Viking Air Plus Service

We are ready to book air flights for our Sept 2016 Rhine Rivre cruise. When I talked with Viking's Air Plus they said that while they can book our flights, we would have to wait until 24 hrs before our departure to get seat assignments. I've never heard of such a thing... totally unacceptable. Is this normal with Viking ?? :mad:

Well, I guess the sort of flip side of that is what happened to us last year. We booked our cruise & flights about 6 months in advance. We too used Viking Air Plus and paid the premium for confirmed flights and seat assignments. There were 5 "legs" in our flight reservations. Up to the night before our departure our reservations were still good. Then our odyssey began. Not one of the seat assignments of the 5 "legs" was honored! Not one!

Our river cruise was absolutely perfect but getting there and getting back was a nightmare.

We have booked another cruise but I am making my own air arrangements. From reading this board I get the impression most people make their own air reservations now.

We just got back, and had used Viking air. We were booked on United and the seats were honored on all flights to and from US. We did fly to Munich from Budapest on Lufthansa and the seats were only assigned 24 hours prior to the flight. I believe Lufthansa has that policy unless you pay extra for early seat assignments. It really now depends on the airline you fly.

It's very risky... I would want to sit next to my wife on the long oversea flight. Did you get to sit where you wanted? Were you able to get, or even were you able to request, an aisle seat?

It all rather depends on who you are flying with and which cabin you are traveling in.

With a number of the European airlines it is not at all uncommon for passengers without elite status to not be able to pick seats until 24 hours from departure, unless they pay for the option.

Get a little more detail before you condemn this as a Viking problem.

It all rather depends on who you are flying with and which cabin you are traveling in.

 

With a number of the European airlines it is not at all uncommon for passengers without elite status to not be able to pick seats until 24 hours from departure, unless they pay for the option.

 

Get a little more detail before you condemn this as a Viking problem.

Totally correct, Mark. I would go to the website of the airline you are assigned to travel on and pretend to book the same flights in the same class as you have with Viking. That will give you an idea of the rules.

But who would want to fly 5 legs to get to Europe? Sounds like a Guarantee Recipe for Lost Luggage!

When you book thru ANY Cruiseline (not just Viking) you get what you pay for.... And it's not all good!

We are ready to book air flights for our Sept 2016 Rhine Rivre cruise. When I talked with Viking's Air Plus they said that while they can book our flights, we would have to wait until 24 hrs before our departure to get seat assignments. I've never heard of such a thing... totally unacceptable. Is this normal with Viking ?? :mad:

We used Viking Air Plus for our Sept 2016. At first we booked economy (in Oct) - thinking to upgrade our seats to economy plus on the United flights. Then we decided to treat ourselves to business/first. There were Delta flights that were $1600 cheaper than the United flights, so we booked that, but the return flight was Air France (through Delta) with a change over to Delta in Paris (CDG). On all the flights except the Air France we had seat assignments.

We only had an hour & a half between the flights, and I was concerned about running around CCG - where we have never been, and don't speak French. I thought if the plane from Zurich was delayed at all, we'd really be hustling. I found a Delta flight that was non-stop from Zurich to JFK - instead of EWR which we are leaving from. I called Viking Air Plus to see if we could switch the return flight. Very painless procedure. They were very helpful. We have all our seat assignments coming and going.

I was even able to go onto the Delta web site and move us back a couple of rows. Our original seats were close to the bathrooms for the flight over and I thought that wouldn't be good for an overnight flight.

Which cruise are you on? We are doing the Mani from AMS to BAS in August 2016.

The seat assignment policy is an airline policy not a Viking policy. This past Oct./Nov. we had Delta direct flights to and return from Amsterdam with seat assignments as soon as the flights were booked- about 90 days out. We were able to change the computer assigned seats (economy) immediately to more forward economy seats. Then when we asked Viking Air to actually pay for the seats, about 75 days out, we "upgraded" to Delta economy comfort plus seating - done within 24 hours of our purchase request to Viking.

In our experience, working with air provided by a number of cruise lines, it is the category of ticket purchased by the line that determines when you can select your seat. This category may vary.

