Upgrade Fairy

[dam1050]

Have you had a visit from the "upgrade fairy" for any of your past cruises?

[Krazy Kruizers]

:)

No because we always book suites.

:)

[Esme]

Yes, once. From a B to an A - same cabin different location. Didn't figure it was much of an upgrade. :rolleyes:

[spcl4cs_gal]

Yes, on this coming cruise...from a BB to an A.

[CaptData]

:mad: :mad: No, they don't upgrade disabled people at all on any line. :mad:

[jhannah]

We've been lucky to receive upgrades. On the Zuiderdam, there was a problem with the plumbing in the cabin we'd booked. Engineering decided to make a permanent fix during our cruise, thus taking that AA cabin out of service. An SS came open at the last minute due to a cancellation, so they put us there. Nice!

We also got upgraded to a full suite on the Coral Princess. That was really nice!

[olderpilot]

Last year on the Oosterdam. Found out just before we left for Copenhagen that we had been upgraded from an A to an S. I was double checking our shore excursions and noticed we had a new cabin number. What a happy surprise.

Not sure why - maybe because we had booked almost a year early and hung in there through war and pestilence (Iraq, SARS) and tough reviews about the new Vista class. As well, the suite was one of those next to the midships elevators, which are the last to be sold. At any rate we were most appreciative and enjoyed it to the max.

Jerry

[starysacz]

Once from S to PH and twice from B to S.

[tomc]

No, they don't upgrade disabled people at all on any line. Probably they don't upgrade people who need the special cabins. I've been upgraded several times (without HAL knowing of my disability), but I can use a regular cabin. I would imagine that if I needed one of the specially-designed cabins, I might have to take what was available.

[dst]

on our upcoming honeymoon cruise from a BB to an S on the Zuiderdam. Looking forward to it :)

[LAFFNVEGAS]

We have always been our own Upgrade Fairy:p . Sometimes just a few weeks before, such as the Zuirderdam last April. I think we were driving our TA nuts for our Zuirderdam cruise. We switched cabins 3 times, all upgrades we paid for.
We will be in our first Inside cabin on the Ryndam although we will be on the Navigation Deck. I actually do not want any upgrade unless it is to a Suite and I will even pay extra. For some reason all the Verandah cabins are booked and not very good locations left for the outside cabins so an upgrade in my opinion would be lousy unless a Verandah opened up.:D

My guess for our Westerdam cruise in March is we will be our own upgrade fairy again. We are seriously considering SS or maybe an S. "It's Only Money":eek:

[RevNeal]

From an inside M to an outside D
From an inside J to an outside C
From an inside J to a B

I paid a small fee for the J to a B (small = $100 per person) at the pier.

[trustee55]

Hi!
We have been most fortunate to be upgraded on all but one of our HAL cruises.
On our last cruise on the Prinsendam in May, we booked a BC and were upgraded to an SS. It was wonderful!
We have booked an outside guarantee for our upcoming Canada/New England cruise on October 20-30 and will be waiting patiently to see where we end up.
However, any day onboard ship is a PLUS.

Happy Sailing,

Carol Ann

[obriendan]

In nine cruises we have been upgraded twice. On the Ryndam Panama Canal cruise we were upgraded from a C to a veranda B. On the QE2 transatlantic we were upgraded from C1 to Princess Grill.

[SHayesShip]

BC (solid balcony w/ shower only) to A on Zuiderdam.
J (inside) to BC (outside w/ balcony) on Coral Princess.
Inside to Outside cabin on Crown Princess and Ocean Princess.
Low inside to "larger" inside (what a laugh-larger compared to what?)RCCL Vision OTS
Inside-Riviera Deck to Outside Empress Deck twice on CCL Jubilee


Have you had a visit from the "upgrade fairy" for any of your past cruises?

[Druke I]

Upgraded in-transit on Maasdam, 11-95 trans-Atlantic, after some half dozen cabins forward on main deck flooded during Atlantic storm. Water entered hull through hawsepipe (anchor chainway).

Luckily, there were open cabins to which we could be moved.

Would have liked to be upgraded to a suite, but alas, just one category, same deck, midships.

Michael

[Sailure]

Have you had a visit from the "upgrade fairy" for any of your past cruises?
I always book a suite, but a couple times I was upgraded from a mini-suite on the Century to a sky suite and once the royal suite from a sky suite. That was nice.:)

[iluvcruzin]

Has anyone had an upgrade they didn't care for? I just called my TA as I'm new to HAL and asked about the policy. Unless you specifically say you don't want an upgrade they will do it. However, she did say that if you select a cabin (like I did), the chances aren't as great. Sure I think an upgrade would be nice - just not ones forward on the ship.

[Santa Fe Jim]

Has anyone had an upgrade they didn't care for? I just called my TA as I'm new to HAL and asked about the policy. Unless you specifically say you don't want an upgrade they will do it. However, she did say that if you select a cabin (like I did), the chances aren't as great. Sure I think an upgrade would be nice - just not ones forward on the ship.
I had "upgrade" from an L inside guarantee to an F outside last time. While it was nice to be able to tell day from night, I couldn't see much else due to salt on the window, and the waves. It was on the lowest deck near the stern and was terribly noisy when docking. I think I would have preferred an inside in a better location (or the Penthouse;) ). Previously had a B guarantee and received that, which was just fine.


SFJ

[RevNeal]

However, she did say that if you select a cabin (like I did), the chances aren't as great. Sure I think an upgrade would be nice - just not ones forward on the ship.

