I thought I should expound on the new onboard booking policy. It has changed a little since we all discussed it before and since I answer these questions every day this is a good forum to clarify the rules.

An "OPEN" booking is NEVER refundable it is transferable only.

A "REAL" booking on a particular sailing IS fully refundable and transferable.

OPEN BOOKINGS - no particular date
You do it "open" so you can decide later.

In simple terms if you do an "open" booking then later assign it to a cruise and then cancel that cruise without transferring the open booking to another cruise immediately you LOSE The $400.

If you book a "real" cruise - a date and ship onboard and then you decide to cancel that cruise the entire amount, deposit AND onboard booking is refundable.

I think this is confusing and wish both the "open" and "real" cruises had the same criteria but I dont make the rules.

It doesn't seem worth the effort to do an open on board booking any more. Ngaire, given these changes, do you think we should still do on board bookings, open or real? Or should I ask, under which circumstances does it make sense?

Colleen

Ngaire,

Can you keep rolling forward the open booking deposit "forever"?

Of course, Ngaire can and will answer this better than I, but although I do not know about "forever". It was explained to us by Brian O'Brien, when we made our on-board "real" booking last week, that it can be rolled over. So if you plan to cruise with RSSC in the next year or so, I think it is wise to do it.

Betty

The cruise consultant onboard the Navigator told me that I had to use the open booking we made within 6 months.......to put it on a cruise any cruise in 2005. Then she said that I could keep rolling it over even into 2006 as long as I cancel the cruise before final payment and rolled it over to another cruise. She said I could keep doing this until we finally decide which cruise we want to take. I still think it is worth the extra 5% off of the cruise fare to do this. Just make sure that you note on a calendar somewhere when your 6 months is up or when you have to roll it over again.

I am going to buy a bunch of these onboard bookings next week, some for cruises already booked but out of the penalty range, and an extra for something that just might suit my fancy before I could get another on MINT (like RSSC opening up booking for just one segment of the WC/BAIL that I really want!) I know they have discretion in this regard (allowing one to get it for a cruise already booked), but I don't think Radisson is out to tick-off loyal customers. There is simply too much goodwill spread by regular posters/cruisers on this board for the policy to be otherwise. Under the old rules, they didn't require me to even put in the deposit. Now that things have changed, I fully expect to have to put the money forward.

Goodie Oliva! I hope you put $ down for at least one BAIL segment!!!

ACtually if you are trying to add an onboard booking 5% to an already existing booking that is fully deposited you do not put down any more money.

It must be a booking that (a) is still offered at the same price (b) the cabin category is still available and (c) you are outside of cancellation. In other words if you could cancel and rebook the exact same thing. This is done on a "consideration" basis and is not "guaranteed' to be approved. In fact there are so many changes coming this may or may not be available in the future but right now it is available.

At this time you can keep rolling it forward. You must make the new booking at the exact same time you cancel the old booking. Eventually it will stay the same booking number and just change dates - that should be coming soon. This will help things a lot.

Only those of us in the business know what a trauma the operation of the onboard booking situation is. I spend 20% of every day dealing with these things. It should not be that difficult but it is. Rolling over from booking to booking trying to keep track of that - people forget and then want Radisson to tell them what they have. There is no central location in their system they cant just look at the computer. They have to pull up every sailing you were on to see if there is one and then track it from there. People constantly think they have not used them or that they made more than one and so tracking all that is time consuming. Also they can get lost in the system so be SURE to keep your letters and send a copy to your TA.

A lot of the new rules are because of these problems not to make it difficult for the passengers. I hope a better system will be forthcoming soon.

It is a nice savings and I still think it is worth doing. The savings are 5% and that can be substantial on some of the more expensive cruises.

Yes Olivia how about a BAIL segment??? Maybe 3 or 4??? Joanna

I recently booked 3 weeks on the PG for next year - we are also booked on the Navigator this Fall. When making the first 2 week booking on PG, I inquired about on board booking on the Navigator to apply to PG. "No problem" - just give the booking number and it will be applied. Two days later when adding a 3rd week to the PG trip, I raised the same question - different answer - it is treated on a "case by case" basis. What are the cases? I ask. No answer. Ngaire spells out the cases in her reply on this thread. They seem reasonable. Question? Same category cabin has to be available. In this case, it can't be - I've got it! Only one owners suite on the boat! It seems like the onboard booking credit is a tiger by the tail - a lot of trouble but difficult to get rid of.

We just got off Navigator this morning. Ilene says hello to Ngaire.

We did an open booking, and she arranged for it to be applied to our PIP booking next year for an extra 5% off.