There is a Cruise Air forum on this board which may help in understanding the features of using a cruise line's air programme.

Cruise air forum, read up!

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=654448

The seat assignment policy is an airline policy not a Viking policy. This past Oct./Nov. we had Delta direct flights to and return from Amsterdam with seat assignments as soon as the flights were booked- about 90 days out. We were able to change the computer assigned seats (economy) immediately to more forward economy seats. Then when we asked Viking Air to actually pay for the seats, about 75 days out, we "upgraded" to Delta economy comfort plus seating - done within 24 hours of our purchase request to Viking.

Quite often, in fact more often than not seats obtained thru cruise air programs are NOT upgradable due to the fare class. You also often can not get FF miles for these flights.

Your experience was very good but if you have been reading these boards over the last 3 yrs (or even the last 12 months) your experience was not typical and I would hate for a cruiser to expect upgradable seats and direct flights.

I guess I could have clarified the 5 legs. It was from a local airport to JFK coming and going. The 5th leg was from Basel to Amsterdam as they had no direct flights from Basel back to JFK.

Also, we tried to upgrade our seats to economy comfort. What was interesting was on the JFK to Amsterdam flight, economy comfort was only half full. The gate agent explained (as JVilleGal has said) that our level of tickets did not allow for any upgrades at all. I couldn't even use FF miles.

Dear Zygzag and rothbury,

We are sorry to hear of your disappointment in our Viking Air Plus service and encourage you both to contact us at TellUs@vikingcruises.com so that we may discuss the details of your experiences further.

We are looking forward to hearing from each of you!

Kind regards,

Viking Cruises

We are ready to book air flights for our Sept 2016 Rhine Rivre cruise. When I talked with Viking's Air Plus they said that while they can book our flights, we would have to wait until 24 hrs before our departure to get seat assignments. I've never heard of such a thing... totally unacceptable. Is this normal with Viking ?? :mad:

Well, I guess the sort of flip side of that is what happened to us last year. We booked our cruise & flights about 6 months in advance. We too used Viking Air Plus and paid the premium for confirmed flights and seat assignments. There were 5 "legs" in our flight reservations. Up to the night before our departure our reservations were still good. Then our odyssey began. Not one of the seat assignments of the 5 "legs" was honored! Not one!

 

Our river cruise was absolutely perfect but getting there and getting back was a nightmare.

 

We have booked another cruise but I am making my own air arrangements. From reading this board I get the impression most people make their own air reservations now.

Whoever I talked to first time misled me. I called back and this time talked with very helpful lady at Viking Air Plus. We are traveling with another couple and she was able to book all of us on a non-stop KLM flight from LAX to Amsterdam as well as the return flight. Seating arrangements on the plane are 3-4-3. She was able to get the 4 of us seated together on the incoming and return flights. I am extremely pleased.

We have been very happy with Viking Air selected flights. Air for us was included with our booking. Last year we did Portraits of Southern France. Viking chose flights that were good. As soon as we got the flights, we asked them to ticket. They ticketed and got us assigned seats in good locations. We were thrilled to only change planes once going. We had a nonstop returning. This year we are doing Grand Europe from Budapest to Amsterdam. Made our final payment last week. 2 days layer we had our airline flights. One stop each way. As soon as we accepted the flights, Viking ticketed and got us assigned seats on the transatlantic flights. We cannot get a seat assignment on a flights from Frankfurt to Budapest or from Amsterdam to Frankfurt. Those flights are short. That is ok. For us Viking has been excellent. We have had other companies book us into terrible flights with many changes. Viking air is good.

I have to agree with RedTravel. Viking air has been great for us. Very kind and patient. Their job must be a very high stress.

We paid the extra $50. It was worth every penny.

Viking air has been good for me when we have traveled with them. We are lucky to live near JFK in NY so we dont have to have the added flights as others do that live in the midwest. We were very lucky to have good times but others had to leave the boat at 3am or earlier to get home and they still didnt arrive home until after we did. This is not Viking problem just how flights go. KLM seems to be the best for me which is also Delta and other airlines with different flight numbers. Iceland air was very nice as well in my opinion.