RoyalUp Program worth the stress?

[GSgolden11]

So I apparently decided to torture myself by choosing to wait for the Guaranteed room over selecting my own, but hey why not save a few bucks?! But now, I'm waiting on pens and needles for the RoyalUp bid. We are leaving May 4 on Independence and though i've been assigned my 6th floor room... Im praying every second that I get this upgrade!!!! What do you guys think, like is it likely to get an upgrade and when do you find out if the bid is accepted or not??? 

[Jetdriver787]

Depends on what you are bidding from and to? At this stage any upgrade is likely to come (if at all) around 3 days before sailing. First you would likely know about it would be a debit on your credit card flagging up. You then get an email telling you yea or nay. 
 

It’s a speculative bid so definitely don’t stress. The answer is usually “Nay!” but like the lottery, you might get lucky.

[miyanc]

We book gty. Often it's the difference in going or not.  We are very agreeable with most things. Good room or bad. I should be knocking on wood.  I have had bad luck while picking my room myself and good luck letting them do it.  Maybe you get a bad room and get fcc out of it.  Maybe you only loose if you end up spending more for your room plus royal up compared to what it would have been if you booked the room straight away.  

[loman]

I , for one do not participate in this program for the simple reason as i dont want a cabin under the pool deck . This would seriously impact my happiness, as the deck chairs get dragged around in the early hours of the morning.

I select my cabin and stick with it . 

 

Others dont mind getting less than desirable cabin locations though.

And i suspect they will most likely be the ones left over for the royal up program.

Although some may get lucky and snag a good location.

Good luck to you . 

 

[GSgolden11]

3 minutes ago, Jetdriver787 said:

Depends on what you are bidding from and to? At this stage any upgrade is likely to come (if at all) around 3 days before sailing. First you would likely know about it would be a debit on your credit card flagging up. You then get an email telling you yea or nay. 
 

It’s a speculative bid so definitely don’t stress. The answer is usually “Nay!” but like the lottery, you might get lucky.

I received a 6th floor GTY interior.. And honestly, Im not mad about it at all! We're kind of excited to try an interior for the first time... HOWEVER (lol) if we can win this bid and get upgrade to spacious ocean view or something in that realm that would be the icing on the cake!!! I just stress about it because I get really into planning these trips and I just NEED to know a definite answer about where im sleeping or ill be on YouTube for hours looking at all the "could've beens" and "maybe we wills" lol

[TheInnocentAge]

21 minutes ago, GSgolden11 said:

What do you guys think, like is it likely to get an upgrade and when do you find out if the bid is accepted or not??? 

We've had a variety of different outcomes. We've been notified as early as four weeks before the cruise (accepted), to as late as three hours after sail away (denied). I've bid the maximum before and was declined, and I've bid the minimum and was approved.

 

Best of luck, and either way, enjoy your cruise!

[GSgolden11]

5 minutes ago, miyanc said:

We book gty. Often it's the difference in going or not.  We are very agreeable with most things. Good room or bad. I should be knocking on wood.  I have had bad luck while picking my room myself and good luck letting them do it.  Maybe you get a bad room and get fcc out of it.  Maybe you only loose if you end up spending more for your room plus royal up compared to what it would have been if you booked the room straight away.  

This is our 2nd time booking GTY, we like the idea of saving money and we are new to cruising so we're trying to figure out if we are picky or not about our cabins LOL last trip was last year on Freedom, we book GTY interior AND won our RoyalUp bid for an ocean view!!! Im starting to think that bid win was a fluke. 

[GSgolden11]

8 minutes ago, loman said:

I , for one do not participate in this program for the simple reason as i dont want a cabin under the pool deck . This would seriously impact my happiness, as the deck chairs get dragged around in the early hours of the morning.

I select my cabin and stick with it . 

 

Others dont mind getting less than desirable cabin locations though.

And i suspect they will most likely be the ones left over for the royal up program.

Although some may get lucky and snag a good location.

Good luck to you . 

 

I believe there is so truth to this, I've heard that they only bid off the less desirables too!! Now that I think about it, our last trip was our first time bidding and not only did we have plumbing issues but we were on deck 2 so we heard all kinds of "ship sounds".. BUT overall it was still a great room, beautiful trip. Like it wasn't the worst. *shrugs* 

[smokeybandit]

There should be no stress. As long as you understand what you're bidding on (a cabin category upgrade might be seen as a downgrade based on location on the ship of that cabin), you bid, and you forget about it.  Some crock pot logic. Set it and forget it. And if you win, great.

[fpcruiser]

40 minutes ago, loman said:

I , for one do not participate in this program for the simple reason as i dont want a cabin under the pool deck . This would seriously impact my happiness, as the deck chairs get dragged around in the early hours of the morning.

I select my cabin and stick with it . 

 

Others dont mind getting less than desirable cabin locations though.

