Real NHDOC

The link from the navigator works to access the menus, just go to dining and choose view more and pick Tamarind then click on the menu button. Yes, it even works when you are not onboard the ship, before the cruise.

This is especially galling when the "representative photo" shows features that clearly don't exist in most of the cabins in the category. An example of this is the interior cabins on the smaller ships. Every photo shows the "J" category which is a spacious cabin with a wrap around corner couch but in reality almost all of the interiors don't have this feature or any separate seating at all and are much smaller cabins. Is it sleazy? Yes. Is it illegal? Probably not but it certainly isn't ethical when they could easily show photos of the actual layout of the cabin you booked. To help you out I suggest you use cruisedeckplans.com. Membership is only $9/yr and there are lots and lots of photos and videos of actual cabins. You might not find the exact one you booked but probably one that is in the same part of the ship or on a "sister ship" that will give you a much better idea of the cabin you're going to see when you open the door.

We typically do what the others have said. Tip on the last day of the cruise or the last day of a leg of a B2B. If someone really goes out of their way for a particular request, then giving them a little extra for that is also a nice gesture. But, if you want to do something especially nice mention the cabana attendants by name in your survey response after the cruise. Those are seen by their supervisor (the beverage manager) and are used for future promotions too. While the cash is surely appreciated a merit promotion will last a lot longer.

I was wondering who the Cruise Director is on N-S now? We are boarding early next month and HAL started to populate the activities on the Navigator and it says "coffee with Betty Ann" but I thought Claire was onboard? Claire was the CD when we left in May - I suppose it's possible her time is up and Betty Ann is coming back but was wondering who is on now? Also, is Jose still hosting Trivia?

Yes, and for people like me who NEVER buy the insurance why risk the extra $$$ before you actually board the ship? I think it's great they allow you to add it once onboard and even if I couldn't pay using OBC I would wait for that reason alone but the added benefit of being able to use OBC to buy it is great.

Thanks. If that's the case then I am OK with it. I just got the impression they were saying the ship sets the price for that particular sailing. If that's a mis-impression I would be willing to accept the risk of a "across the board" price increase in exchange for being able to use OBC to pay for the package as I would have little use for OBC if I pre-bought it.

Thanks for the reply. I got the impression from the customer service rep that the price was "dynamic" when you wait to purchase onboard - it won't be the same as the $60PP/Day they sell it for beforehand. Not necessarily that the "going rate" price rises across the board but they adjust the price onboard to account for how many other passengers on that cruise have it and there's no way to know beforehand what it will be.

So being relatively new to Princess I was curious about the option I saw on their website to add Princess Plus to your booking once onboard and I called princess and asked about whether I could use my OBC then to pay for it as that would be a great way to spend the OBC I got from our TA. The answer was yes, but the price may be higher...wait, what? Yes, they confirmed that you do have the option to buy it on the first or second day of the cruise but the price is only guaranteed to be $60PP/Day if you buy it beforehand. What the price will be onboard, they cannot say beforehand. Of course the website doesn't mention this little catch. So, has anyone bought Princess Plus once onboard and if so what have been your experiences with that? Were you able to use OBC to pay for it and was the price higher than $60PP/Day?

cruisedeckplans.com only costs $8.99 to join for a year and it is well worth the investment, IMHO. If you purchase multiple years it is even less per year and if you post photos they pay you $.50 per photo so you can offset the cost that way if you need to 😉 It takes a lot of the mystery out of the cabin layouts and while not perfect it is a lot better than the generic photos the cruise lines show for each cabin class.

It's an issue with cookies and HAL's terrible website coding. If you clear the cookies from HAL and go back to the HAL website it should work, at least it has always worked for me. In firefox you have to go to settings, then privacy and security and wait for manage data to become available then search for Holland America choose remove selected and save changes...voila then it will work again until next time. When you go back to HAL's site just accept only strictly necessary cookies and shut all of the others off. That should help extend the time between having to reset again. Maybe when their IT guy gets in from recess he will fix it.

Only in the world of Holland America does it make any sense at all. Don't try and understand it...just accept they have their own way of doing things.

