Being bumped from a reserved cabin

This has not happened to me yet but there are a number of reports on Facebook pages where this has happened. Thomson's standard response seem to be 'double booking, sorry, here is your £45 back. What do people think Thomson could do to make this less likely to happen and if it does, what should their response be?

You should be able to book your cabin when you book your cruise on line like you could with Ocean Village and pay for the whole cruise in one go The programme should be able to block couples booking a 4 berth cabin where a 2/3 berth is available They can manage to do it when you book your plane seats so why not for cabins?

If double booking does happen the first people to book the cabin should get it and Thomson should know the time to the second it's booked from the email confirmation they send - not the first cruisers to board

I did a dummy booking this morning for a P&O Oceana fly cruise next July, The program happily allowed me to select a 4 berth cabin for a 2 person booking. Maybe there is a block during school holidays?

I agree reserving a cabin during booking is logical and not rocket science but when is Thomson HQ logical?

I think the least they could do is point out in writing to people who book a 4 berth for 2 or cabins with connecting doors that they could be bumped by a 3 or 4 booking if that happens later.

Their response should be to compensate you for their mistake !! :(

Their response should be to compensate you for their mistake !! :(

They seem to think that refunding your £45 is sufficient compensation even if the replacement cabin is in a part of the ship you did not want.

IMO when they do this they are selling something that is not available which has trading standards implications, think I may have been fortunate that we have never experienced it in all our cruises but would not be happy having booked 15months in advanced being moved!

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On facebook someone mentioned someone being bumped from cabin 7060 on Discovery because a family wanted cabins with interconnecting doors. Apparently 7060 does not have an interconnecting door so they were being told porkies. I think it more likely that they were the victims of someone wanting 2 adjacent cabins and refusing to book if they did not get their wish, especially as one of the cabins next door was a higher grade. Or they could be the victims of a chain of bumps.

then you have the simple? C..up. Someone booked 3 adjacent balcony cabins on Spirit and they were ALL double booked. with the rarity of balcony cabins how can you compensate for the required downgrading?

Using dat/time of booking is little help as they are not going to disclose that information are they!

If you make a booking naming only 2 adults you should not be able to book a 4 berth cabin whether on line or by phone. I have tried this - cabin 7133 on Dream and was told I could book it but if a 4 berth was required by a family booking later they would move us - not wanting to risk this have always since booked 7129 then have checked who was in the 4 berth cabin and it has always been a couple However we always travel outside school holidays so maybe it would be worth the risk in future

Also on adult only cruises highly unlikely 4 adults would want a 4 berth

At least you were told you might be bumped but they should do this for all bookings including through TA's.

Totally agree

I did a dummy booking this morning for a P&O Oceana fly cruise next July, The program happily allowed me to select a 4 berth cabin for a 2 person booking. Maybe there is a block during school holidays?

 

I agree reserving a cabin during booking is logical and not rocket science but when is Thomson HQ logical?

 

I think the least they could do is point out in writing to people who book a 4 berth for 2 or cabins with connecting doors that they could be bumped by a 3 or 4 booking if that happens later.

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Sorry didn't mean to reply but can't delete this![emoji848]

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More news from facebook, someone booked two adjacent double cabins soon after the brochure launch and have now been bumped to 2 cabins at the other end of the ship. WHY?

Someone else reported that a cruise director told them that this can happen if a regular customer booking later wants one of those cabins they will bump the original customers to retain the regular customers business.

If true this is atrocious

When we were on the Celebration last month we were asked to go to reception and tell them how many cruises we have done with Thomson. Later, we were invited to a cocktail party and were told that Thomson didn't know how many cruises people had done previously as they hadn't any records. Not sure if that is correct or not but with Thomson, anything is possible.

They say they have records as a couple of years ago they contacted us informing us we had cruised fifty times with them which I felt was incorrect.

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They have records because on my last cruise there was a half bottle of champers in my cabin in recognition of the number of cruises I had done with them. Later in the cruise we had a reception in the concierge lounge, again because I was a valued repeat customer.