And i suspect they will most likely be the ones left over for the royal up program.

Although some may get lucky and snag a good location.

Good luck to you . 

 

We have won 4 Royal Up's, all from inside guarantees bidding minimum. We have never been under the pool deck.

[island lady]

I have never in the past won a Royal UP bid...until the one that mattered the most.  

 

Not being able to have a choice (all sold out) as to anything over a balcony cabin on our first quarter World Cruise (all picked over by full WC cruisers) I put in a bid for a GS. 

 

We won our bid.  Heavenly spending that 63 nights in a GS (our usual cabin of choice).  😉 

[leaveitallbehind]

2 hours ago, miyanc said:

We book gty. Often it's the difference in going or not.  We are very agreeable with most things. Good room or bad. I should be knocking on wood.  I have had bad luck while picking my room myself and good luck letting them do it.  Maybe you get a bad room and get fcc out of it.  Maybe you only loose if you end up spending more for your room plus royal up compared to what it would have been if you booked the room straight away.  

With any US booked GTY assignment if you are not happy with the stateroom location all you have to do is contact whomever you booked through and you can move to any other location that is still available within the assigned sub-category.  They will confirm available locations and then will reassign your original stateroom to the new one.  Have done so several times.

 

Same holds true for a stateroom you originally selected.  Not sure why you think you would get an FCC from a room selection you made.  And certainly not with a GTY that they assigned.  Especially when, as indicated, you can change either based on availability.

Edited April 22 by leaveitallbehind

[leaveitallbehind]

1 hour ago, smokeybandit said:

There should be no stress. As long as you understand what you're bidding on (a cabin category upgrade might be seen as a downgrade based on location on the ship of that cabin), you bid, and you forget about it.  Some crock pot logic. Set it and forget it. And if you win, great.

Agree. Not sure why a speculative bid would carry any stress, especially as it is the people who do so's choice to do it.  If you get it, great, if not, no loss as you stay where you originally purchased.

Edited April 22 by leaveitallbehind

[taglovestocruise]

2 hours ago, GSgolden11 said:

This is our 2nd time booking GTY, we like the idea of saving money and we are new to cruising so we're trying to figure out if we are picky or not about our cabins LOL last trip was last year on Freedom, we book GTY interior AND won our RoyalUp bid for an ocean view!!! Im starting to think that bid win was a fluke. 

No one has mentioned this but once your cabin has been assigned you can switch to any other cabin on the ship in the same category. Never mention GTY, just ask to switch cabins. Do a mock booking so you know what cabin is available and just ask to switch.  Side note, most royal up cabins come from no shows or last minute cancelations. Has nothing to do with cabin location. Also Royal has no part in the royal up offerings, they are all done by a third party company. 

[leaveitallbehind]

2 minutes ago, taglovestocruise said:

No one has mentioned this but once your cabin has been assigned you can switch to any other cabin on the ship in the same category. Never mention GTY, just ask to switch cabins. Do a mock booking so you know what cabin is available and just ask to switch.  Side note, most royal up cabins come from no shows or last minute cancelations. Has nothing to do with cabin location. Also Royal has no part in the royal up offerings, they are all done by a third party company. 

You were likely typing as I was posting as I just mentioned that two posts before you - LOL.  But it doesn't matter whether you mention GTY or not as your booking will show that when they are making the change.

Edited April 22 by leaveitallbehind

[BirdTravels]

3 hours ago, GSgolden11 said:

So I apparently decided to torture myself by choosing to wait for the Guaranteed room over selecting my own, but hey why not save a few bucks?! But now, I'm waiting on pens and needles for the RoyalUp bid. We are leaving May 4 on Independence and though i've been assigned my 6th floor room... Im praying every second that I get this upgrade!!!! What do you guys think, like is it likely to get an upgrade and when do you find out if the bid is accepted or not??? 

So you could get assigned a Deck 2 Ocean View. I would have only bid on a balcony. 

 

Lower level upgrades can occur at any time from the moment you submit a bid to a couple of days prior to departure. Suites are usually done on week of cruise. While they say that they will continue to process upgrades up to departure time, they really mean suites may be upgraded on departure day, not ocean views. 

[leaveitallbehind]

3 minutes ago, BirdTravels said:

So you could get assigned a Deck 2 Ocean View. I would have only bid on a balcony. 

 

Lower level upgrades can occur at any time from the moment you submit a bid to a couple of days prior to departure. Suites are usually done on week of cruise. While they say that they will continue to process upgrades up to departure time, they really mean suites may be upgraded on departure day, not ocean views. 

While I agree the their post is a bit confusing, the OP indicates that they have been assigned a deck 6 GTY, so there is no way to downgrade to a deck 2 unless they selected that as their RoyalUp bid, which wouldn't make sense.  Their deck 2 experience was with what is indicated as a bid from a prior cruise - but also not sure why one would bid on a category that could be assigned there. Wonder if they meant GTY?  Confused. 

