? re: hurricane and no insurance

[princesslondon]

Does Disney still reimburse you or let you rebook your cruise if it is cancelled or shortened by a hurricane or do they only do that if you have the insurance? We can travel anytime so if they cancel our cruise before we go there will be no issues for us - we drive so no airfare issues either.
Am I thinking about this correctly - how will the insurance benefit us?

 

[lbgraves]

If you do a search for any of the huricanes last year in this forum you will see how it can make a world of difference. When the cruises were delayed or moved to another port the facts changed by the minute. For example...on Thursday DCL was saying that Saturday's cruise was still going to happen with no changes. Friday morning the same was true so everyone was faced with canceling on their own with whatever the financial situation would be for them or making their way down to PC with a major hurricane on its way. Friday afternoon the story changed...after most people were already on their way there. The cruise was pushed back to Sunday. When people arrived in PC after a long drive they found out that now they had to find a hotel to stay at in PC or perhaps Orlando for an extra night. They didn't have the benefit of discounts or booking ahead. They were charged full rack rate. It wasn't easy to find a hotel in Orlando with a room because of the evacuation in FL. Many people went inland to WDW. They then had to buy food for Sunday, which they hadn't planned on since they would be on the ship. Of course, that cruise was delayed 3 days so that led to more nights in a hotel that was expensive & more food...if they could get it.

People who had travel insurance were reimbursed for all of those expenses past Friday night. It cost us $45 each for DH & I to be insured & the kids were free with the AAA plan thru accessamerica.com. I am sure that those people spent way more than that over the course of those three days waiting for their cruise to start.

As far as DCL, they did credit the difference in the number of days missed from the cruise, to a point...though many thought that when they were told it would be 50% it should have been literally 50% of what they paid. They didn't do this with the port fees or taxes I believe. Those who cruised also were given a discount of 25-50% off their next cruise...not counting any special cruises...within a certain time range. If you chose to cancel after the cruise was shortened I believe that DCL did refund people, but not before they officially moved the cruise to Sunday.

 

[princesslondon]

Thanks so much for all the info. So Disney will help with refunding or changing our cruise if we don't have insurance, but the expenses incured is what the actual insurance is for. That makes more sense now and since we are cruising in Sept, if its not too late we will probably look into the insurance. If we are not AAA, is Disney the best way to go to get the insurance and is it too late since we booked months ago?

 

[BuzzBoyMom]

Even if you are purchasing insurance late....Disney is NOT the way to go.

Try accessamerica.com or insuremytrip.com

 

[lbgraves]

You don't have to have AAA to get their family plan thru Accessamerica. Just go to their website to get the phone number because you can't get a quote for it online. If someone tells you that you need to have AAA, either ask for a supervisor or hang up & call back.

 

[HooKooDooKu]

We were scheduled for one of those hurricane trips last year. One of the options DCL gave us was to cancel with a 100% refund (fare, fees, taxes, AND cost of insurance).

Since it was DCL changing plans, I don't think it has anything to do with insurance, I believe we would have been given the same option if we didn't have the insurance.

And lbgraves was on the mark as to how things went down...

In our case, we were driving from central Alabama. We called DCL as we left home on Friday for our Saturday cruise, and they said it was still on. They took my name and number to call back in-case plans changed. We were near the Alabama-Florida boarder when we got the call that the Saturday sailing was canceled. We turned around and headed for home (no point is travelling TO Florida when everyone else is LEAVING) and decided we couldn't handle the extra driving and bus trip with a 2yo because of the port changes (not to mention we would have to drive back to Florida on the Sunday the hurrican was making land fall to make it in time for our Monday sailing).

 

[Az Pirates]

You don't have to have AAA to get their family plan thru Accessamerica. Just go to their website to get the phone number because you can't get a quote for it online. If someone tells you that you need to have AAA, either ask for a supervisor or hang up & call back.

I've seen several mentions of the AAA family plan here.

When I called and asked about it I was told that yes the kids are free, but I needed to insure the total cost of the trip anyway... so the quote I got was no different than the quotes I got by plugging in my info online.


Are others getting a different answer and better rates with this plan?

 

[kcashner]

We were on the 7 day Magic cruise that became a 4 day cruise in 2004--Jeane got us!

As above, a call to DCL on Friday morning got the answer that the cruise would go out on Saturday as planned. At 4 pm on Friday, I was informed that the cruise would go out on Monday from Ft. Lauderdale.

My understanding is that DCL handled each of the "hurricaned" cruises differently based on length of cruise and number of days messed up. We had the option of totally cancelling or rescheduling with a full refund of all payments (or applied to the cost of new cruise). My understanding is that we would have kept our onboard credit had we chosen to rebook. Since our 7 day became a 4 day, we got a 40% refund of the "cruise fare" portion of our ticket and an onboard credit. In addition, we got 25% off the cruise fare portion of a future 7 day cruise within a certain time period. DCL ran bus transportaion from MCO and WDW to Ft. Lauderdale, and on the return from Port Canaveral back to WDW or MCO at no charge.

Since we were already at WDW with plans to go to a hotel closer to the port for Friday night, cancelling wasn't really an option. I had to book hotels for Saturday and Sunday, paying full fare. We did stay at WDW, but we paid full rack rate. Of course, I had to feed my family for those days. I was allowed to leave my car at WDW during the cruise and was issued a special pass allowing this. WDW ran non-stop movies on 3 channels while we were confined to our room.

So....what I'm saying is that I feel that Disney treated us fairly. However, it cost me every penny of the 40% to provide the hotel rooms and microwaveable food for the 2 extra nights. We did not have insurance--I've sometimes had it, sometimes not. People with insurance were reimbursed according to the terms of the insurance policies. Some were getting a flat $1000 per day for the cancelled days. Some were submitting receipts and getting their actual expenses for the lost days. I'm sailing again this fall, and I do have insurance!

The other thing to consider is whether your medical insurance would cover the cost of an air evacuation if this were needed. This can cost as much as 25K. It is usually covered by travel insurance policies.