Can Princess cancel your booking - Guarantee cabin

Hi we are booked to sail in 15 days. Still waiting for cabin assignment. Its our first time doing it this way and my husband is driving me nuts. He’s adamant that Princess can cancel your booking and just refund your money if they have overbooked the trip. He keeps saying we will turn up at the port to be told there’s no room at the inn.

Is that possible? Will we end up flying to Sydney all dressed up and no where to go??

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No, this will not happen. What will happen if the ship is indeed oversold is that Princess will start contacting guests and making "move over" offers--essentially they will offer a full refund for this cruise in the form of refundable onboard credit AND another cruise at no charge. They will typically specify a length and part of the world for the free cruise. And they will make this offer to as many people as they need to until they have freed up the needed number of cabins.

However, the fact that you do not know your cabin number yet does not mean that the ship is oversold. It simply means that Princess has not assigned you to a cabin. The latest we ever learned our cabin number was from the security guard who was allowing people into the port area! I've been told that I could have seen it on line that morning, but I didn't look. I know that as of the evening before, we didn't have an assignment....at least anywhere that I could learn what it was.

You will learn your cabin assignment at some point between now and check in. You will not be turned away at the port...unless you fail the medical screening and are deemed to be too ill to cruise. If you give the correct answers on the health form, there will be no further screening. So don't start worrying about that either!

As Moki'smommy said, you are safe. You will have a cabin.

Enjoy your cruise they will assign you a cabin

Your husband is half right: Princess CAN cancel your cruise but they don’t have to give you your money back. You have a contract with them that protects them from you. You have no rights.

But they WILL NOT cancel your cruise. As others have explained, Princess will shift cruisers around in the time leading up to your cruise in order to maximize profit and sell out the ship. Don’t worry; you’ll be sailing.

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Here’s an example: in December 2015, the Pacific Princess was sailing its 50th Anniversary cruise with the Love Boat cast onboard for the whole 14-day cruise. It sold out quickly and unlike the norm, few people canceled so that Guarantees could be assigned. Two days before sailing, there were still about twenty cabins to be assigned and no available cabins. Passengers were offered great moveover packages (free cruises, huge amounts of onboard credit) but few took the offer. Don’t know what the final offers were but they had to have been huge. My sister and I each had oceanview cabins. We were offered the Owner’s suite if we would give up our two cabins. We did. Somehow, and with a lot of juggling, Princess found cabins.

You’ll have a cabin and will be sailing. Enjoy!

Your husband is half right: Princess CAN cancel your cruise but they don’t have to give you your money back. You have a contract with them that protects them from you. You have no rights.

But they WILL NOT cancel your cruise. As others have explained, Princess will shift cruisers around in the time leading up to your cruise in order to maximize profit and sell out the ship. Don’t worry; you’ll be sailing.

 

 

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Wow that seems pretty unfair! Thanks for your replies and reassurance!

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Your husband is half right: Princess CAN cancel your cruise but they don’t have to give you your money back. You have a contract with them that protects them from you. You have no rights.

But they WILL NOT cancel your cruise. As others have explained, Princess will shift cruisers around in the time leading up to your cruise in order to maximize profit and sell out the ship. Don’t worry; you’ll be sailing.

 

 

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Actually, what you say is not quite right. Yes, a cruise line (any cruise line) can unilaterraly cancel your cruise and it occasionally happens. But most of the time it is because an entire voyage is canceled. If a cruise is over booked, the cruise line will try to get a few cruisers to voluntarily cancel/postpone their cruise....by offering them various deals such as a free or reduced price future cruise....big upgrade on a future cruise, etc. But, if the cruise line does cancel your booking they are contractually obligated to refund your entire cruise fare. In the USA, if there is an issue with getting a refund the customer can simply put the charge into "dispute" with their credit card company. Some credit card companies like AMEX will immediately credit back the entire payment and then take the issue to the cruise line.

Where there can be a big problem is with airfares which are generally not refundable and usually involve substantial change fees if used on a future flight. We are aware of a couple of cases where the cruiser was able to negotiate a settlement with the cruise line for loses due to non-refundable air...but that is not guaranteed.

Hank

My cruise departs in two days and we have not yet been assigned a cabin. We got a move over offer last week (as did a lot of others in our roll call). Unfortunately, we couldn't take it because we're locked into these dates...but it seems like (much like the airlines) they'll just keep sweetening the deal until they free up enough space. With that many people sailing, there are going to be enough that want that really great deal!! I'm not going to worry about it, I'll just show up and hope my bags eventually find me :) Just enjoy the surprise of it all (and hope for an awesome upgrade)!

Ever been on an oversold flight where they offer you a $250 flight voucher to give up your seat? It's just like that. The offers increase until they get enough people to give up their cabins. ;)

Here’s an example: in December 2015, the Pacific Princess was sailing its 50th Anniversary cruise with the Love Boat cast onboard for the whole 14-day cruise. It sold out quickly and unlike the norm, few people canceled so that Guarantees could be assigned. Two days before sailing, there were still about twenty cabins to be assigned and no available cabins. Passengers were offered great moveover packages (free cruises, huge amounts of onboard credit) but few took the offer. Don’t know what the final offers were but they had to have been huge. My sister and I each had oceanview cabins. We were offered the Owner’s suite if we would give up our two cabins. We did. Somehow, and with a lot of juggling, Princess found cabins.

 

You’ll have a cabin and will be sailing. Enjoy!

Wow! That is a great offer.

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My sailing on the Emerald Princess Feb. 14 was massively oversold. I got a moreover offer and couldn't take it, but over 20 cabins from our roll call left the cruise and took the offer. The offer got as high as 28 days of free cruising with Princess to give up a 14 day cruise. Then people were getting downgrade offers: give up your balcony cabin for an inside and get the cruise for free plus another 7 days of free cruising from Princess. Eventually everyone with a guarantee was accommodated, even if at the last minute upon arrival at the pier.

