handicapped rooms

[oliviaonthe beach]

I am wondering about something...I have reserved an SS cat. and an inside cat. cabin on Zuiderdam. Both are on the Navigation deck but they are not right across the hall from each other. Originally, the cabins were right across the hall but I upgraded to SS from Verandah to surprise my DH. Our 16 year old daughter and friend will be sharing the inside cabin. There happens to be a handicapped inside cabin almost directly across the hall from our SS instead of about 8 doors down like our currently reserbed one is. Obviously, I would never want to "steal" the handicapped cabin from a truly disabled person but what is the best way to get first dibs on it if noone handicapped reserves it? My TA is being very UNhelpful about this. Any ideas???

[jcrandle]

If you search the HA forum with handicap as a keyword, you will doubtless find much confusion about HA's process of assigning HC designated cabins. I will preface this that I am not HC (other than mental) and have no axe to grind, yet I consider myself sensitive to the requirements of HC.

HA's stated policy is that they will ask for a "special needs" document (my terminology) to be filled out when an accessible cabin is booked. Various posters have disputed whether this is uniformly enforced, and I tend to believe that HA is less than perfect in verifying that an accessible cabin is going to be occupied by a HC individual.

That said, it is clear that HA cannot reserve accessible cabins forever and lose the revenue for an unsold cabin.

The real problem is that only HA has all of the information to judge whether they are in sync with their stated policy on accessible cabins. Several posters have stated that HA has been less than frank with them when they have requested assistance in determining if there are accessible cabins that are occupied by able bodied pax that could be moved to other cabins.

If I were booked into an accessible cabin, I would go on record with HA that I did NOT require that level of accomodation, and would specifically state that I would be willing to be moved to another cabin of equal or higher category if it were needed by a handicapped pax.

Other than that, I don't know how to determine if HA is really living up to its stated policies on HC pax.

[Oceanwench]

When is your cruise?
You could contact HAL now and explain the situation and ask if they would move your daughter & her friend to the room across from you at some point, if/when the HC rooms are made available to the general public.

If you move your daughter to the HC room, with the understanding that if a person with HC needs the room you'll give it up, are you prepared for HAL to move her to another deck? That could happen. Although I have heard that HAL does not keep any list of able-bodied people occupying HC rooms.

Eight rooms away is not that far, and at least you know you have that room booked.