Be very careful when booking onboard!

We made a mistake by booking a future cruise while onboard the Escape T/A. When we talked to one of the very experienced people at the Future Cruise desk they were very sharp, and when we said we were ready to book we were handed off to a novice "to complete the paperwork". Our intent was to book directly with NCL and he apparently set it up through a travel agent without even asking us; then to make matters worse they used a Future Cruise credit we just bought (good for 4 years) rather than an old one that expires in 2017. We told him we wanted to use the old one...

Now 5 phone calls and 10 days since we disembarked I am still trying to get this corrected (as one might expect each phone call to NCL results in 3 or 4 handoffs)! Be very cautious and question everything especially if they try to impress you with a 90 second booking time. You do not receive any printout while on the ship and need to get home before you can print it out and see what you just booked (unlike how Celebrity handles these by giving you an immediate confirmation...by then the damage is done if they make errors.

Booking while on a cruise is VERY new for Norwegian, perhaps they are still 'learning' as well. Sorry this has been such a hassle for you.

Booking while on a cruise is VERY new for Norwegian, perhaps they are still 'learning' as well. Sorry this has been such a hassle for you.

No matter how long they have been doing things on NCL, most of the time they are still 'learning'. So much incompetence at every level.

We booked on board the Dawn last month. The promotions are not what they appear, on one statement it reads

" Specialty Dining Package:

First two stateroom guests can eat at Norwegian Cruise Line's award winning specialty restaurants throughout your cruise."

When the dust settles it is only for 6 nights on a 14 day cruise, it does state only 6 nights on other parts of the booking form. However, in my mind "throughout" means the whole cruise not just a portion of it. An analogy may be "you have use of a cabin throughout the 14 day cruise, (except for 8 nights)" The folks on the ship are not all that well informed. We have other issues and are trying to explain to NCL representatives what we were told regarding other promotions and promises, which are not been honoured so far. The staff were very helpful but not convinced of what we were told on the ship, we are waiting for a call back. It is hard to get anything in writing on the ship, once home things are very different.

Our intent was to book directly with NCL and he apparently set it up through a travel agent without even asking us

Sorry that the whole thing happened to you, but the quoted above happens with other cruise lines too, assigning the new reservation like the current one is the default procedure and most people seem to want it (and TAs would be pissed if cruise lines stole their clients as default).

Also with Celebrity you need to specifically state if you do not want the reservation assigned to the party that handled your current cruise (if you book with the order form they send to cabins, it even has a separate checkbox at the bottom to not to assign the new res like current one).

I'd previously posted about issues with my booking made while on the Escape TA, too. Nothing this big of a deal, but still...

We made a mistake by booking a future cruise while onboard the Escape T/A. When we talked to one of the very experienced people at the Future Cruise desk they were very sharp, and when we said we were ready to book we were handed off to a novice "to complete the paperwork". Our intent was to book directly with NCL and he apparently set it up through a travel agent without even asking us; then to make matters worse they used a Future Cruise credit we just bought (good for 4 years) rather than an old one that expires in 2017. We told him we wanted to use the old one...

 

Now 5 phone calls and 10 days since we disembarked I am still trying to get this corrected (as one might expect each phone call to NCL results in 3 or 4 handoffs)! Be very cautious and question everything especially if they try to impress you with a 90 second booking time. You do not receive any printout while on the ship and need to get home before you can print it out and see what you just booked (unlike how Celebrity handles these by giving you an immediate confirmation...by then the damage is done if they make errors.

I didn't see any benefit to booking on-board. It's the same perks they are offering right now. Thanks for the warning though. You aren't the first person this has happened to!

I didn't see any benefit to booking on-board. It's the same perks they are offering right now. Thanks for the warning though. You aren't the first person this has happened to!

The only benefit I saw is that if the promos end, and 8 months from now I want to cancel my cruise and book something else, I retain the promo.

I hope you get it worked out, my wife recently booked our first cruise with NCL and it has been a horrible experience so far. I was too busy to help her and found the cruise online that I asked her to book, instead of giving us the 2 staterooms for our 5 person family they stuck us all in one small one! Even thought there online price for 2 was cheaper. We have spent weeks trying to get it straightened out and they want to charge us $1500 cancelation to move to the original rooms we asked for. We have spent over 10 hours on hold for them and it has always ended in them telling us someone would call us back. I never imagined that we would start a vacation off feeling this cheated!