This has been my experience -- choose a specific cabin and among the only reasons why they might want to move you is if they've got a big group they don't want to break up, and they need the cabin you're in to keep 'em together. That happened to me on the Statendam in November/December 2002. They moved me from an M inside amidships to an E outside, amidships. It was a VERY good upgrade -- worth, at the time, about $800 per person, if memory serves me correctly.

Once I was offered an upgrade from my favorite J category to what is now an HH category far forward on an S-class ship. I turned it down. Like you, don't like being forward of the forward elevators. Oh, I've had to take a forward cabin when I did an ROS Guarantee ... C104, forward on the Verandah deck (but with no verandah! :( ). It wasn't bad, but the motion was more than I would have liked.

[seattleadjuster]

We got one from regular outside to an outside suite. We had 4 windows, 5 foot wide each. We were in heaven! It was on the SS Norway.

[jhannah]

... if you select a cabin (like I did), the chances aren't as great.H-m-m-m. Maybe so ... but we always select a specific cabin and have been upgraded 3 times out of 5. Not bad odds! Since all SS cabins are sold out on our upcoming Prinsendam sailing, and S and PH are still available, I just might hold out a glimmer of hope to receive another bump. If not, that's fine. I love HAL's SS staterooms.

[Orcrone]

Has anyone had an upgrade they didn't care for? I just called my TA as I'm new to HAL and asked about the policy. Unless you specifically say you don't want an upgrade they will do it. However, she did say that if you select a cabin (like I did), the chances aren't as great. Sure I think an upgrade would be nice - just not ones forward on the ship.Maureen,

I was playing on HAL's website and went part way through the booking process. If you select a specific cabin they actually have you select whether you want to stay in that cabin, or will allow an upgrade.

[Cauvet]

Never upgraded, always book a specific balcony cabin

[mattR]

I got a great upgrade on a Princess cruise in 2002. Booked inside garuntee and was upgraded to a Balcony cabin. No Idea why others that were traveling with us seperate bookings were upgraded to ocean views.

[dam1050]

I must say that I'm surprised to see how many people have been upgraded on this board....I think that's really good.

I was offered one upgrade once on Princess (who seem to have far too many categories much the same) -- however it did not appear to be much of a difference between the balcony cabin I'd already booked and was not in as good a location, so I declined.

Have never received an upgrade on Celebrity, HAL, NCL, or RCI cruises I've sailed, but have also never tried for a "guarantee" ... perhaps I should ?

Thanks for taking part in the polls ...

Dave

[Phil_W]

We were upgraded to a suite on Wind Surf on our honeymoon. Our agent told us that she was putting "honeymoon" on every comment field she could find because that is usually good for upgrades on the cruise/hotels/airlines/etc.

We'll be on the 7/31 Zuiderdam but no upgrades. Perhaps we should have called it another honeymoon. :)

[drdaddy]

Had a very interesting upgrade last year on Explorer of the Seas. We booked cabin 1688. This is top deck, corner, aft. Huge cabin for the same price as others in the category. Many people die for this one. Well, 10 days before the cruise, someone on our Roll Call thread said everyone should check their cabin numbers. She had the mirror image cabin as we did. Well, lo and behold, RCCL "upgraded" us one category. They called it a suite but due to the configuration of the cabin we had, we did not want this. They did not even tellus about the upgrade. We only found out when our online forms had a new cabin number. Very bad experience and it took ALOT of yelling to get this cabin back. Never got an answer as to the reason.

Revneal, those upgrades from inside to out. Were they guarantees or just luck?

And to all. These upgrades. Were y'all previous cruisers (especially interested in HAL)? We have an inside gurantee and we are anxioulsly awaiting our assignment. We leave 8/28.

Hi, MattR! I think we have spoken quite a bit in the past.

Thanks, all.

[alexMD]

Hi,

I wanted to say how impressed I am with HAL. I had a SS (Superior Verandah) Suite booked on the New Year's cruise and just got upgraded to a "S" (Deluxe Verandah) and given a refund. I just got the news from my TA today.

[jhannah]

That's fantastic! Good for you. I'm guessing this is because of the promo they're running on S suites. Just curious ... did your TA find this for you, or did you have to prompt him/her to investigate?

[Jeal]

jhannah - what promotion is being run on S suites? And, where would I find it?

[jhannah]

I think I was mistakenly thinking of Promo 5069 what offered free business class airfare for booking a suite on certain Prinsendam or Westerdam sailings. I mixed this in with seeing where S suites are just less than $200 more than SS on HAL's website for our sailing.

[Jeal]

Thanks for letting me know. We are booked on the Zaandam for New Year's - category A. I haven't noticed that suites were going down in price but maybe alexMD will shed some light on this. We like where our cabin is located so don't really care about the upgrade but thought if there was a promotion we would contact our TA about it. I love this board. I have gotten tons of useful info on it including the info about the $100 shipboard credit that we notified our TA about for this sailing.

[Roadwork]

We have been upgraded many times on various cruise lines. On Holland we went from an ROS to a C twice. Once we booked a C and got upgraded to a mini suite. We were happy cruisers.

[1cruiselvr]

I don't think you can compare upgrades from different cruiselines, as each one practices a different upgrade method, some being more generous than others. Also, some cruiselines offer upgrades at the pier for a reduced price and others do not. So I wonder if the original poster of the upgrade question is generally curious or is asking specifically about HAL upgrades because there is a difference. HAL sails full most of the time. It has a very loyal suite/balcony clientele so your chances of an upgrade to that category is substantially less than other cruiselines. Also HAL ships are smaller in comparison to some of the larger ships that sail in other cruiselines. The larger the ship, the more cabins potentially open for last minute freebie upgrades.
Happy Sailing!