Enjoying My First Day Available Booking Experience?

I have never booked a cruise so early that it was the first day available(not elite). Interesting experience, I guess.

I went into the website (I am booking an TA for Summer of 2019), at 1/2 hour before the starting time and it showed booking available, but the cabin choices were very very limited with most categories saying guarantee booking only available! Well thought maybe that was because I had snuck in a tad early. So decided to call and book and see what happened. When I called, the specific cabins I wanted were not available. In fact the best I could do was do a DA guarantee (which includes my first and second choice cabins), and that is not too bad in that only 10 such cabins exist and I would be ok with any, but of course would like the largest angled balcony, but for some reason again could not book an exact cabin. Since deposit is refundable, and can change to specific cabin when and if becomes available I went ahead and booked to at least secure my cabin type and location.

Went into website an hour later, and still very limited specific rooms available and most showing sold?!!!!!??

Well, went in again at the 12:30 mark and now it is showing that the entire ship from inside to suite is sold out!!!!

Obviously the IT department is doing some re-figuring with prices, etc. and doesn't want anyone booking in the meantime as come on, it can't be sold out already!!! Another sign of this is my secured booking does not show up in my personalizer and when rep. went to check with IT, answer was not sure why but that they are doing some heavy duty working on the summer 2019 cruises and that it should probably show up by tomorrow!!!!

So this will be fun to keep an eye out for!!!!

Pooh

looks like the ***** team sent some gremlins to the 2019 bookings to take some of the attention off them

Voljeep, thanks for the laugh! Yes this booking disaster is a great way to take the spotlight off ***** problems.

But all it is doing is making longtime Princess fans like myself want to jump ship and take my 2019 cruise money elsewhere.

The same thing is happening with some of the RCI cruises too. It's really frustrating when they tell you there are only 2 balcony cabins left on a mega-sized ship on the very first day of booking for C&A members. Oh, and all the suites are supposedly sold out too. It all just seems wacky.

My cough and asthma had me up playing on the Princess website with my box of Kleenex last night.

I know that at 12:01 PST you could book the newly opened 2019 cruises. I was playing around with what cabins and payment would look like if I was able to take my dream cruises and was able to take bookings all the way to deposit payment. Stopped just short of putting them on hold or actually booking but I know they were open way before 8am PST.

So it is possible that there were people who realized the bookings would be open and placed cabins on hold or actually booked what they wanted and that is why here are areas that are showing sold out?

And wow, some of the Suites options. Owners, Grand, Top Deck. These suites are bigger than my house. Do these suites include airport pickup? Top shelf treatment. I guess if you are fortunate enough to get one of these you don't have to worry about upsells or being moved without your knowledge.

Oh well it was fun to dream and one day I will be on some of these cruises albeit probably in a mini suite.

Ok, Pam, Keith, and others who have so much knowledge of Princess. It has been 24 hours and finally my reservation is at least showing on my Personalizer! Took about 15 hours after booking for it to show up. But if you are trying to book this particular August, 2019, TA cruise, you still have very limited stateroom selection. In fact the "let Princess pick your stateroom" function is non-functioning! If you want one of the desirable balconies (not mini or CC) you basically cannot pick a room- all is book a guarantee!!!!! Is this normal?

Called into Princess today to see if can pick a stateroom and they can't either (rep. says); in fact she says the particular guarantee I have (DA), is now on waitlist!!!!!!! I did ask her to note that I WANTED a DA cabin(angled balcony if possible of course), and if had to be upgraded that I DID NOT want a D4 cabin. The next 2-3 minis classes up are in ok locations on the whole so won't cry if get one of those.

So can I do anything else to try to control just a little my guaranteed cabin?

Thanks for any input you guys may have.

Pooh

Keep watching. Princess may release more cabins in the category you want. I wouldn't just wait till you are assigned one. If you see what you want , call Princess right away to get it.

Holy cow! I see what you all mean. This is ridiculous.

We love Princess and have been waiting for these itineraries to be released.

This seems very strange- no matter what cruise I looked at, it was the same

situation- almost nothing available. Could this really be so on all of the cruises

I looked at?

I looked at 4 different itineraries and various months.

Holy cow! I see what you all mean. This is ridiculous.

We love Princess and have been waiting for these itineraries to be released.

This seems very strange- no matter what cruise I looked at, it was the same

situation- almost nothing available. Could this really be so on all of the cruises

I looked at?

I looked at 4 different itineraries and various months.

Yep, nini, welcome to the club. Very weird isn't it and Princess reps have no idea why or anything. It is what it is.

Pooh