Cruise ships with thousands of passengers on board are a great way to travel the world with ease and comfort.
However, with limited space on board, cabin sizes are smaller than your typical hotel room. An upgrade, therefore, will make a considerable difference to the trip.
With that in mind, making sure you have secured the right cabin for you is imperative as you’ll be spending a lot of time in the same room.
Cruise cabin prices vary widely and depend on the category of cabin that you choose. There are typically around 20 categories in total, far more than your typical hotel room options.
However, Cruise Critic has revealed a handy trick that could see your cabin upgraded for free.
When booking the cruise, Elissa Leibowitz, a Cruise Critic contributor who have been on more than 50 cruises advised to “book a guarantee cabin”.
She went on to explain: “A ‘guarantee’ means you’re assured a cabin in the category you requested, but are not assigned a specific cabin until a short time before departure – usually, a week, give or take.
“If you book a guarantee in a specific category and it’s full, you might get upgraded for free.”
However, unlike the name suggests this not ‘guarantee’ of an upgrade.
She went on to add: “On the other hand, someone else (perhaps a member of the past-passenger program with higher status) might nab the upgrade, and you’d get their cabin in your category.”
Booking into this option may secure you an upgrade, but Elissa revealed that this is a bit of a gamble.
Passengers should only book a guarantee cabin if they are happy to receive whatever cabin is allocated from that category.
Although you may end up will a better cabin for a lower price, you could also end up with precisely the type of cabin you have paid for.
The cabin you receive will, however, only be from the category you have chosen.
You will not be allocated a cabin from a lower category than what you have paid.
Ms Leibowitz went on to add that cruising with the same line over time could grab you a free upgrade at a later date.
She said: “Just like airlines and hotels reward their loyalty program members, cruise lines do, too.”
“The more frequent the cruiser, the more likely she or he would be offered a free or paid upgrade.
“Merely joining a cruise line’s loyalty program won’t get you automatically upgraded – even after you’ve taken a handful of cruises.”
There is another point to highlight, which is your view of an upgrade and that of the cruise line might differ. A cruise line may see a cabin with a better view, in the same category, as an upgrade. Not necessarily the same idea of an upgrade as yours.
