days and they beat that deadline.  Now waiting for the refund on the interrupted portion of the cruise.  They have a couple of weeks based on their deadline.

 

They did credit us us with all the 128 days we would have had toward star status on the cruise.  Given everything else happening in the world I will give them the benefit of the doubt.  Am I completely happy, of course not but not many others on the planet are either.  

[Storylady]

2 hours ago, npcl said:

I might believe the work load excuse, if we were seeing any consistent flow of refunds in any kind of organized fashion.  It is now almost two months  from the suspension. Even with a manual process the information needed to process refunds are in their systems, except for the customer reply for FCC or refund, and that data can be entered very efficiently.  By this time enough refunds should have been processed such that even if they were going to take an extended time, people would be consistently reporting getting refunds.

 

Almost 2 months in, pretty much zero on the refunds.  Nope the workload excuse doesn't fly.

We have had a sizable amount of money returned to our credit card from our last cruise. It took them about 6 weeks: from March to now.  And those deposits I wanted moved to another cruise were also finally done. It took them 6 weeks to do it. So I think that they are working as fast as they can. Plus, I wouldn’t be surprised if they had full staff to handle the situation. The Seattle area had a huge COvid-19  outbreak if I remember correctly. I would wait, you might be pleasantly surprised.

[Nymich]

1 hour ago, Captain Ricky said:

They have several ships in the water taking staff and crew home.  

I think it was quite obvious what I meant.  I guess that workload makes it impossible to communicate with the people whose money they have taken.  

[Nymich]

40 minutes ago, Storylady said:

We have had a sizable amount of money returned to our credit card from our last cruise. It took them about 6 weeks: from March to now.  And those deposits I wanted moved to another cruise were also finally done. It took them 6 weeks to do it. So I think that they are working as fast as they can. Plus, I wouldn’t be surprised if they had full staff to handle the situation. The Seattle area had a huge COvid-19  outbreak if I remember correctly. I would wait, you might be pleasantly surprised.

Was that a March cruise that HAL cancelled and you chose full refund or did you self cancel?

[Storylady]

1 minute ago, Nymich said:

Was that a March cruise that HAL cancelled and you chose full refund or did you self cancel?

 

1 minute ago, Nymich said:

Was that a March cruise that HAL cancelled and you chose full refund or did you self cancel?

Actually, it was shore excursions money HAL  We had two extremely expensive shore excursions overland in Africa. The amount was large enough for a month of cruising. It was so large, I hate to even say, I was extremely worried that I wouldn’t get it back. Normally, such money is returned immediately.

[Nymich]

3 minutes ago, Storylady said:

 

Actually, it was shore excursions money HAL  We had two extremely expensive shore excursions overland in Africa. The amount was large enough for a month of cruising. It was so large, I hate to even say, I was extremely worried that I wouldn’t get it back. Normally, such money is returned immediately.

Glad you got the money!

[Cruising-along]

7 minutes ago, Nymich said:

Glad you got the money!

Maybe you've missed the posts, but quite a few people have reported getting refunds for shore excursions, other purchases, and I recently saw one whose port fees were refunded.  I actually am more upset with our travel insurance company, they have been way less communicative than HAL has with us.  

[Nymich]

1 hour ago, Cruising-along said:

Maybe you've missed the posts, but quite a few people have reported getting refunds for shore excursions, other purchases, and I recently saw one whose port fees were refunded.  I actually am more upset with our travel insurance company, they have been way less communicative than HAL has with us.  

With all due respect i have missed nothing.  While a few token shore excursion refunds is a good thing it is not even close to what I am looking for. Perhaps you can read this entire thread and it'll be pretty clear what I have been looking for.

[Cruising-along]

1 hour ago, Nymich said:

With all due respect i have missed nothing.  While a few token shore excursion refunds is a good thing it is not even close to what I am looking for. Perhaps you can read this entire thread and it'll be pretty clear what I have been looking for.

With all due respect I have read the whole thread and know what you want, it would be hard to miss all your posts all over the board.  You want it now, and it isn't happening fast enough for you. What is happening is the refunds are starting.  It's a start and some of us see that as progress.  

[Captain Ricky]

1 hour ago, Nymich said:

With all due respect i have missed nothing.  While a few token shore excursion refunds is a good thing it is not even close to what I am looking for. Perhaps you can read this entire thread and it'll be pretty clear what I have been looking for.

$5K is not token to me.  OK, I still want the other roughly $30K that they owe me but it's a good start.  I will hold criticism until 60 days has past.  Right now I would rather have them use the cash on hand to pay the crew contracts and get them home.

[Nymich]

23 minutes ago, Cruising-along said:

With all due respect I have read the whole thread and know what you want, it would be hard to miss all your posts all over the board.  You want it now, and it isn't happening fast enough for you. What is happening is the refunds are starting.  It's a start and some of us see that as progress.  

I will refer you to the OP.  Happy to hear you are happy with the progress!

[Captain Ricky]

Orlando Ashford is out.

 

https://www.cruiseindustrynews.com/cruise-news/22930-orlando-ashford-leaving-holland-america.html

[Captain Ricky]

I just got an email trying to sell me Carnival Cruises for the beginning of September.  I asked if they realistically thought the CDC "No Sail" order would be lifted before a vaccine.  The agent on the chat line said "We can't answer for the CDC."  but "With Carnival, if you were to be on a cruise that the cruise line cancelled due to Covid, the cruise line does not have a set time for refunds to be processed and can exceed 90 days as they have over 1.5 million refunds to process."  To book the cruise I have to put up a deposit right now, (and if I book within 4 days I get extra on board credit and hotel fees paid.) and if I cancel it is non refundable.  I get the feeling that I am being asked to contribute to a big "Ponzi" scheme.  It ain't just HAL.

[Captain Ricky]

And Now this.

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/local-business/seattle-based-holland-america-line-announces-2000-layoffs-other-measures-as-coronavirus-halts-cruise-sailings-worldwide/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=article_inset_1.1&fbclid=IwAR30qGwIF-wY0ErqSB_YI1VcMYkiKcZkdLWFNhzD2i6T7TyrQq5ZfnPVB0o