I think you are confusing the rear facing AS cabins on decks 4 and 7 to the VS cabins on the other decks. AS cabins are Vista Suites (in HAL terms the word suite is a misnomer here as it is just slightly larger than a Veranda and just has a slightly different layout). VS are the rear facing verandas. Whenever you accept a guarantee cabin you are at the mercy of those who have subjectively deemed what they consider to be "superior". Lots of "superior" category veranda cabins are on deck 8, directly below the lido which would be my last choice of location on the ship. So we always try to choose our cabin and never take guarantee or the upgrade option unless it is the only choice. If we do then we keep our fingers crossed. Depending on how nice they want to be you can always call in and ask to have the cabins changed even after taking a guarantee. There may be an "inferior" cabin (V, VA, VB, VC or VD) that is more preferable to the VQ they assigned you and sometimes they will accommodate a request to change even though, technically, when you accept a guarantee they can give you anything they want as long as they have deemed it to be at least as good as what you paid for and you have agreed to accept that as part of the guarantee acceptance. Or, for a small additional fee they may offer to put you into a Vista Suite.

AFAIK the only interiors that don't have the TV opposite the bed are the midship "I" category cabins on decks 4-8 which are designated as having the couches in them. So virtually all interiors have the TV opposite the bed and are actually quite well laid out except for those which they intended to be triples. I would say that for a solo traveler the interiors are probably fine. Two or more do start to feel cramped IMHO but I do understand it is all very subjective. Anyone desiring a usable seating area other than the bed will have to go up to an ocean view. My point was that the Pinnacle class interiors are almost all just about the same size - none are truly "large" - at least not in a usable way like they were on the smaller ships.

NCTribefan shows photos of the cabin I mentioned above that has a useless couch in it (useless other than for sleeping a third passenger). You cannot sit on it and watch TV or eat room service (no table) and there's maybe two feet of space between it and the side of the bed. Plus, with the TV located at 90 degrees to the bed it's less than ideal to watch from there too. The standard interiors all have the TV on the wall opposite the bed so you can at least lay in it and watch without turning your head. So that's what you get with the largest interior on the Pinnacle class - a poor layout with a useless couch.

You can use the gift cards when you pre-book or pre-pay for items before the cruise or you can bring them with you and have them applied to your onboard account as credit against purchases. If you want to use them to pre-book or prepay (for tips, for example) you just use the "manage my bookings" section of the website and when it comes to checkout there is an area to apply gift cards or credit cards. Just be aware you cannot split between gift and credit cards when doing this online, you can either choose one payment method or the other. But there is no limit to the number of gift cards you can apply at checkout so if you have say $1200 in purchases you can use two $500 cards and two $100 cards (or three $500 cards and just have a balance left on one).

Adjoining cabins can be a nightmare - I personally would never take one again. We were on back to backs on the Nieuw Statendam last winter and on one leg we noticed the noise from next door was excessive. We had a neighbor who opened the door on their side to use it to hang stuff from so there was literally no sound they made we couldn't hear because there was now only one door separating the two cabins instead of two. I know this is the case because I opened our door once and could look right into their cabin. We had to keep asking the steward to close the door on their side it was so noisy. Even when the door on their side was closed it was still much noisier than a traditional cabin without adjoining doors. Lesson learned. Never take a cabin with adjoining doors.

IMO there is no such thing as a large interior on any of the Pinnacle class ships. There are four larger category I interiors on deck 1 (1111, 1115, 1124 and 1128) but the extra space in them is pretty useless as it is mostly in the entry. If you had a scooter it would be suitable for parking it. None of the interiors have a functional sitting area other than the bed. No sofa, no table. They do have a dressing table with a cube to sit on, but that is all you get. Ironically, some of the J's have a couch in them but it's really for sleeping as third guest bed and not suitable for sitting as it is slipped alongside the bed with the TV hung above it. So it makes watching TV from either the bed or the couch difficult and awkward. Nothing like the large interiors on the smaller ships which have a wrap around corner couch or separate seating areas. In short, the interior cabins are all pretty small. Just a few feet bigger than the bed. Don't believe the claim of some being "larger" - if they are it isn't that much of a difference.

