dogcanyon

About 3 weeks ago I received an email from Holland America offering outside cabins (obstructed view) on their 14 day South America cruise departing from Buenos Aires on Dec 6 2016 for $799 per person (double occupancy). To my amazement, frequent flyer seats were available for the dates I would need.
Unfortunately, the friend I would be going with was out of the country at the time. When he returned a week later, the price for the cheapest outside cabin had increased to $1099. Right now we are 64 days out from the sailing and I see 96 open cabins on the boat (Yes, I went through and tediously counted them, category by category). Do you experienced cruisers who watch these things expect that they will cut prices again in order to fill the unsold cabins and if so, when would you expect that to happen? Thanks in advance for your advice.

747FC

Have you tried the appropriate Cruise Critic forum?

At either price, seems like a steal!

bigbuy

I would put this up for bid on www.cruisecompete.com
Also, check the 90 day ticker often on www.vacationstogo.com
Yes, they will often drop prices before departure. I have also seen the opposite.

Randyk47

That's not going to do them much good as they've made final payment and would incur a substantial penalty to cancel and rebook. More likely is that the OP may be offered an upsell.....a reduced fare to move up to a higher category cabin. That can happen anytime now that they're beyond final payment but probably more likely two to three weeks out from the sailing. Another option is to contact Holland America, either through their travel agent or directly depending on how they booked their cruise, and see if they can get a reduced fare for a higher category cabin. The third possibility is that the OP's cabin category will be included in a "last minute" sale and the OP may be able to negotiate a lower fare or onboard credit because of the sale. (NOTE: Holland America, and most lines for that matter, usually limit these sales to new bookings only so you nay or may not be able to get the reduced rate or negotiate some kind of offset. They are not obligated to offer the new reduced fare but sometimes will because of the goodwill factor.) Finally there's always the potential that the OP will be given a free upgrade to a higher category cabin. It seems this happens a little less often than maybe a few years ago but it still happens.

bigbuy

Final payment

Randyk47

OK. I see what you're saying. I read the OP's post to mean they'd already booked and paid for the cruise. My bad if they haven't. While I personally don't like or use CruiseCompete or VacationsToGo those would be options. The other option is to watch Holland America site closely for a last minute sale though there could be an issue with the frequent flyer seats by that time.

Doc Savage

Is $300 going to be a deal breaker? That's a lot of cruising, food, etc. even for $1099.

I did the Valparaiso to BsAs cruise on Royal Caribbean a few years ago, definitely a lot of beautiful scenery. If I were you, I'd just grab the price while you still can.

Have fun!

dogcanyon

No, I didn't book it because my potential traveling companion was out of the country at the time. By the time he returned (a week later), the $799 outside cabins were all gone.

dogcanyon

Good point. I guess it's a personality quirk that I always like to pay the lowest price possible for everything. In this case the "taxes, fees and port charges" add another $521 to the price and I believe there is a mandatory cabin gratuity of $175 ($12.50 per day), so for the $1099 cruise fare the true total cost is closer to $1800.

dogcanyon

Thank you. I did not know about cruisecompete.com.

Randyk47

You could also try a discount travel agency like Pavlus. They give cash rebates of 10-12% for most cruise lines. That's fare only and not fees, taxes, or gratuities but it's still a nice savings.

YVR Cockroach

Perhaps it was a "private sale" where the fare is available only to you (via a membership number?) I've had (and taken up) a few such offers from Carnival Corp.

Doesn't mean much, unfortunately. The unassigned cabins may not reflect the number of booked cabins as I would imagine a good many were sold on "guarantee" basis (which is what/how I've only booked a cruise). In the most severe case, it could be there are 95 unassigned guarantee bookings and if you booked one cabin, the rest may well disappear from sale.

dogcanyon

Thanks. I looked at the email and it wasn't a private sale although I did put in my Mariner number when searching in order to pick up any discounts associated with that. I see your point about the unassigned cabins, but my gut feel is that in this case one more cabin being sold is probably not going to be the domino that fills up the ship.

YVR Cockroach

No, but these fares tend to be time-limited especially when they become very cheap. Was eyeing a repo cruise earlier this year and waited until they offered an incredible sale, which they did ~ 30 days out, $169 for all non-suite cabins (line, Princess in this case, was asking a ridiculous $500 for insides weeks earlier for a 4-nighter) for member, $10-20 more for non-members, and the cruise went from badly selling to sold out in a week or so (as did the following R/T cruise to Hawaii).

Could wait. Go to cruisefish and keep a monitor on prices (you might want to do that yourself 2x daily though the HAL site is a PITA to use).

dogcanyon

Thanks. I was kind of waiting for another HAL email, but I will monitor the HAL site a couple of times a day to see if there is a drop before any official sale or announcement and set up an alert on cruisefish. Thanks for the new acronym (PITA). It took me a minute, but then I figured it out, and you're right.