Any Advantages to Booking Onboard Ship??

[robin13]

I'm going to be on The Gem 9/26 and want to buy some Cruise Next certificates.  In the past I just bought them without actually booking a cruise.  This time I have a cruise in mind and was wondering if there was any advantages to booking onboard? Do you get a better rate than if I booked when I got home?  I'm looking at the Prima for 12/3/22 so it is pretty far off but if I can get a better rate onboard than I would book it.  Any guidance would be most helpful. 

[Shellbelle28]

I don't know if this is how it is currently, but in 2020 when we bought Cruise Next deposits on board we got half the amount as onboard credit on the cruise we were on at the time. I don't believe it got us a better price on the new cruise itself.

[robin13]

15 minutes ago, Shellbelle28 said:

I don't know if this is how it is currently, but in 2020 when we bought Cruise Next deposits on board we got half the amount as onboard credit on the cruise we were on at the time. I don't believe it got us a better price on the new cruise itself.

Yes, that is still the same according to the paperwork they sent me.

[julig22]

In the past you might get a small upgrade within a category - like a higher deck.

[The Traveling Man]

2 hours ago, robin13 said:

I'm going to be on The Gem 9/26 and want to buy some Cruise Next certificates.  In the past I just bought them without actually booking a cruise.  This time I have a cruise in mind and was wondering if there was any advantages to booking onboard? Do you get a better rate than if I booked when I got home?  I'm looking at the Prima for 12/3/22 so it is pretty far off but if I can get a better rate onboard than I would book it.  Any guidance would be most helpful. 

There definitely is an advantage to booking onboard and it is completely separate from whether you purchase Cruise Next Deposits or not.  When you book onboard, you can reserve the best (most expensive) cabin in a category (for Balconies, that usually would be a BA) but only pay for the least expensive room in that category, say a BF.

[JamieLogical]

Usually, when you book onboard, you can get an in-category upgrade for the price of a lower category. So, for example, you might get a BA for the price of a BF. 

[The Traveling Man]

23 hours ago, robin13 said:

I'm going to be on The Gem 9/26 and want to buy some Cruise Next certificates.  In the past I just bought them without actually booking a cruise.  This time I have a cruise in mind and was wondering if there was any advantages to booking onboard? Do you get a better rate than if I booked when I got home?  I'm looking at the Prima for 12/3/22 so it is pretty far off but if I can get a better rate onboard than I would book it.  Any guidance would be most helpful. 

One other thing to keep in mind, though.  When you purchase Cruise Next Deposits onboard, they don't become effective until after your cruise ends.  That means you can't buy a CND and then immediately use it as a deposit on a new cruise that you book while you are still onboard.  You could reserve a new cruise by means of a credit card deposit, or you can use a CND you had purchased on a previous cruise.  NCL frequently allows more than one CND to be used as payment for a cruise, though, so you could book a new cruise with a credit card deposit, then apply your just-purchased CNDs soon after you return home.

[Sailing12Away]

18 minutes ago, The Traveling Man said:

One other thing to keep in mind, though.  When you purchase Cruise Next Deposits onboard, they don't become effective until after your cruise ends.  That means you can't buy a CND and then immediately use it as a deposit on a new cruise that you book while you are still onboard.  You could reserve a new cruise by means of a credit card deposit, or you can use a CND you had purchased on a previous cruise.  NCL frequently allows more than one CND to be used as payment for a cruise, though, so you could book a new cruise with a credit card deposit, then apply your just-purchased CNDs soon after you return home.

Is that new? When we were on the Epic pre-Covid we booked 3 cabins for a NY to Bermuda cruise and got a total of 4 CN certificates to apply towards them. 2 went to our cabin, and 1 each for my parents and sister's cabins. The cruise ended up being Covid-cancelled and then that became a bit of a beast to get the 4 CN certificates back in my name - but we were able to use the CN we purchased on board as the deposit for those 3 cabins.

[Sailing12Away]

As others have already said, there are some small perks to booking a new sailing while onboard a current sailing, but that depends on the category of cabin you're looking into. We did it once and booked a BA balcony room at the rate of the BF - saved about $500 total. But when it came time to looking into upgrading our room when prices dropped, we were being charged the price difference of the BF instead of the BA.

 

So even though we were in a BA and it would be $200 to go into a MA, we were being charged as if we were still in the BF so the upgrade cost would have been $750 and no longer worth it. Prices kept dropping and we ended up outright upgrading to an H2 instead for $1000/pp on a 10 night cruise - still feel like we stole that one from them.

[The Traveling Man]

56 minutes ago, Sailing12Away said:

Is that new? When we were on the Epic pre-Covid we booked 3 cabins for a NY to Bermuda cruise and got a total of 4 CN certificates to apply towards them. 2 went to our cabin, and 1 each for my parents and sister's cabins. The cruise ended up being Covid-cancelled and then that became a bit of a beast to get the 4 CN certificates back in my name - but we were able to use the CN we purchased on board as the deposit for those 3 cabins.

It may have changed a couple of years ago, but we ran into this "Catch 22" on a couple of different ships in 2019 and earlier when we wanted to book a new cruise while still onboard.

[The Traveling Man]

1 hour ago, Sailing12Away said:

As others have already said, there are some small perks to booking a new sailing while onboard a current sailing, but that depends on the category of cabin you're looking into. We did it once and booked a BA balcony room at the rate of the BF - saved about $500 total. But when it came time to looking into upgrading our room when prices dropped, we were being charged the price difference of the BF instead of the BA.

 

So even though we were in a BA and it would be $200 to go into a MA, we were being charged as if we were still in the BF so the upgrade cost would have been $750 and no longer worth it. Prices kept dropping and we ended up outright upgrading to an H2 instead for $1000/pp on a 10 night cruise - still feel like we stole that one from them.

You're right.  Booking a new cruise while already on a cruise works out best when the room you book is one you'll be happy to keep.  If you're thinking about rebooking later for an upgrade, you'll lose the price advantage you received at the time you originally booked.  In a sense, you already got a free upgrade at the time you booked, so upgrading to an even more expensive room takes you back to square one.

[ziggyuk]

3 hours ago, The Traveling Man said:

One other thing to keep in mind, though.  When you purchase Cruise Next Deposits onboard, they don't become effective until after your cruise ends.  That means you can't buy a CND and then immediately use it as a deposit on a new cruise that you book while you are still onboard.  You could reserve a new cruise by means of a credit card deposit, or you can use a CND you had purchased on a previous cruise.  NCL frequently allows more than one CND to be used as payment for a cruise, though, so you could book a new cruise with a credit card deposit, then apply your just-purchased CNDs soon after you return home.

 

If this is the case, you can apply them as soon as you get home so it's not an issue.