Interesting comments by DCL

[lotsofboys]

I hope none of this is a repeat. I've been reading most everything on the boards these last few days, but I just wanted to share some information that was given to us today. We received a call from DCL confirming our Main dining selection (still don't know why because the confirmation shows it already). Anyway, DH asked all the questions that he has been wondering about for the past few days. Remember these are the answers given by a "sales" person. I am just repeating what she said, which may or may not be true:

1) How full are the ships? As of this morning she said only 2 staterooms left on the FL - CA and the CA - FL was 90% full

2) Why price increase so quickly? As was very well stated in a previous thread, she confirmed that the computer is automatically set to raise prices when certain percentages of a category are sold. She said that a typical Disney cruise takes 2 or more months to reach that point and Wednesday it took less than 2 hours as we all know.

Also with regard to the price increase, DCL is contractually obligated to pay for a certain number of cruises out of Port Canaveral even if the Magic is on the West Coast. The cost of using the San Pedro Port is obviously very expensive because they have no long term contract with them. The same applies to supplies, DCL would have long term contracts with suppliers out of Port Canaveral but not necessarily on the West Coast. So it would be reasonable to expect the cost of the 7 day cruises out of CA to be higher than out of FL.

4) What will DCL do about only 3 shows for 14 days? She said don't worry they have many surprises in store for everyone.

5) Why are some people able to transfer their $200 stateroom credit and 10% early booking discount and others are not? She stated that this has been the biggest source of controversy over the past 48 hours and that they were told officially that neither can be transferred. (We are in this situation and she suggested writing to guest services and explaining our situation since we were told it would transfer and that is why we decided to rebook the repositioning cruise.)

6) We are a family of 5 and booked two Cat 8's with the thought that we can convince 2 more family members to come with us. She said to give her two names right away because the ship is rapidly approaching sell out capacity and even if there is room in your cabin, we would be unable to add any more passengers. That one felt like a sales job, but we went ahead and gave grandparent's names and deposits for them because we know someone will go with us.

I'm sure I forgot something, so I will add it as it comes to mind.

 

[jgalecpa]

Great post.

I was especially interest in how the computer automatically reprices the cruise, and how the cruise reached that level in only two hours!


Thanks

Jim

 

[GenieDana]

The capacity issue is perhaps why the CM may have told you to add the names now.

In the past, I've read additions have been limited by:

- Total capacity there are only so many lifeboats / liferafts
- Childcare capacity - there is a limit to the number of eligible children allowed on-board due to the capacity of clubs to handle them

The prices rise in tiers ("tears" for some folks unfortunately). As the ship fills, late comers get stuck because of demand. However, very latecomers have gotten bargains on less than full sailings (at last minute). Don't count on it for these special iteneraries (I bet there is a waitlist already).

 

[jragland]

Just checked the DCL site and they only show cat 11 available. Just this morning they had several categories available for the FL to CA trip. I still think things will change beginning Monday and continuing for awhile. But who knows? The available categories have been changing hourly for the past couple of days! Looking forward to being there...it's gonna be a long wait.

 

[SandraLee]

lotsofboys . . . Regarding the 10% and $200 OBC, did the CM say if there was going to be a resolution to this problem? Or, was the expection that each person is to fight for their own?

What a mess that issue has become. I have reservation with DCL that *has* applied the 10% discount, but the reservation with Dreams is unable to use the 10% discount. That is the dumbest thing I've seen in ages.

 

[kimkatmom]

jragland:

We only have 53 more weeks to wait!!!

 

[jfs9900]

Isn't a full to capacity ship when every room has the maximum number of passengers allowed for each room?


So if I have a room with only 2 people in a CAT 4 room it and every other room is full - the ship will sail with will sail three short of a full ship.

I'm pretty sure that Disney created the ship so that every room could be completely filled....

 

[lotsofboys]

jfs9900....actually full capacity is determined by many things including theatre seating, dining seating and anticipated cabin usage. For example, DCL expects that a certain percentage of the ship will be couples only, so obviously one or two beds in those rooms will be unoccupied, but my understanding is they build that expectation into the "capacity" count. So a full to capacity ship isn't necessarily determined by bed count. That is what I have been told by other TAs.

 

[lotsofboys]

SandraLee...unfortunately DH spoke directly with DCL so he was only trying to resolve our situation, but it sort of seems like it is every person for themselves, which doesn't seem fair.

 

[ivanova]

Originally posted by jfs9900
Isn't a full to capacity ship when every room has the maximum number of passengers allowed for each room?


