upgrades & onboard credits

[jpatrick]

I always read about people getting upgrades and or onboard credits, how is this accomplished ?

[Joanne G.]

We've gotten onboard credits twice, but only because the cruises we had been booked on later became unavailable - once because of a charter and once because NCL sent the ship to Europe. It was nothing we had any control over. The credit was compensation for re-booking for a different week.

I've seen onboard credits offered as part of Latitudes specials for particular sailings.

Upgrades - who knows! It's the luck of the draw there, though booking category guarantees rather than particular cabins seems to improve th odds. And upgrades, also, are sometimes part of special promotions for certain sailings.

By the way, many "upgrades" are no more than the same type of cabin on a different deck. The cruise lines have many categories of identical cabins; it allows them to give what look like multiple-category upgrades but you aren't really getting a better cabin, only a "better" location, which may or not be any real improvement.

I know there are stories of booking an inside and getting a suite or some such massive upgrade, but I believe that is a very rare occurance.

[Cruise_More_Often]

We received onboard credits when we signed up for a cruise at our TA's cruise show.

We were also upgraded from a mini-suite to an AD Penthouse about two weeks before the cruise; it wasn't free, but it wasn't as expensive as it would have been if we had booked a Penthouse originally. Same thing happened to the couple in the suite next to us. Both of us had booked the cruise way early!

[mariakitty]

We are sailing NCL Spirit on 6/12 and just found out we were "upgraded" one catagory. We paid for a BD guarantee, got a BC. The only difference I can see in the rooms is that we are deck 11 rather than deck 9. Of course we were hoping for a suite! haha

I also have a question regarding upgrades, since we already have a cabin assigned is it still worth asking for an additional upgrade or am I just being greedy? And would a paid upgrade be less expensive than had we booked the room? I realize this is probably dependent on availability, but I would like to know anyone has had success doing this.

Maria

Carnival Fantasy (??) 12/90
RCCL Monarch of the Seas 9/92
Carival Ecstasy 9/2002
NCL Spirit 6/2004

[smeyer418]

It depends how full the ship is. It is easier to sell the lower priced rooms. Have your TA call the reaccomodation desk and ask how much they will charge to upgrade to an A suite... if you don't ask you don't get.