Anyone Ever Upgraded From an AB?

[2boyzmom]

There are 10 AB suites on the Dawn. If I book a "guarantee" what would be my chances of an upgrade? It looks like the next cabin to accomidate 4 people is a garden villa and I cannot imagine being upgraded to that :)

[jhayman]

There are 10 AB suites on the Dawn. If I book a "guarantee" what would be my chances of an upgrade? It looks like the next cabin to accomidate 4 people is a garden villa and I cannot imagine being upgraded to that :)

 

I don't think the AB's generally sell that well and are usually some of the last cabins to fill up so I wouldn't hold my breath. It would be very nice though to be upgraded or get a good upsell to the Garden Villas! There's always a chance...

[2boyzmom]

Why don't the ABs sell well? They are the only suites that will accomidate a family of four?

[2Cruise4Ever]

The AF mini suites can accommodate 4. But the AB's are the only Penthouses that can accommodate 4. And, the jump from an AF to an AB is a pretty significant hike price-wise. So, maybe that's why. The chances of an upsell to the Garden Villa is slim to none. Over the last 3 years I have yet to see a Garden Villa even available for an upsell (on the Dawn anyway).

 

You'll aboslutely love the AB, though. It's perfect for a family of 4!

[terrymtex01]

I have a friend who works in the cruise industry and according to him, when they go through and offer upgrade to you they will approach the people who paid full price for the cabin they are currently in first. If you book a guarantee rate since it is reduced, you will probably be one of the last to be offered upgrades.

 

We have sailed with NCL twice and about to do our third. The first cruise we were offered an upgrade to a nicer suite for a very small fee. The second and the third we had to pay for the upgrade outright because we were guest of casino at sea's and they had put us in mini-suites and we wanted at least a penthouse.

 

I don't believe I have ever read where someone was booked in a AB and offered to upgrade to the Garden Villa (and I read cruise reviews daily). But if they do offer you that, I will be GREEN with envy.

[cruizinwithkids]

I sailed on the Dawn in 2006. During the cruise we had a tour of the Garden Villa. We were told that upsells are never done for the garden villa. Within a week of returning, someone had posted that they had gotten an upsell to a GV. Again, the mystery of the upsell fairy.

[flgirl]

Why wouldn't they upsell the AA suite to a Garden suite before an AB suite? Doesn't that cost more money? Does the Dawn even have an AA owners suite?

[jhayman]

Why wouldn't they upsell the AA suite to a Garden suite before an AB suite? Doesn't that cost more money? Does the Dawn even have an AA owners suite?

 

Yes, there are AA suites on the Dawn. They would probably upsell an AB to the Garden Villa before an AA because AB guests will more than likely have 3-4 people in the cabin since it has 2 bedrooms. I believe the AA only has one bedroom?

 

So the total price paid could potentially be more for someone in an AB cabin since there would be more people. Plus it would almost be a waste for only 2 people to be in one of the huge Garden Villa suites.

[gcjstri]

My DH and i are booked in an AB on the Dawn in October (just the two of us). I am hoping for an upsell to an AA Owners Suite. The price was just too good to pass up the AB Suite. I have heard that u get free liquor bottles with the AA Owners Suite. There are probably other special perks besides the liquor that i am not aware of YET that come with the Owners Suite

:) :) :)

[beachchick]

My DH and i are booked in an AB on the Dawn in October (just the two of us). I am hoping for an upsell to an AA Owners Suite. The price was just too good to pass up the AB Suite. I have heard that u get free liquor bottles with the AA Owners Suite. There are probably other special perks besides the liquor that i am not aware of YET that come with the Owners Suite

:) :) :)

 

I've recently read (here and elsewhere) that the AAs no longer have the bottles of liquor included, but you'll want to confirm that with someone who knows for sure.

 

beachchick

[Cruise_More_Often]

2boyzmom, have you made your decision yet? Come back and let us know!

[salty dingo]

We have an AB/AF combo booked on the Pearl, and they are connecting cabins. I don't think they could offer an upgrade to the AB that we would like since the cabins are connecting, and it forms one big suite for our family.

 

If they upgraded to the GV, I guess all four of us could be in the same cabin, but that would be moving two cabins into one, and they would not want us to REDUCE the number of cabins sold!

[waltd]

At what point in time could you expect a call from NCL to try and do an upsell? Enquiring minds would like to know. :) My cruise is in Jan. 09

 

Thanks

 

Joe

[VoyageVirgin]

Waltd - The upsell comes depending on how well the ship is selling - less passengers signed up - the sooner they call. If the ship is semi full with the upper tier still open they will start calling.

 

As for upsells to the Garden Villas - We were booked into a Courtyard Villa

(Jade) paid in full - early December 07 - received a call 2 weeks prior to sailing for a upsell to the Deluxe Owners Suite (yes we did get 3 bottles of premium liquor) Two days before we left we received an email offer to upsell to the Garden Villa for an additional 2500. pp - no we didn't - that money will go towards another cruise, and it really was only the two of us. Got to see it - very nice.

[joycep13]

We have an AB/AF combo booked on the Pearl, and they are connecting cabins. I don't think they could offer an upgrade to the AB that we would like since the cabins are connecting, and it forms one big suite for our family.

