New casino offer today (April 12).

[ger_77]

16 hours ago, HELENPSL said:

I also received the offer today for Alaska, Canada/NE and Europe sailings.  I was hoping there would be some offers for 2023 but these are all for 2022 with the earliest being 4/17 and the latest 10/8.  I think they're having a hard time filling the ships even to a 60% capacity.  Hopefully there will be a follow up list with 2023 cruises.  Fingers crossed!

Helen

Like you, I was hoping there would be some 2023 itineraries, but they're not working on them yet, I guess.  Oh well, patience pays off (I hope!).

[grest]

4 hours ago, rodndonna said:

 

I think on tables you have to "let them know" somehow. With slots, it is automatic if you out your card in the machine  when you play. At least for us that worked - we didn;t register or anything, just played some slots and "voila" we get offers now (including the one in this post)

the dealer asks for our card every time we play, and it gets recorded....we'll see.

 

[highscar]

Offer was on the Nordham.  

[highscar]

Leaving from ft lauderdale April 24.  

[Mary229]

You guys make me jealous.  I am leaving Sunday and have a plan in play.  Wish me luck!

[HELENPSL]

From what I’ve been told it’s not so much the amount you spend but the amount of time you’re playing.

Helen

[Mary229]

6 minutes ago, HELENPSL said:

From what I’ve been told it’s not so much the amount you spend but the amount of time you’re playing.

Helen

Yes, I have been taking lessons from these guys for a while now.  That seems to be the consensus.  I was not a gambler but the risk reward seems quite reasonable if as described.   I will give it a whirl. 

[Jinty684]

4 hours ago, DaveOKC said:

We booked ours with a casino offer a few months ago.  Interesting difference is the cost to upgrade yourself to a higher category.  Three months agp we received a free Oceanview and upgraded to Neptune to $1599.  This time we received a free Verandah and the cost to upgrade to a Neptune ranged from $1599 to $2499.  Does not make sense IMO.

 

We received a free verandah and were told it would be $1249 to upgrade to a Signature Suite....we passed. 🙂

[Lindancer]

20 hours ago, HELENPSL said:

I also received the offer today for Alaska, Canada/NE and Europe sailings.  I was hoping there would be some offers for 2023 but these are all for 2022 with the earliest being 4/17 and the latest 10/8.  I think they're having a hard time filling the ships even to a 60% capacity.  Hopefully there will be a follow up list with 2023 cruises.  Fingers crossed!

Helen

I got a good casino rate on the Oosterdam August 9 sailing, saved over $7000 on a Neptune Suite for 3 (and over $1000 on the insurance because the cruise was cheaper.)  Now I want to get out of it because there is no longer a stop in Venice and my airfare is already booked, so I can't even fly in a couple of days early (so my grandson can see a bit of Venice).  I recently got the same Players Club offer that is being discussed here, so I asked my PCC if I could transfer to the July 16 Oosterdam sailing.  She said that cruise is "fairly full" and that a Neptune Suite would cost $3699 a person.  No thanks.  She also said the only way HAL would let me transfer a non-refundable casino-rate cruise is if I spent considerably more money on the 2nd one.  I wasn't even considering a cruise this summer until I got the first offer for a "free cruise".  Now here I am, ha ha

[mr. godfredo]

On 4/12/2022 at 2:06 PM, DaveOKC said:

New free stateroom offer today for 2022 sailings to Alaska, New England and Europe.  Mostly 7 days, but a few longer.  We were fortunate to get a Verandah this time.  Watch your email!

 

Yup we got it and booked this morning for the 14 night Norway cruise. We were not fortunate enough to get a verandah as they were already gone, but my TA will keep checking back. Airfare was not too bad and we were able to book direct flights from LA through Flight Ease. 

