One element of the coronavirus pandemic that has undoubtedly kept many people from booking a cruise has been the fear that they will need to cancel their cruise. We totally understand this worry. Who wants to put down a deposit (or perhaps even pay in full) for a cruise, only to get busy or sick beforehand and be unable to go, losing major money? To combat this worry and increase bookings, many cruise lines have rolled out different cancellation policies to help their guests have confidence when booking with them. Royal Caribbean Group’s overarching cancellation policy, aptly called Cruise with Confidence, has just recently been extended. Let’s check it out.
Cruise with Confidence
The Cruise with Confidence policy is actually pretty simple. It states that you are able to cancel your cruise up to 48 hours before the departure time. This gives you a lot of flexibility in terms of changing plans, which is something that is definitely appreciated in the most uncertain time period in most of our lives. It should be noted, however, that the refunds that you get after cancellation won’t be in cash; instead, you’ll get 100% of your fare back in future cruise credit.
What are the dates?
The Cruise with Confidence policy applies to bookings which were set to sail between now and September 30th, 2020, and has been extended by Royal Caribbean to allow you to use the credit to book a cruise any time all the way up to April 2022. This means that if you have a cruise booked for any day between now and September 30th, 2020, you can cancel it within 48 hours of departure and get credit that will be good for up to a year and a half! That’s not a half bad deal, if you ask us.
What cruise lines does this impact?
Royal Caribbean Group is the parent company of Celebrity Cruises, Azamara, Silversea, and Royal Caribbean, of course. That means that each of these cruise lines will be adopting this policy, with one exception: Silversea. In Silversea’s case, the policy is even more lenient: all cruises that depart before April 30th, 2021 will allow you to cancel within 48 hours of departure. You’ll get the same deal with future cruise credit as you would with any other Royal Caribbean line, as well.
While it’s certainly an odd time to be planning travel, it’s encouraging to see cruise lines take policies like this seriously. They make their guests feel that much more secure booking with them, which benefits both travelers and travel companies. Hopefully even more cruise lines can extend their cancellation policies as time goes on!
