How does Priority Disembarkation work?

[CruisingNCLHokie]

I tried searching but couldn't find anything.  We're booked to go on the Epic on Sunday and wanted to see how the priority disembarkation perk for Gold and above works?  Is there a specific time or location?  Thanks!

[KeithJenner]

11 minutes ago, CruisingNCLHokie said:

I tried searching but couldn't find anything.  We're booked to go on the Epic on Sunday and wanted to see how the priority disembarkation perk for Gold and above works?  Is there a specific time or location?  Thanks!

Some people have reported things like being escorted off the ship etc, but the general consensus is that this is rare. I have never tried things like that, so couldn’t talk from experience. I’ve generally worked out the way off the ship by that point all by myself. 🙂

 

Anyway, for us what the latitudes disembarkation means is that you get coloured luggage tags which are one of the first to be available after disembarkation starts (usually just after haven), and you can get off the ship early, before all the other colours are called.

 

It is useful if you need to get off the ship early, and it is usually fairly easy to find your bags as there are less of them than other colour tags.

 

If you don’t want to leave until later then you can do so, your bags will still be waiting for you.

 

You still have to find your way off by yourself though.

[CruisingNCLHokie]

4 minutes ago, KeithJenner said:

Some people have reported things like being escorted off the ship etc, but the general consensus is that this is rare. I have never tried things like that, so couldn’t talk from experience. I’ve generally worked out the way off the ship by that point all by myself. 🙂

 

Anyway, for us what the latitudes disembarkation means is that you get coloured luggage tags which are one of the first to be available after disembarkation starts (usually just after haven), and you can get off the ship early, before all the other colours are called.

 

It is useful if you need to get off the ship early, and it is usually fairly easy to find your bags as there are less of them than other colour tags.

 

If you don’t want to leave until later then you can do so, your bags will still be waiting for you.

 

You still have to find your way off by yourself though.

Thank you.  I assumed it was just an early time, but I was really hoping there was a secret meeting place or a special line.

[MCMC100]

An issue I have encountered with early disembarkation is you may get off the ship, but your luggage is still onboard. I spent 90 minutes in the  Manhattan Cruise Terminal last February waiting for port employees to finish off loading the luggage. We were all held along the side of the building or inside at the top of the escalators watching them offload 10,000 suitcases. They would not allow anyone into Luggage Hall until the ship was empty and the forklifts were parked. It takes time……

 

NCL may offer the perk of early disembarkation, but they don’t control the speed of Port of N.Y. employees operating the forklifts…..not sure if this is a universal port problem, but it is in NY. Something to consider and research.  

 

I usually take my luggage off with me at 0 dark thirty.  That’s the fastest way and only way to guarantee that both you and your luggage are off early. 

[DCGuy64]

I would not expect @MCMC100's experience to be typical. Priority disembarkation means you'll have your luggage waiting for you, there'd be no point in disembarking early if you didn't have your luggage. This would also be a good issue to bring up with either your TA or your PCC. Have a great cruise. We sailed on the Epic in December 2022 and had the time of our lives.

[cruiseny4life]

7 minutes ago, MCMC100 said:

An issue I have encountered with early disembarkation is you may get off the ship, but your luggage is still onboard. I spent 90 minutes in the  Manhattan Cruise Terminal last February waiting for port employees to finish off loading the luggage. We were all held along the side of the building or inside at the top of the escalators watching them offload 10,000 suitcases. They would not allow anyone into Luggage Hall until the ship was empty and the forklifts were parked. It takes time……

 

NCL may offer the perk of early disembarkation, but they don’t control the speed of Port of N.Y. employees operating the forklifts…..not sure if this is a universal port problem, but it is in NY. Something to consider and research.  

 

I usually take my luggage off with me at 0 dark thirty.  That’s the fastest way and only way to guarantee that both you and your luggage are off early. 

Regarding MCT, I agree. Our first cruise on NCL, back in April, 2022 was very similar. We had quite the wait, then we had to wander around looking for our color tags. They were priority tags (Haven, not Latitudes). We spent an extra 1.5 hours waiting for our luggage.