It would appear some people are posting with little or no actual knowledge. You have temporarily been assigned a cabin, at the lowest category you have selected. At some point, at cruise line's discretion, reassignment of these temp assignments to higher category is made to make solid blocks of confirmed cabins. At the end of this process any vacancies are at the lower desirability. In the past, we have booked this method four times. Three times we were "upgraded" in name only, cabin location by a matter of feet. You will be on the ship and and should be happy with whatever category you chose as the lowest category acceptable.

I imagine that you shouldn't worry...what's the definition of "guarantee"?

We book guarantee cabins frequently and have never been disappointed. One time we didn't learn of our cabin assignment until we were at the port and were escorted to the office so we could get the proper luggage tags, that was a great upgrade. Enjoy your cruise.

Here’s an example: in December 2015, the Pacific Princess was sailing its 50th Anniversary cruise with the Love Boat cast onboard for the whole 14-day cruise. It sold out quickly and unlike the norm, few people canceled so that Guarantees could be assigned. Two days before sailing, there were still about twenty cabins to be assigned and no available cabins. Passengers were offered great moveover packages (free cruises, huge amounts of onboard credit) but few took the offer. Don’t know what the final offers were but they had to have been huge. My sister and I each had oceanview cabins. We were offered the Owner’s suite if we would give up our two cabins. We did. Somehow, and with a lot of juggling, Princess found cabins.

 

You’ll have a cabin and will be sailing. Enjoy!

Pam how long did it take you to say yes to that great deal?? :)

Tony

Several years ago, Carnival did involuntarily bump people from a cruise out of Baltimore. It's booking algorithm did not work for that port and not enough passengers canceled. I've never heard of Princess canceling anyone's cruise involuntarily.

It would appear some people are posting with little or no actual knowledge. You have temporarily been assigned a cabin, at the lowest category you have selected. At some point, at cruise line's discretion, reassignment of these temp assignments to higher category is made to make solid blocks of confirmed cabins. At the end of this process any vacancies are at the lower desirability. In the past, we have booked this method four times. Three times we were "upgraded" in name only, cabin location by a matter of feet. You will be on the ship and and should be happy with whatever category you chose as the lowest category acceptable.

We found out our upcoming cruise is completely oversold. Just curious, if everyone is assigned a temporary cabin, do they put multiple families in the same cabin? If so, for what purpose? Thanks.

We found out our upcoming cruise is completely oversold. Just curious, if everyone is assigned a temporary cabin, do they put multiple families in the same cabin? If so, for what purpose? Thanks.

When you have a GTY, there is no "temporary cabin" assignment.

Sometimes there will be GTYs when there are available cabins, but Princess has not yet assigned any of these to GTY bookings. Sometimes there will be no currently available cabins, so Princess is expecting some to become available due to people cancelling.

For each cabin category Princess only will accept the number of GTYs the computers say cabins will be available sooner or later. Once that category has reached the number of allowed GTYs, it will be marked as "sold out."

Hi we sail in 2 days and got our assignment today! Also for our cruise they were doing "move down offers" not enough balconies but a lot of inside cabins unfilled. Offer was move to inside with 100% refund of cruise cost as OBC and OBC is refundable.:)

We found out our upcoming cruise is completely oversold. Just curious, if everyone is assigned a temporary cabin, do they put multiple families in the same cabin? If so, for what purpose? Thanks.

Just wondering how you would know that an upcoming cruise is oversold? And if that would be true, than Princess will start to make "move over" offers to some who are booked. In most cases they will be able to find enough volunteers who are willing to move to a different cruise....when given some financial incentives.

Hank

Just wondering how you would know that an upcoming cruise is oversold?

When a category is marked "sold out" and you know that there are unassigned GTYs for that category.

When we were on a cruise that was 100% sold out, there were still 30 or so people on the roll call that did not have a cabin assigned yet. We could assume some people not on the roll call also had GTYs that were not assigned yet.

When a category is marked "sold out" and you know that there are unassigned GTYs for that category.

 

When we were on a cruise that was 100% sold out, there were still 30 or so people on the roll call that did not have a cabin assigned yet. We could assume some people not on the roll call also had GTYs that were not assigned yet.

Exactly--We wanted to book a "sold out" category for an upcoming cruise. Obviously we couldn't and booked a more costly category. Now, a few weeks before the cruise, the lower priced category has opened up at a lower rate than when I booked.

If an entire cruise is marked as "sold out," it means that they don't want to take any more bookings; they are sufficiently overbooked and they anticipate some people dropping out. If people don't cancel on their own, incentives will be offered. But a cruise marked as "sold out" does not mean that the gtys have been assigned yet....only that the computer algorithm tells princess to stop bookings.

Our South America cruise was sold out at least six months prior to sailing. And several folks with guarantees were still waiting for assignments a short time before the cruise departed so it was no surprise that they ended up offering some very attractive moveover offers to accommodate all the guarantees.

Your husband is half right: Princess CAN cancel your cruise but they don’t have to give you your money back. You have a contract with them that protects them from you. You have no rights.

But they WILL NOT cancel your cruise. As others have explained, Princess will shift cruisers around in the time leading up to your cruise in order to maximize profit and sell out the ship. Don’t worry; you’ll be sailing.

 

 

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Wow that seems pretty unfair! Thanks for your replies and reassurance!

 

 

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Personally I would give any thought to the above comment that Princess can cancel your cruise, but not give you your money back. I am not sure why anyone would ever make that statement. No worries. You have rights.