QM2 - a day late and a dollar short

[rmsEtruria]

12 hours ago, HopefulCruiser123 said:

Thank you and glad to meet a fellow traveler a whole year and a half in advance!  Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving, indeed! Perhaps you’d like to sign in on the Roll Call that @D&N started—they also are on that sailing.

[maggielou362]

On 11/23/2023 at 5:19 AM, HopefulCruiser123 said:

... thanks to all of you wonderful seasoned travelers, we will be doing a luggage forward for both of our cruises to help with the specific items for the various stages of our trip. It really helped to make the final decision easy.  Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!  

Aren't they all wonderful on this discussion board? People really know their stuff, and are so generous with sharing information and goodwill. Have a lovely voyage, HopefulCruiser!

[ClipperinSFO]

We all have a very strong interest in others having a great experience with Cunard and seeing it thrive as a result.  Long may we sail!  

[exlondoner]

In an article by Stephen Payne in Ships Monthly, it says that in an evaluation after Covid it was found that 18 ships contributed only 3% of Carnival’s revenues, and they were culled. Isn’t it good none of them were Cunarders?

[techteach]

4 hours ago, exlondoner said:

In an article by Stephen Payne in Ships Monthly, it says that in an evaluation after Covid it was found that 18 ships contributed only 3% of Carnival’s revenues, and they were culled. Isn’t it good none of them were Cunarders?

@exlondoner I’m trying to find the article on-line. Do you remember the month it was published? Thanks.

[exlondoner]

33 minutes ago, techteach said:

@exlondoner I’m trying to find the article on-line. Do you remember the month it was published? Thanks.

It is December 2023. It just arrived today. It is in an article about Renaissance/Maasdam.

[Covepointcruiser]

We attempted to book the QM2 12/8/25 round trip and the Q5s-Q7s are totally booked except for one Q7 accessible suite.   We don’t need an accessible suite (at least not in 11/23) so we are waitlisted for any non accessible suite in those categories.    As far as I know this crossing opened up in the last week so the suites are selling fast.   We had a wonderful time on the 12/22 B2B2B and loved the Christmas flavor.

[bluemarble]

51 minutes ago, Covepointcruiser said:

We attempted to book the QM2 12/8/25 round trip and the Q5s-Q7s are totally booked except for one Q7 accessible suite.   We don’t need an accessible suite (at least not in 11/23) so we are waitlisted for any non accessible suite in those categories.    As far as I know this crossing opened up in the last week so the suites are selling fast.   We had a wonderful time on the 12/22 B2B2B and loved the Christmas flavor.

 

Looks like the typical problem where they didn't allocate many suites to the 14-night round trip crossing (M538A) compared to each of the individual 7-night crossings (M538 and M539). There are many Q5-Q6 suites available on each of the 7-night crossings and it's not hard to find instances of the same Q5-Q6 suites available on both crossings. The catch is the fare is about $1,500 more per person to book the two separate crossings compared to the fare being quoted for the combined 14-night round trip crossing.

Edited November 24, 2023 by bluemarble

[JT1101]

6 hours ago, exlondoner said:

In an article by Stephen Payne in Ships Monthly, it says that in an evaluation after Covid it was found that 18 ships contributed only 3% of Carnival’s revenues, and they were culled. Isn’t it good none of them were Cunarders?

IIRC Carnival has a total of 91 ships (I think, could be higher). So an average money-making ship would contribute 1.09% of the total. In 2022 Cunard's three ships contributed almost 4.6% of venue (they actually beat P&O who has 10 ships). So on average each Cunard ship put forward 1.53% of the total revenue. Just high level approximations of course. 

[exlondoner]

11 hours ago, JT1101 said:

IIRC Carnival has a total of 91 ships (I think, could be higher). So an average money-making ship would contribute 1.09% of the total. In 2022 Cunard's three ships contributed almost 4.6% of venue (they actually beat P&O who has 10 ships). So on average each Cunard ship put forward 1.53% of the total revenue. Just high level approximations of course. 

So it’s just not just us (should be we but sounds so odd) who love Cunard. 😀

[ClipperinSFO]

18 hours ago, bluemarble said:

 

Looks like the typical problem where they didn't allocate many suites to the 14-night round trip crossing (M538A) compared to each of the individual 7-night crossings (M538 and M539). There are many Q5-Q6 suites available on each of the 7-night crossings and it's not hard to find instances of the same Q5-Q6 suites available on both crossings. The catch is the fare is about $1,500 more per person to book the two separate crossings compared to the fare being quoted for the combined 14-night round trip crossing.

 

@bluemarblemakes an excellent point about Cunard's allocation of Q5-Q6  inventory to the round trip vs one way (or any other itinerary combinations).  They clearly see this as optimizing revenue for them at the moment, but conditions and market demand changes.  As sales progress in the coming months, these inventory allocations across itinerary combinations will likely be adjusted to meet revised demand, so the Q5/-Q6's may indeed become available for the roundtrip as a single booking.  

[D&N]

On 11/24/2023 at 8:24 PM, Covepointcruiser said:

We attempted to book the QM2 12/8/25 round trip and the Q5s-Q7s are totally booked except for one Q7 accessible suite.   We don’t need an accessible suite (at least not in 11/23) so we are waitlisted for any non accessible suite in those categories.    As far as I know this crossing opened up in the last week so the suites are selling fast.   We had a wonderful time on the 12/22 B2B2B and loved the Christmas flavor.

Follow up to the last few helpful posts. We had this at release date. I checked availability of a specific cabin on the two short segments. I advised my agent who asked for the issue to be escalated to the "berthing team". A few hours later we had our preferred cabin. So ask your agent or call Cunard and tell them the cabin you want is free for both segments and you want to book the round trip version. It might suit them to get more for the two trips but I think it's much simpler than that. Their IT simply can't cope with a cabin being available to multiple cruise numbers.

[exlondoner]

5 minutes ago, D&N said:

Follow up to the last few helpful posts. We had this at release date. I checked availability of a specific cabin on the two short segments. I advised my agent who asked for the issue to be escalated to the "berthing team". A few hours later we had our preferred cabin. So ask your agent or call Cunard and tell them the cabin you want is free for both segments and you want to book the round trip version. It might suit them to get more for the two trips but I think it's much simpler than that. Their IT simply can't cope with a cabin being available to multiple cruise numbers.

Well, that is the most surprising suggestion I’ve heard for a long time. Cunard’s IT not cope with something straightforward? Shocking.

[JT1101]

Basically Cunard's website comes off like it was designed by people who don't use browsers. And there are other aspects of their booking operation that need to improve. However their experience at sea is marvelous and that is what counts. 

I have booked usually by phone direct to Cunard - it seems to work the best. I'm sure a good Travel Agent is also a good choice. 

[Underwatr]

They maintain different inventories for booking each direction of a round trip vs the round trip itself.

On the one hand, this ensures the availability of cabins to occupy for the entire round trip but occasionally it does result in cabins being allocated for each direction individually when you'd like to occupy them as a round trip booking. 

In my case I wanted to book a cabin class for a 12 night NYC-NYC Caribbean trip and that class was only available for the 19-night Southampton-NYC (via Caribbean) itinerary. The onboard booking office blocked the cabin for me and made the necessary calls to free it to be booked for 12 nights.

If an agent is knowledgeable they can make the contacts to book as you'd like (assuming there are room available) but the inventory has to be moved among allocations by the home office to permit that.

Edited November 27, 2023 by Underwatr