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Just received an offer To Cancel

teacherman

By teacherman,
in Holland America Line

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teacherman

teacherman

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We are scheduled to fly to Boston on Friday and depart Saturday on Volendam for Montreal.  I have received an offer today to give up our reservation, receive all of our money back, maybe have our airline rebooking fees paid, and get a "free" cruise on Zuiderdam in late August or September with the same itinerary.  Does this mean they have overbooked this cruise?  Can passengers possibly be "bumped" from the cruise.  I have never before seen an offer like this the week of the cruise.  Have any of you?

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Taters

Taters

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Yes, this probably means that the ship is overbooked.  You don't have to accept the offer, and the offers may get better later on if no one take them up on this one.  We have a 14 night Montreal to Ft. Lauderdale cruise booked on Volendam, sailing on October 5th.  There's no way I would accept an offer like that after buying plane tickets from Fairbanks to Toronto, and train tickets from Toronto to Montreal, especially when they "might" refund air.

 

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shadow 123

shadow 123

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1 hour ago, teacherman said:

We are scheduled to fly to Boston on Friday and depart Saturday on Volendam for Montreal.  I have received an offer today to give up our reservation, receive all of our money back, maybe have our airline rebooking fees paid, and get a "free" cruise on Zuiderdam in late August or September with the same itinerary.  Does this mean they have overbooked this cruise?  Can passengers possibly be "bumped" from the cruise.  I have never before seen an offer like this the week of the cruise.  Have any of you?

Never

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SLC1954

SLC1954

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7 minutes ago, LetItSnow said:

Full refund and a free cruise!  I'm sure it's legit but double check to make sure the email was sent from HAL.  I'm paranoid lately with so many scams around.  You just can't trust anything thesee days.  

I received one also, it is legitimate offer, it has my full name and booking number.

this cruise has been sold out for a long time, so I was not surprised to get the email.  I won’t take it cuz I’m booked as a B2B and retuning to Boston.

 

 

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senoragilbert

senoragilbert

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I got the same email. I also received one from Princess in June for our Alaska cruise. The cruise is oversold and if they don't get people to take the offer, they'll have to "bump" the guarantee cabin folks. However, it's a sweet deal for those who aren't in education, so I'll bet they'll get takers!

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rochelle_s

rochelle_s

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What source do you have that they will bump guarantee cabin reservations? My understanding is that they will keep sweetening the offers till they get enough takers to the point they can accommodate everyone, including those with guarantee reservations. 
 

Rochelle

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senoragilbert

senoragilbert

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I should have said, when I said "guarantee" that I meant folks that haven't been assigned a cabin yet (with 5 days to sailing). It'll be interesting to see how this shakes out!

 

ETA I see that this happened in June and the guarantee folks did get on board...the offers they make can be incredible! Lesson learned, sorry for the fake news, folks. 🙂

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TRLD

TRLD

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2 hours ago, senoragilbert said:

Sorry to offend, I don't have a source. I'm basing this on how other cruise lines have done this. But you're right, they'll do absolutely everything they can to avoid an involuntary cancellation!

The only cruise line I have heard the actually bumped passengers was Royal and it was due to a problem with their software during restart.  It happened to a couple of cruises around the same time then they got the problem fixed.

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TiogaCruiser "Live from...." Rare

TiogaCruiser

Posted
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1 hour ago, senoragilbert said:

I should have said, when I said "guarantee" that I meant folks that haven't been assigned a cabin yet (with 5 days to sailing). It'll be interesting to see how this shakes out!

 

ETA I see that this happened in June and the guarantee folks did get on board...the offers they make can be incredible! Lesson learned, sorry for the fake news, folks. 🙂

Guarantee just means you accept a cabin HAL assigns: you don’t choose. But there will be one for you. You don’t just get bumped.

 

If you are on Interline, then you could get bumped or downgraded. But that’s part of the deal.

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teacherman

teacherman

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We actually booked this cruise on March 31, while we were in the car driving home from a RCCL cruise out of Bayonne.  I was checking my email, while my DW was driving, and I received a VERY good offer from HAL for this particular cruise.  It seemed to me that maybe they were trying to fill "left over" cabins.  There were only a few cabins left, so we took an inside on Deck 2.  We have had one of those on a previous cruise and don't mind it for this particular itinerary.

 

We booked our air ourselves with DELTA.  We are not going to take the offer, since we would have more difficulty moving it to the offered dates.  And I don't want to mess around trying to change our flights to another date.  But I imagine it might be a great offer for people who are driving to the cruise.

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sambamama Great Review Rare

sambamama

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To clarify, if you book a guarantee cabin, you are booking a cabin in a certain category. I almost always book guarantees, and I get my cabin number anywhere from one month to 3 days before. You may go up from what you booked, and I always have. I always book an inside, and always end up with an outside cabin. So just because you booked a guarantee, you wouldn't get bumped. You are booking a cabin you just don't have a number. The ship gains flexibility. I usually book a year or more in advance. 

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terrydtx Great Review Rare

terrydtx

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We are on the Volendam in August and that cruise is also sold out and no longer shows up on the HAL website. I suspect the same offers may well go out for our cruise. I have heard of people getting bumped off an oversold cruise. We never book a guaranteed cabin as we are picky about our cabin locations and want to choose. I would think if you book a GTY and none are available and you do not have an assigned cabin you could get bumped, that happens with airlines all the time.

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