 

I'm interpreting their stress as waiting to hear if their upgrade bid was successful. The other option if they are unhappy with their current deck 6 assignment would be withdraw the bid to move it as mentioned in my prior post.

[taglovestocruise]

And to add more stress, some have received the upgrade or the denial while waiting in the checkin line. 

[Biker19]

31 minutes ago, taglovestocruise said:

And to add more stress, some have received the upgrade or the denial while waiting in the checkin line. 

The recent reporting seems to suggest RCI doesn't do it that way anymore, usually. Denials usually come before pier check in.

[George C]

I like royal up and celebrity similar plan, you must first book a cabin or suite that you will be happy with , but I like to possible get an upper larger suite with more perks . A few years ago we went from a small suite on celebrity to penthouse, fantastic experience but still not cheap.

[PhillyFan33579]

2 hours ago, Biker19 said:

The recent reporting seems to suggest RCI doesn't do it that way anymore, usually. Denials usually come before pier check in.

On my last three cruises (over the last six weeks) my bids for suites were rejected, as expected, due to submitting pretty low bids. However, for all three cruises I was notified of the denial via e-mail after I was already on the ship. 

[bucfan2]

The only people that should be stressing are those who create stress/thrive on it. Either a) book the cabin you desire, or b) book a cabin you can live with, and bid what you'd like for a cabin offered thru royalup. Extremely simple, but some will do all they can to make it difficult.

Edited April 23 by bucfan2

[ReneeFLL]

10 hours ago, miyanc said:

We book gty. Often it's the difference in going or not.  We are very agreeable with most things. Good room or bad. I should be knocking on wood.  I have had bad luck while picking my room myself and good luck letting them do it.  Maybe you get a bad room and get fcc out of it.  Maybe you only loose if you end up spending more for your room plus royal up compared to what it would have been if you booked the room straight away.  

Why would you think someone deserves a fcc? They/you were willing to take a gamble on a gty in order to save money. Either accept what is given (or change accordingly to their rules) or don’t go the gty route. Expecting a fcc is ridiculous. 🙄

[Jetdriver787]

Important to understand that “Royal up” is very different from “Guarantee!” 
The latter exists (usually,) and it is only the specific assignment within that category that is notified at a later date.

 

The former, often doesn’t exist and is used as an ancillary revenue generator  for possible unsold or returned inventory at a later date. It is run by a company called “plusgrade” who run similar programmes for many other hospitality and transportation companies. 
 

It can be quite misleading when terms such as “offer” and “invitation to bid” are used, because it makes it sound like an auction for a product. In fact there is usually no product to auction. It is the possibility of one becoming available (that the subscribing company doesn’t otherwise sell, resell or keep) at a later date, that is really being “offered!” 
 

As a revenue generator for the company, it also seeks to do that by creating chains whereby the revenue is maximised within each individual chain. Somebodies highest bid won’t necessarily achieve that result, and of course the result of a bid is opaque to the bidder. 

 

Additionally, the programme can (and is) used to balance stock, particularly in the large categories. Think of it as a pyramid. At various junctures between a cruise going on sale and the sailing itself, there will be expected levels of sales projections. Sometimes a particular category isn’t selling at projection. The programme enables the subscribing company to utilise “bidders” to rebalance inventory in order to free up stock that likely would be easier to sell.

 

Most cruise ships these days are built to maximise “balcony” cabins. Broadly speaking, this is 3 tiers up the pyramid and it is usually within this category (possibly including Junior suites) that a  sales imbalance can occur. Selling a cheaper category is often much easier and can also be achieved without necessarily devaluing the brand. 

 

Rebalancing (where it might be required) enables the company to maximise revenue on remaining sales. In order to do this it requires that there be time to sell. Clearly that isn’t likely 3 days before sailing, so you will often see people saying they got a “bid” accepted 56 days out (or whatever). 
 

 

Even on a full cruise (completely sold out) “Royal up” will invite bids on all categories of room (relevant to the existing product held) even though none may be available. That enables potential revenue chains to be created later, from unsold or late returned inventory (no-shows, cancellations etc.) Usually these tend to be allocated at around 3 days before sailing, although they can occur right up until departure and technically up to 2 hours after sailing.

 

For the bidder you are entering into a binding offer to accept a “better” grade of cabin IF one becomes available that is subsequently assigned to you, at ANY time between making the valid bid and acceptance or closure of that allocation cycle.

 

 

Edited April 23 by Jetdriver787

[luvbrady]

We look at available inventory for what we want to 'royal up' on before considering bidding.  As someone stated- a lot of it is dependent on last minute cancelations and no-shows.  If they're showing some inventory for a level we're interested in bidding on- we might.  Otherwise pretty good bet it may not happen.  Only successful bid for us was before they were sailing at full capacity again.