[Norseh2o]

Had never gambled on a HAL ship & when I read on cruisecritic so much about casino offers, I asked cruisescritic how to get an offer. I learned from cc,  prior to my last HAL cruise (02/27/2022),  that one only had to gamble a little in the casino in order to score a casino offer. DH and I did ‘gamble just a little’  yet no April 12 email from HAL for us. Hmmm… 🎰

[rodndonna]

5 hours ago, Norseh2o said:

Had never gambled on a HAL ship & when I read on cruisecritic so much about casino offers, I asked cruisescritic how to get an offer. I learned from cc,  prior to my last HAL cruise (02/27/2022),  that one only had to gamble a little in the casino in order to score a casino offer. DH and I did ‘gamble just a little’  yet no April 12 email from HAL for us. Hmmm… 🎰

maybe you were 'a little too little'?   Our first (and only to date) HAL cruise was a 7 day in Dec 2021 and we have been received the offers since then and now have Alaska and Norway Fjords booked with the 'free' Casino offers. We 'donated' about $250 over the course of the 7 days playing with $50 each day. Over the week of being ups and downs, I can't recall how many 'points' we accumulated (400??) , but we were playing slots and generally sticking with ones that had more 'play' so we could milk the donation. 

 

We've certainly received a good return to date, although not sure how good they will be as cruising demand picks back up. We used the same approach with Carnival (pre-pandemic) and then generally received offers that provided a 'decent return' on our donation(pre-pandemic) and we now are still getting them with much better offers (free rooms).

[albingirl]

I just noticed that an upcoming cruise is included in the casino offers.  Don't know about you, but I'm not fond of this since it packs the ship full of people paying very little money while I'm out thousands.  I'm not happy about it at all, and will be canceling later today.

[DaveOKC]

6 hours ago, Norseh2o said:

Had never gambled on a HAL ship & when I read on cruisecritic so much about casino offers, I asked cruisescritic how to get an offer. I learned from cc,  prior to my last HAL cruise (02/27/2022),  that one only had to gamble a little in the casino in order to score a casino offer. DH and I did ‘gamble just a little’  yet no April 12 email from HAL for us. Hmmm… 🎰

You do have to gamble a bit more than "a little" to get the offers.  No one knows how much, as I think it depends on how bad HAL wants to fill the ship.  Also, as mentioned before on this board, most casinos base their comps not on how much you won or lost, but rather how much you put though the system (card bets or slot coin in).    

[Lindancer]

8 hours ago, Norseh2o said:

Had never gambled on a HAL ship & when I read on cruisecritic so much about casino offers, I asked cruisescritic how to get an offer. I learned from cc,  prior to my last HAL cruise (02/27/2022),  that one only had to gamble a little in the casino in order to score a casino offer. DH and I did ‘gamble just a little’  yet no April 12 email from HAL for us. Hmmm… 🎰

I have been gambling (moderately, I guess I'd say) on HAL cruises for years now and just my first casino offer this March.  On a Greek cruise with them last summer,  I overheard a guy in the casino say his cruise was free and I figured he was just a great big high roller!

[rodndonna]

8 minutes ago, Lindancer said:

I have been gambling (moderately, I guess I'd say) on HAL cruises for years now and just my first casino offer this March.  On a Greek cruise with them last summer,  I overheard a guy in the casino say his cruise was free and I figured he was just a great big high roller!

 

One thing about receiving these "free" room offers, is I've really come to appreciate what a small component the 'room' price is in the overall cost of the cruise holiday 😉 

[Laminator]

3 hours ago, albingirl said:

I just noticed that an upcoming cruise is included in the casino offers.  Don't know about you, but I'm not fond of this since it packs the ship full of people paying very little money while I'm out thousands.  I'm not happy about it at all, and will be canceling later today.

For the most part unless it is an "event" such as a slot tournament there are not many pax onboard. On our last cruise which was an event cruise there was around 100. I am speculating on a cruise with just a casino deal there may be 20 to 40 so your comment of a ship full of people paying very little money could not be further from the truth. 

