Pay upgrades at Port?

[tamu91]

I'm new to HAL so here is an upgrade question for you HAL veterans. Does HAL offer pay upgrades at Port during check-in and if so, what's the process? Thanks in advance.

[Krazy Kruizers]

IF there are any cabins left -- you can pay for upgrade -- but it won't be cheap. HAL charges what the cabin would cost without any say like TA discounts or early booking discounts or sales. In other words -- IF there is a better cabin still available expect to pay big bucks.

[kazu]

If there are upsells, you normally get them offered to you one to two weeks before you cruise. That doesn't mean that you might not get upgraded. That happened to cruise companions last cruise. However, as you will see on the boards, an upgrade is not always a good thing.

Hal will try to sell their higher end cabins in advance of the cruise at a discount. If you booked an inside, don't expect a call for a suite though unless everyone else has turned it down first. however, if you book a verandah, you might get an offer for a superior verandah, for example. Won't be free but at a substantial discount.

That's your best bet IMO

[jtl513]

In other words -- IF there is a better cabin still available expect to pay big bucks.
In other words, if you're willing to pay the difference for an upgrade, you may as well do it now while they're available!

Or HOPE they call you with an upsell offer before embarkation day, which would be a little cheaper as kazu said. We've only gotten one upsell offer in 10 cruises, and we passed because it wasn't enough of a bargain to us.

[3rdGenCunarder]

On a number of cruises, I've seen little signs on the counter at checkin: "This sailing if fully booked, so cabin changes will not be possible." or words to that effect. And I'm not so sure they really were sold out. It's done to stop people from asking.

Unless you're an elite frequent flier, airlines won't do cheap upsells at checkin, either. Virgin offers a cheap upsell to "premium economy" at the time of booking. But if you ask about doing it at checkin, they charge the difference between what you paid (in our case cheap because of early booking) and what it would sell for if someone were to buy that ticket at that moment.

[tamu91]

I'm ecstatic with the deal we got for our December cruise so we'd be fine no matter where we end up as long as we're sailing. DCL offers substantial savings during check-in so I was curious about HAL. Thanks all for your input.

[Jade13]

all of our HAL cruises have been sold out so there was never any option.

[kazu]

correct. they are normally sold out. and upsells or upgrades happens before you get there. :):)

[noblepa]

On a number of cruises, I've seen little signs on the counter at checkin: "This sailing if fully booked, so cabin changes will not be possible." or words to that effect. And I'm not so sure they really were sold out. It's done to stop people from asking.

I seriously doubt that HAL, or any other cruise line, would deliberately leave money on the table in that way. If there are cabins available, and someone is willing to pay more money to upgrade, they're going to take that money!

If the cruise is, in fact, sold out, then, yes, those signs are to answer the question before it is asked.

When I see those signs, on almost every cruise I've been on, I believe them.

There have also been quite a few threads here, about cabins that had something go seriously wrong, like a burst pipe, and the ship had no where to move the pax to. I have to believe that most cruises really do sail full.

Paul