So if I have a room with only 2 people in a CAT 4 room it and every other room is full - the ship will sail with will sail three short of a full ship.

I'm pretty sure that Disney created the ship so that every room could be completely filled....

Actually full capacity does not allow for maximum capacity in every single stateroom (or so I've been told by supposed industry experts).

 

[tvguy]

Sounds like DCL uses the same computer software the airlines use, if demand rises on certain dates, so does the rate, automatically. If demand drops, so do prices.

 

[HooKooDooKu]

Isn't a full to capacity ship when every room has the maximum number of passengers allowed for each room?

I think the capacity of the life boats is going to be a better estimate than the number of beds.

Everything on the ship has been designed based on an AVERAGE number of people per stateroom.

Here's an example from a design perspective. There must be space on life boats for every one on board (law). You will never have every bed on board in use (i.e. what are the odds that everyone who books will have three or four people with them)(law of averages)? So you don't design the ship for the WORST CASE SENARIO (in terms of who might try to book). You instead design for the AVERAGE that will book. Every room has 3-4 beds so that you don't get things complicated and you divide reservations between family rooms and couples-only rooms. (i.e. would you want to start turning away couples if all the couples-only rooms were booked hoping that enough "families" will book to fill all of your family rooms?)

 

[mmouse37]

lots of boys....great post!!!! See you on the CA to FL cruise!!!


MJ

 

[lotsofboys]

Thanks MJ ... I'm going to PM you the name of a book that someone of the boards here recommended in case you are interested.

 

[ryan9]

Just an FYI, there are new shows planned for the 10 day & 14 day cruises...don't worry about being bored, 8 sea days will go by quick!!!

 

[BEAV]

Originally posted by lotsofboys


2) Why price increase so quickly? As was very well stated in a previous thread, she confirmed that the computer is automatically set to raise prices when certain percentages of a category are sold. She said that a typical Disney cruise takes 2 or more months to reach that point and Wednesday it took less than 2 hours as we all know.

While I have no reason not to believe the pricing scenario, we experienced a very strange situation.

On Wednesday, we booked a cat 11 for ourselves and a cat 6 for friends. We were fortunate to get through to DCL within the first hour and got confirmations before any of the multiple fare increases went into effect.

By Friday, our friends in the cat 6 decided not to sail. We decided we wanted their cat 6 and to cancel our cat 11. I figured we could just simply change names on the reservations, without ever having to adjust inventory. Wrong! We learned that name changes in the manner we wished to do them aren't allowed. The DCL agent said if we wanted to upgrade our cat 11 to a cat 6 we would have to pay the current cat 6 pricing. I immediately said "no" as I knew the cat 6 pricing was now much higher than when we had booked our friends two days earlier. The Agent insisted on checking it out, announcing that the "current" cat 6 pricing was the same as when we had booked on Wednesday. I asked her how that could be as we knew the prices had risen. Her response was "current occupancy levels determine current pricing." I was dumbfounded. How could their occupancy levels be back to that of the first hour of selling from on Wednesday? Had that many cabins already been released back into inventory?

It's remains a mystery to me. I quickly gave the Agent our credit card to charge the deposit before she discovered any errors! Can anyone explain this?

 

[SueEllen]

Beav,
You are priced correctly. While you cannot move your names to the other reservation, you can change to a different category of cabin at the tier in which you are already booked if the new category is available.

It is only if you have to book a new reservation that you go to the current pricing tier.

I hope this helps clear that up for you.
Sue Ellen

 

[BEAV]

Thanks Sue Ellen!

I have been thinking ever since our original price tier must have had something to do with it. That's a valuable thing to know. I don't expect we'll be changing categories any more, but would our original price tier remain in effect in the event we did decide to make any future changes?

 

[SueEllen]

Yes, as long as you don't cancel the reservation or add another cabin. Your cabin can change catgeories without the pricing tier changing. However, if you add another cabin the new cabin will be under the current tier when you book it.

Sue Ellen

 

[SandraLee]

SueEllen . . . I don't get it. When I booked the CA/FL, there were no cat 6 avail directly from DCL. The CM said she could waitlist me for a cat 6. I booked a cat 5. But, I said "By the time the cat 6 comes through, I'd be paying the prices at that time, right?" And, the CM told me 'Yes, it may be cheaper for you to keep your Cat 5 -- even though a cat 6 may be available in the future."

Are you saying that if I waitlist for a cat 6, I would get the price that it was at the time I booked the cat 5? That is definetly NOT what the CM told me on the phone. But, it would be great!