If you were booking to get the free promo on the cruise the Consultant did the right thing with applying the new credit vs the old one sitting in your account. The old FCC does NOT give you the extra promo so they would need to apply the newest one to that booking.

I cannot for the life of me figure out why they would use TA when they work for NCL. They cannot even do an onboard booking for a CAS player.

Did you book the original trip with a TA? Have you ever heard of the TA?? If you booked with a TA; and booked onboard, they are supposed to send that to the TA.

I hope you get it worked out, my wife recently booked our first cruise with NCL and it has been a horrible experience so far. I was too busy to help her and found the cruise online that I asked her to book, instead of giving us the 2 staterooms for our 5 person family they stuck us all in one small one! Even thought there online price for 2 was cheaper. We have spent weeks trying to get it straightened out and they want to charge us $1500 cancelation to move to the original rooms we asked for. We have spent over 10 hours on hold for them and it has always ended in them telling us someone would call us back. I never imagined that we would start a vacation off feeling this cheated!

This is confusing. What cabin did you book? I always book two connecting balcony cabins, the PCC gives me options, I look at the locations online, and agree to those cabins.

We made a mistake by booking a future cruise while onboard the Escape T/A. When we talked to one of the very experienced people at the Future Cruise desk they were very sharp, and when we said we were ready to book we were handed off to a novice "to complete the paperwork". Our intent was to book directly with NCL and he apparently set it up through a travel agent without even asking us; then to make matters worse they used a Future Cruise credit we just bought (good for 4 years) rather than an old one that expires in 2017. We told him we wanted to use the old one...

 

Now 5 phone calls and 10 days since we disembarked I am still trying to get this corrected (as one might expect each phone call to NCL results in 3 or 4 handoffs)! Be very cautious and question everything especially if they try to impress you with a 90 second booking time. You do not receive any printout while on the ship and need to get home before you can print it out and see what you just booked (unlike how Celebrity handles these by giving you an immediate confirmation...by then the damage is done if they make errors.

I'm sorry you didn't get what you expected. Did you book the cruise you were on with that Travel Agent? If so, that is automatically who gets the booking for the FCC cruise booked aboard.

Also, the bookings aboard automatically use the FCC just purchased. But I do agree that when you told them you wanted to use the old one they should have told you that is not part of the onboard booking process. You then could have waited until you got home and did the booking with old one.

If I book another cruise while on board, the promotions better be good and the prices too. Otherwise, I see no advantage when it restricts you to 1 change. I also do not want to use the same travel agency (a big box warehouse) but it sounds like we are forced to do that.

The only benefit I saw is that if the promos end, and 8 months from now I want to cancel my cruise and book something else, I retain the promo.

We are hoping that the promo is transferable too after the current one ends, who knows. That is why we re-booked our cruises yesterday before the current promo ends. The ones we made on the ship were chosen arbitrary by the cruise consultant, she also suggested we use NCL instead of our TA. As another poster wrote, stay on line with the agent until you have been emailed the booking and go over everything. We are still waiting for our call back from NCL.

Booking while on a cruise is VERY new for Norwegian, perhaps they are still 'learning' as well. Sorry this has been such a hassle for you.

NCL had on board booking in the past, stopped for a while, and resumed the practice. Newer staff might not know how to do it.

When we booked this onboard we specifically told the cruise consultant that we did not want to use the online agency that we used 18 months prior with whom we made the Escape booking. On Celebrity when we tell them this we simply signed a form stating we did not want to go through the travel agent for the new booking and it was not an issue. (We stopped using TA's a year ago due to time delays when we wanted to make changes). Celebrity in the past has definitely offered additional perks for booking onboard unlike NCL.

The only reason we booked onboard is that over a 2 day weekend (ending 11/1) NCL offered 2 perks rather than only one on Trans Atlantics (which is what we booked). Cabin choice was not an issue since we know the Jewell Class ships quite well and it was pretty wide open.

We should have this cleared up by early next week but boy have I spent a lot of time on the phone!

NCL had on board booking in the past, stopped for a while, and resumed the practice. Newer staff might not know how to do it.

When NCL used to book onboard there were no FCC's and no promos such as the ones now. I booked a future cruise aboard NCL ship in 2005 and it did not have all the complications that today's onboard booking with an FCC had.

Next April when aboard NCL's Jade I will purchase a FCC but will wait until I'm home to book the October cruise we are planning.