 

If they upgraded to the GV, I guess all four of us could be in the same cabin, but that would be moving two cabins into one, and they would not want us to REDUCE the number of cabins sold!

 

Though that would make sense, it's not actually true, at least in our case - we got an upsell from 2 suites to 1 Garden Villa on our Feb 2008 13-night Panama Canal cruise. Originally we had one AB Penthouse with 5 people and one AE Penthouse with 2 people and we were able to trade both in (plus some add'l cash!) for one Garden Villa on the Norwegian Jade.

 

If you're interested in the details....

My family and I were offered an upsell to a Garden Villa on our 13-night Panama Cruise earlier this year (Feb 16-29, 2008) on the Norwegian Jade. My parents, aunt, brother and I (5 of us) had paid for an AB Penthouse on Deck 11 fwd. Two weeks before the cruise we received an upsell offer from NCL - via our TA - to a Garden Villa for $8250 total (we weren't going to take it).

 

But out of curiosity we asked our TA to check with NCL on whether it was possible to trade in TWO cabins for the Garden Villa, and if so how much. (Another one of my brothers and his wife had an AE Penthouse Suite on the stern of Deck 8 and they were interested in chasing after the GV Holy Grail with us ;) We figured NCL wouldn't allow us to trade in 2 suites for 1 villa, or that the upsell price would be cost prohibitive, but to our great surprise, NCL offered the 7 of us the Garden Villa for $3500 total - sounded good to us so we took it!

 

The Math: That worked out to $500 p.p. for the upsell. The total cost of staying in the Garden Villa came to around $22-23K (or a little over $3200 p.p.) total for the 2-week cruise - VERY WELL WORTH IT. The Garden Villa space, amenities, and perks were extraordinary! And with an elderly, not-too-mobile parent we spent a great deal of our time just hanging around, even having dinner most nights, in the Villa.

 

BTW - the other Garden Villa on our cruise (there are 2 on the ship) was occupied by a couple who, from what I heard anyway, also were in a GV due to an upsell or upgrade offer, however I don't know the details of their situation. (They were the only 2 in their Villa. Must have been roomy for them! In our GV, we had 7 people staying there, plus a 3rd brother and his girlfriend (who had an inside cabin on Deck 11) came to hang out in the Villa with us - making 9 total at times - and we'd still lose track of where everyone was in the Villa because of all the space (3 bdrms, garden patio with hot tub, steam room, upstairs sundeck, etc.)

 

In other posts I've seen people asking what prompts a tap of the wand from the Upsell Fairy:

- Long-time cruiser? No, this was only our third trip on any cruise line so we're cruising lightweights

- Being a loyal NCL customer (or having a high Latitude status)? No, this was our first cruise with NCL

- A loyal travel agent you do business with a lot, who's really assertive and 'fights' for you? In our case, not really - this was the first time we'd used this TA, And our TA is not a heavy-hitter in the travel field. He actually owns and runs a business totally unrelated to travel, and only does travel work on the side. I know our TA did not initiate getting the upsell offer (I understand that's not possible as NCL has a "we'll call you" upsell/upgrade policy) nor do any 'negotiating' on pricing, so it appears having an assertive TA isn't necessarily needed to get a good upsell offer.

 

So at least in our case, getting the upsell offer didn't have anything to do with anything we "did", per se, but rather must have been based on facts & figures known only to the Upsell Fairy!

 

BTW, I've seen people post that NCL only allows 6 adults and 1 or 2 children max. in a Garden Villa. However we had 7 adults (no kids), and we would have been allowed an 8th in the room if we'd had one (so actually 8 adults is the maximum capacity for the GV, per NCL. There are queen beds in each of the 3 bdrms, plus they'll let you have up to 2 cots. Which, I can attest firsthand, are pretty comfortable - I drew the short straw :) This is true on the Jade, anyway, though I would imagine that it would apply to any GV on any ship.

 

Cheers,

Joyce

[2boyzmom]

2boyzmom, have you made your decision yet? Come back and let us know!

 

I landed up booking the 9 night for President's Week 2010 on the Dawn. I really wanted to be on the Pearl or Gem, but the Gem is doing a cold 7 nighter Bahama trip from NY and the Pearl is only 7 nights. The kids really will miss a slide and the kids area in the back looks like a toddler area. I booked the AB for a great price plus 50% off deposit. I'm thrilled to finally book a suite!!

[beachchick]

joycep13: Just wanted to say that was nicely done! What a superb deal.:D

 

beachchick

[joycep13]

joycep13: Just wanted to say that was nicely done! What a superb deal. :D

 

beachchick

 

Thanks beachchick! I appreciate everyone sharing their experiences here (on these boards) so I thought sharing some of ours was the least I could do.

 

This was probably a 1-time shot for us (will likely never get it for that value again), but if we get to stay in another GV some day we'll be sure and invite all the CC-ers in for a get together ;)

 

Cheers ~Joyce

[freestylecruizer]

There are 10 AB suites on the Dawn. If I book a "guarantee" what would be my chances of an upgrade? It looks like the next cabin to accomidate 4 people is a garden villa and I cannot imagine being upgraded to that :)

 

A friend of mine booked an AB on the Star last October and they were offered an upsell (not upgrade) to a Garden Villa - however the upsell price was more than the price of another cruise, so they decided against it - it was tempting.