Thread: Newlyweds, Hubby deployed to Afghanistan

Originally Posted by thegreenfam

Thank you all for such great advice, and friendly welcomes!!!

A question hs popped up in my mind, how far in advance should I purchase our cruise? Thanks!

It depends. If you want to take the risks and don't mind taking what is left of cabins, book late. You may- or may not- get a better rate.

Booking early - as early as possible means you get the cabin you want and an initially lower rate.

One of the nice things about cruises is, if the price goes down before 90 days before a cruise, you can often get the cruise line to match the lower offer either in cash or in onboard credit. You can also cancel the cruise up to 90 days.

You always want to book as early as possible. Don't listen to those websites that advertise 'save up to 75% on last minute cruises'. Doesn't happen! They sell the same cruises for the same price as everyone else. That 75% off is based on brochure rate and nobody, not even the cruise lines, sell them for the brochure rate.

Also, the price offered at the beginning when the cruise becomes available, may very well be the cheapest price. Depending on when you go, the price may very well keep going up and never been offered at that rate again. This is especially true during the highest travel times of the year; Christmas/New Years, Spring Break, and the first part of Summer when school lets out.

An example of this is Carnival's Early Saver Fare. This is the cheapest rate you can get for a cruise - beats the Past Guest rate, senior rate, military rate, interline rate, and resident rate. But it's only offered up to a point and when it's gone, it's gone.

Also, most of the time, should the price go down, we can get the lower rate for you provided final payment has not yet been made (usually around 70 days prior to sailing). After that time, it depends on the cruise line, the circumstances, and your agent as to whether you can get any onboard credit or upgrades to make up for any price reductions which may occur.

Booking early also allows you to plan ahead; plan for time off from work, plan for all the arrangements you need to make so you can leave for a week, and plan for shore excursions. Not to mention it allows you time to save up to pay for it all.

And lastly, if you wait until late in the process, not only could the price become higher, but airfare will always be higher than if you booked it earlier. So if you're lucky to save money on the cruise, you'll spend the savings on higher airfare. Plus, cabins are being sold, so the longer you wait, the less choices you have. This can be especially problematic if you have a special situation, such as a desire for connecting cabins, cabins for 4 or more, suites, family cabins, etc. During high travel times, these types of cabins will disappear first as they are in high demand.

What happens if you're waiting for the price to go down and it doesn't? Do you forget your vacation and try again later, or do you just bite the bullet and pay the higher rate? What about all the arrangements you need to make? It's easy for retirees to just pack up and leave at the last minute, but most people have to plan well in advance for such things.

The bottom line is there are very few good reasons about booking late, but there are many many good reasons about booking early.

Pete

Pete- not always the case about airfare. Most of the time, yes, but you can almost always do better on airfare during a sale (Europe prices have dropped $500 this week!)

And here's a little known fact about airfare; if you have already booked and the price goes down, you can request the difference. However, you have to specifically request it and they will not give you a refund, but will provide credit towards a future flight, usually within a year.

But with fuel prices continuing to rise, overall we don't see airfare going down except to reset the prices to where they should have been. In other words, they raised the prices too much and now how to reset them, which is what's going on for airfares to Europe. It's all about supply and demand - they expected more demand than what they're getting.

Pete

Pete, it depends on the airline. Southwest will do so, no problem. Most of the legacy airlines require you to rebook the flight and then charge you the rebooking fee. Quite often the fee offsets any possible gain that you might have made at a lower flight price.

I agree with you 100% about the fares being too high. Someone in RM thought there was going to be a lot more demand than there is, and they are compensating by lowering the prices. Good ol' economics supply and demand curves.

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CruiseLineFans

Reggie