We have booked 2 inter-connecting cabins on Explorer for next year (2 in each cabin)....I hope neither of us gets bumped bearing in mind we have both paid £45 for the cabins. I don't want to have paid £45 to have an inter-connecting cabin to a total stranger ;-)

My Mum and I are doing our first cruise next month and booked our cabin when we arranged it back at the beginning of the year. I will be most annoyed if we lose our cabin as it is close to the lifts which will be vital so I am not pushing her wheelchair all over the ship. :confused:

Last Thursday I received a call from Thomson stating they were delighted to offer me an upgrade to extra leg room seat on flight to Jamaica, April 2018. When I requested to see seating configuration on the plane I wasinformed that I had only two rows to choose from and that once I had PAID for the upgrade then I would be able to pick and reserve my seat as I have already paid to pre reserve seats. I thought when they said they were delighted to offer me an upgrade I thought that it was a Complimentary upgrade. The conversation concluded by the person from Thomson saying she would phone me back later in the day after she sent me an-e-mail with the seat configuaration and then I could decide whether to upgrade or not. Needless to say she did not phone back.

Yesterday, I was once again contacted by Thomson with the same scenario relating to flight seating. I was also asked would I like to change my cabin number that I had previously chosen,when I informed the caller that as I had previously requested certain cabin numbers but unfortunately they had been already reserved I would settle for the one I have now. I was then asked the numbers of the specific cabins previously requested and to my amazement informed that both were available and I could change cabins, needless to say I opted for my first choice.

After having been puton hold (I kid you not) for 15min

I was then informed that neither of the cabins WERE available. I was then very quickly thanked forholding on and the call said goodbye and hung up. I didnt even get the chance to ask any further questions. This morning once again I have received an autmated call asking if I was satisfied with the way the caller from the call centre handled my call yesterday. Do Thomson carry out this practise on a regular basis or am I just unlucky to have had three calls within four days. Should I preparefor more ❓oh forgot to mention that I had also received an automated call on Saturday morning requesting feedback on how mycall had been handled by the call centre the previous day. It is our first booking with Thomson since 1994 should I be worried,wonder where I will eventually be sitting on the plane and now concerned if I will actually be allocated the cabin I had requested and paid for.

It is normal for them to call to offer an upgrade but it's never complimentary and they normally only, imc, try once. We had a problem nine years ago when on a flight to the Caribbean in premium we did not sit side by side they changed the t & c after we won a court case to say that seats together could be on a different row😮

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It is normal for them to call to offer an upgrade but it's never complimentary and they normally only, imc, try once. We had a problem nine years ago when on a flight to the Caribbean in premium we did not sit side by side they changed the t & c after we won a court case to say that seats together could be on a different row😮

 

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Thank you Pensioncruiser for informing me that Thomson do call to offer upgrades flights at a cost. Now after my 'rant' I am aware that I might be contacted again and no need to get concerned should they do so.

We booked a B2B cruise on Dream and when I phoned to check something else the cabins we had thought we had booked for the cruise had only been booked for 1 week (?????)and booked by someone else for our second week they did manage to change us to another 2 cabins in a suitable place though ...........

Regarding #20 and #22

Today I have received another call from Thomson relating to my response regarding the automated telephone call stating my disatisfaction on two previous calls from call centre. To my surprise this time I was treated very well and asked to repeat exactly what had occurred and exactly what I, and the two callers from the Call centre had discussed. Thomson customer service manager could not apologise enough and agreed that I had not been treated fairly and assured me that it was not in the companies best interest to treat any customer in the way that I had been and apologised for any confusion that I was left in. To summarise up, I was surprised to receive this call but now am satisfied that everything has been resolved and to be fair I do appreciate the call from the customer service reassuring me our cabin which we picked would be the cabin allocated to us and that the additional extra cost for a upgrade to extra leg room seat would be deducted from our final balance. Bearing in mind we did not request extra leg room seats on the plane in the first instance, we were offered this on the two previous calls from the call centre staff to which I quite clearly stated that we did not wish to reserve seats with extra leg room. Good job the customer service telephoned me or I might have been landed with an additional bill for extra leg room.

Nice result.

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