[albingirl]

1 hour ago, Laminator said:

For the most part unless it is an "event" such as a slot tournament there are not many pax onboard. On our last cruise which was an event cruise there was around 100. I am speculating on a cruise with just a casino deal there may be 20 to 40 so your comment of a ship full of people paying very little money could not be further from the truth. 

Maybe that's because those people were on my last cruise and talking about how they were cruising for free. It irks me, no matter what you say, which is probably a bit speculative. One of them even asked me how much I paid for our cruise.  A bit nervy, wouldn't you say?

[hbsurfcitycruiser]

I went ahead and booked 3 casino offers since the ships started re-sailing after the covid pause. And now no more offers. I was never a huge gambler and didn't understand how or why I got the offers. It's all good! I am very grateful for those 3 sailings though 🙂

[allinthesameboat]

I just posted a question about the free cabin casino promo. Please enlighten me. How did you get the verandah? How soon after you received the offer on 4/12 did you reply and book the cruise? Is the offer per person? I do know it doesn't include taxes, port charges and air.

 

Thank you!

[Laminator]

3 minutes ago, albingirl said:

Maybe that's because those people were on my last cruise and talking about how they were cruising for free. It irks me, no matter what you say, which is probably a bit speculative. One of them even asked me how much I paid for our cruise.  A bit nervy, wouldn't you say?

I think there are several more casino deals out there as HAL was trying to get anyone on their ships. They have been sending them out for several months now. There have been holiday cruises offered which never happened before. It's no one's business how much anyone pays for their cruise. 

 

[Laminator]

1 minute ago, allinthesameboat said:

I just posted a question about the free cabin casino promo. Please enlighten me. How did you get the verandah? How soon after you received the offer on 4/12 did you reply and book the cruise? Is the offer per person? I do know it doesn't include taxes, port charges and air.

 

Thank you!

Depending on your level of play determines your offer. Some offers are for free insides, free ocean views, free verandahs, free signature suites and free neptune suites. The offer counts for both pax in your cabin. 

[albingirl]

9 minutes ago, Laminator said:

I think there are several more casino deals out there as HAL was trying to get anyone on their ships. They have been sending them out for several months now. There have been holiday cruises offered which never happened before. It's no one's business how much anyone pays for their cruise. 

 

Of course.  I ignored the offensive person.  I get it that HAL is trying to fill the ships.  It is irksome to encounter those people who sail for free and brag about it at the bar.  

[Cuttersmom]

Wish I could figure out the rhyme or reason to the offers. In 2018, 4 of us sailed on 1 persons free room offer. She’s a BJ player and we did end up securing a second room once on board. Last year, 3 of the 4 (not the BJ player) received free room offers, 2 oceanview and 1 veranda with varying amounts of casino cash. From the cruise we booked with those offers, our come back and play offers varied widely-BJ player got $250 casino cash, then 1 $650 cc, 1 free veranda with $50 cc, and 1 $750 cc (this one probably spent the most). Call me cheap but I’d rather have the free room than the casino cash! I’m hesitating to book hoping a free room comes through before the 30 days is up!

[DaveOKC]

27 minutes ago, Cuttersmom said:

Wish I could figure out the rhyme or reason to the offers. In 2018, 4 of us sailed on 1 persons free room offer. She’s a BJ player and we did end up securing a second room once on board. Last year, 3 of the 4 (not the BJ player) received free room offers, 2 oceanview and 1 veranda with varying amounts of casino cash. From the cruise we booked with those offers, our come back and play offers varied widely-BJ player got $250 casino cash, then 1 $650 cc, 1 free veranda with $50 cc, and 1 $750 cc (this one probably spent the most). Call me cheap but I’d rather have the free room than the casino cash! I’m hesitating to book hoping a free room comes through before the 30 days is up!

I am not certain that you can combine the casino cash with a free cabin offer, as normally those free cabin offers are very restrictive as to what you can combine with them (or course, I would still call and ask).  For example, I cannot use my stockholder credit (OBC) with the free room offer, but I can if I book using a casino rate (for us normally about 20% discount).  Confusing to be sure.