HAL does not use the term upsell for these paid offers to upgrade. They call them paid "preferrred limited upgrade special" Sometimes the offers get emailed out and sometimes not. If the ship is full or near full they usually don't offer any upgrades. The best thing to do if you are interested is to start calling the ship inventory department 888-628-8107 about 30 days prior to the sailing date and ask. They will ask for the booking number and you ought to have a deck plan and credit card ready. If you aren't satisfied with the offer you can ask if they have anything else (sometimes they will offer another, higher level). It doesn't matter if you book through a TA or not, you can buy an upgraded cabin directly from HAL this way.

I don't know how many times I have to say it but it's just not correct. The HAL representatives can and will add the benefit to a booking made through a TA. If I had not done it myself I wouldn't post it here. But my (and other posts here) contradict this and so my advice would be to just call back and ask another representative to do it. Sometimes with HAL you just have to be persistent and eventually you will find the right person who knows the rules and can actually do their job.

Several of my recent bookings were special "group rates" and I got the AARP benefit added to them so this is untrue. I would say it's a case that your TA just didn't want to go through the hassle of calling them. If I were you I would call HAL directly and handle it myself. Even if you book through a TA you can call HAL and get the AARP benefit added - trust me I did it.

While the $30 decrease is probably not worth fighting for it is important to know the rules when you book in case this happens on a future booking or on a larger reduction in fare. If your booking asked for payment in full (no deposit) and you were more than 90 days out then it was probably a restricted fare without any provision for cancellation. Some fares are nonrefundable from the moment you make the payment and some have nonrefundable deposits so it is important to know what the terms of the fare you got were (preferably before you book it) and then you will know how much leverage you have to renegotiate after booking. The flexible fare will typically allow you to cancel without penalty right up until the final payment is due (usually 90 days before sailing). With those you have the most leverage but usually pay a little more. Typically with those you can ask for an adjustment to the fare when it drops and they will grant it without having to cancel and rebook it but sometimes they require you to cancel and rebook if the terms of the offer have changed dramatically. Cancelling and rebooking for a lower fare will not sacrifice the AARP or stockholder benefits but you will have to ask for them again on the new booking. Since there is no limit on the number of times you can get those you will get them on any booking. The hitch you should be aware of is when paying with gift cards any cancellation refund goes back to the gift cards and that refund is not instantaneous. It can take up to a week or more to post back onto the cards. So don't count on being able to cancel and rebook with the same gift cards. Again, they write the rules.

In answering the prior two posts, there is NO LIMIT to the number of bookings you can use the AARP benefit for. The HAL representatives just need to be trained on how to add them to the additional bookings (see my post #303 above for what to tell them if they tell you there is a limit). And to the question about the deposit, no, it would have no effect on your deposit. It just gets added to the booking as an OBC. Just call in and tell them you want it added to the booking.

Those four large I category cabins aren't under BB Kings or any particularly noisy areas. We've stayed in them and they're quiet. Having said that the extra space in them, while it is usable for storing a scooter isn't very usable for much else. One of my pet peeves with the Pinnacle ships (and maybe my only one) is the cabins are all smaller than they were in the older, smaller ships and it is particularly true of the interior cabins. In order to get a cabin with any kind of seating area you need to book at least an Oceanview as there are no real usable couches in any of the interiors (yes, there are triples and quads but those have shoehorned in sleeper couches that really don't work as seating). We decided to go back to the Eurodam this winter because the J category interiors have plenty of space and a nice corner couch in them - there is nothing like those on the Pinnacle ships.

If anyone is told that the benefit is only good on one cruise per year (as my TA and I was) you should read this from the official terms and conditions to the representative: "This offer can be added to multiple, new bookings per year with revalidation required annually. The AARP Polar template will automatically build 1 FCC per guest. If any additional bookings are created outside of the first initial booking, then those FCC’s need to built manually by a supervisor." This was supplied to me by my PCC and is from an internal HAL T&C sheet.