 

Ever since, we do like you and just go with self-disembarkation. 

 

@DCGuy64, what should the poster bring up with their Travel Agent?

[CruisingNCLHokie]

6 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

I would not expect @MCMC100's experience to be typical. Priority disembarkation means you'll have your luggage waiting for you, there'd be no point in disembarking early if you didn't have your luggage. This would also be a good issue to bring up with either your TA or your PCC. Have a great cruise. We sailed on the Epic in December 2022 and had the time of our lives.

Thanks. We sailed on the Epic in Feb 2022 and had a great time.  This is going to be our first as Platinum, so we're looking forward to all the fun perks, especially priority embarkation, extra dinners, and the wines around the world tasting.  Honestly, I just can't wait until I can turn off the phone and hide from the world for a few days

[CruisingNCLHokie]

We've never had an issue with having to wait for the luggage, but we've never been able to get off the ship that early.  Usually we're standing in line for an hour or two... that's the part that I was hoping to avoid.

[DCGuy64]

8 minutes ago, cruiseny4life said:

Regarding MCT, I agree. Our first cruise on NCL, back in April, 2022 was very similar. We had quite the wait, then we had to wander around looking for our color tags. They were priority tags (Haven, not Latitudes). We spent an extra 1.5 hours waiting for our luggage.

 

Ever since, we do like you and just go with self-disembarkation. 

 

@DCGuy64, what should the poster bring up with their Travel Agent?

If his travel agent is anything like ours, I'd ask him to confirm how Priority disembarkation works. Our TA is a fellow cruiser and also contributes on CC.

[DCGuy64]

1 minute ago, CruisingNCLHokie said:

We've never had an issue with having to wait for the luggage, but we've never been able to get off the ship that early.  Usually we're standing in line for an hour or two... that's the part that I was hoping to avoid.

We've never had a problem with getting our luggage, and this is after 13 cruises.

[PegNRay]

Just off the Escape and had yellow luggage tags as we are gold latitudes. There were many people standing off to the side in luggage hall as their luggage tag color had not been called yet. They were blocked from retrieving their luggage. Also noticed that there was lots of luggage still outside.

[CruisingNCLHokie]

15 minutes ago, DCGuy64 said:

If his travel agent is anything like ours, I'd ask him to confirm how Priority disembarkation works. Our TA is a fellow cruiser and also contributes on CC.

That's a good idea, I just emailed my PCC, we'll see what she says.  I'll update when I hear back.

[JandC_Cruising]

2 hours ago, CruisingNCLHokie said:

I tried searching but couldn't find anything.  We're booked to go on the Epic on Sunday and wanted to see how the priority disembarkation perk for Gold and above works?  Is there a specific time or location?  Thanks!

When they post the disembarkation schedule and put out the disembarkation luggage tags (typically  day before the end of the cruise), there will be varied colors for your "desired disembarkation time window". 

Do not take any of the colors provided on the rack.

Instead, go to the Guest Services desk and request the "Yellow" luggage tags from them.  They will confirm you are indeed Gold or above by looking at your keycard, and then hand you however many tags you need.

You can then disembark when they call "Yellow Priority Disembarkation".  If you get off AFTER that announcement, your bags will be there when you get to the claim area.  In all our cruises, we've never had that fail.

 

 

[julig22]

I've only used priority once, since I'm usually on a post-cruise excursion. On that particular trip the dock-workers decided to have a slow-down, so it was a mess. We got off the ship, then had to wait in line outside the terminal for a good hour. But they were off-loading luggage by tag color so they would only let people into the baggage area when their color was called - so the people who tried to jump the line got sent back outside to wait, since their luggage was still on the ship.

This was in Seattle - pretty sure there were a lot of missed flights that day, for anyone that didn't self-carry.

[SeaShark]

First issue I see here in the thread is that some have mistakenly equated "priority" with "first" or "early" and that just isn't the case.

 

The first guests off the ship will be the VIPs (the actual VIPs, not those who paid for special treatment), the Haven guests, and those who require assistance. Then NCL will disembark the guests who are willing to carry off their own luggage. Once all this is done, everyone left onboard will be people who will have left out luggage the night prior. When it is time to start calling these people, "priority disembarkation" will be the first group called.

 

Priority is nothing more than the first luggage group called. Even then, you still have to wait in line with all of the other priority folks.

[ready2cruzagain]

Just off of the Epic this past Sunday. You should receive the color Yellow luggage tags for Priority Disembarkation for Latitudes, we did not and had to go to GS to ask for them.  First they will let walk offs disembark starting at approx. 7:15am. Next is Yellow tags, Priority which starts at approx. 8:15am.  They actually called Yellow tags at 7:50 am. We walked off the ship, disembark was on deck 7 forward and aft, by the way Aft is less busy. We then went through face recognition and gathered our luggage. We were out of the terminal at 8:05am.

[Grandmafreddie]

If your not in a hurry it's great to be last off ship. Luggage is easy to find no long lines going through customs cans readily available. I have priority and always choose this way.

 

 

[Grandmafreddie]

Met cabs. Just sit in comfy spot till they announce all off a s away we go.

 

[julig22]

On 1/30/2024 at 12:24 PM, ready2cruzagain said:

Just off of the Epic this past Sunday. You should receive the color Yellow luggage tags for Priority Disembarkation for Latitudes, we did not and had to go to GS to ask for them.  First they will let walk offs disembark starting at approx. 7:15am. Next is Yellow tags, Priority which starts at approx. 8:15am.  They actually called Yellow tags at 7:50 am. We walked off the ship, disembark was on deck 7 forward and aft, by the way Aft is less busy. We then went through face recognition and gathered our luggage. We were out of the terminal at 8:05am.

I've always had to go and ask for yellow priority tags - it's not something they automatically assume you want AFAIK.

[shof515]

18 minutes ago, julig22 said:

I've always had to go and ask for yellow priority tags - it's not something they automatically assume you want AFAIK.

i noticed the same thing. no luggage tags with the you are leaving soon paper

[ready2cruzagain]

11 hours ago, julig22 said:

I've always had to go and ask for yellow priority tags - it's not something they automatically assume you want AFAIK.

 

When I went to ask for them the GS person was like...they are in your cabin. I had to explain that no they were not. Had a hard time getting her to give them to me!

[Laszlo]

On 1/30/2024 at 9:16 AM, CruisingNCLHokie said:

I tried searching but couldn't find anything.  We're booked to go on the Epic on Sunday and wanted to see how the priority disembarkation perk for Gold and above works?  Is there a specific time or location?  Thanks!

Priority to me means taking ALL of your bags off with you. We often do this and always do it when we are in a suite or in the Haven

[cruiseny4life]

1 hour ago, Laszlo said:

Priority to me means taking ALL of your bags off with you. We often do this and always do it when we are in a suite or in the Haven

Same! It's certainly not priority when you have to wait a long time onboard, or in the terminal, to get your bags. Walk off in 15 minutes with my bag!

[Sand and Seas]

4 hours ago, ready2cruzagain said:

 

When I went to ask for them the GS person was like...they are in your cabin. I had to explain that no they were not. Had a hard time getting her to give them to me!

Same for us.  Cruise four times a year and we have never had the Yellow tags delivered to us.  Always have to go to Guest Services or CruiseNext desk to pick them up.

[BirdTravels]

On 1/30/2024 at 9:16 AM, CruisingNCLHokie said:

I tried searching but couldn't find anything.  We're booked to go on the Epic on Sunday and wanted to see how the priority disembarkation perk for Gold and above works?  Is there a specific time or location?  Thanks!

Priority Disembarkation means you get yellow luggage tags so that your bags are the first available in the luggage hall (after suites). And you will be the first non-suites to be called for disembarkation. 
 

It does not mean that you will be escorted off the ship nor does it mean you get any special treatment other than early bags in the baggage hall. You have to wait in the [long] lines to get off the ship and into the baggage hall and customs. 
 

It is close to being a non-benefit since the first color tags will come soon after the priority tags.