My husband and I were extremely unhappy with the NCL cruise we just took. We booked an 11 day Western Caribbean cruise on the Norwegian Dawn, leaving on March 11, 2007 from New York. We had booked five shore excursions before we left, including snorkeling which was the primary reason we had chosen this particular cruise. When we embarked we were handed a letter about a change of itinerary, ostensibly due to an engine problem. It said that we could cancel the cruise and rebook for another date. We were already aboard – cancelling was obviously not an option. The itinerary that we paid for and booked offered six stops in the Caribbean. Instead that was cut down to four, eliminating Grand Stirrup Cay in the Bahamas and Ocho Rios, Jamaica. We wound up being able to snorkel for an hour on one of the remaining shore excursions.
In speaking to some of the crew members we were told that the engine problem that caused the itinerary changes was known at least three months prior to the trip, so it was known in advance that the ship would be unable to to reach all of the stops in the original itinerary, but they still sold the cruise with six Carribean stops. We have written to both NCL and Travelocity, through which we booked the cruise, and have received replies from neither. In going onto some trip review sites on the Internet we've found that ours was not an isolated incident. People have written about exactly the same thing (excursion stops eliminated due to "engine problems&quot on cruises with NCL to Alaska and Mexico - involving different ships each time. Obviously this cruise (and others) are sold under false pretenses, and we neither got what we paid for, nor were we compensated to make up for the stops they eliminated.

If you paid with a credit card contact the credit card company directly. Explain what happened; namely, they sold one thing and gave you something completely different, and tell them you want to do a charge back. The credit card company will want as much proof as you can provide, copies of documents, copies of e-mails, and details of the fouled up itinerary, copies of travelocity's guarantee and so forth. The travelocity website states in its guarantee: "All travel booked on Travelocity will be consistent with the promise of its detailed description on our site and your travel itinerary". Western Caribbean said six stops then they must give you all of what you paid for. Don't back down, you want your money back, not travel vouchers on some broken down cruise line. I've done this to companies that ripped us off and got all the money back. Hope this helps.

sally, i am sorry your trip turned out so poorly. others have contacted the "ombudsman" from Conde Nast Traveler magazine for help in similiar situations. good luck.

I haven't taken a cruise in years, but I remember the "fine print" seemed to say that the itinerary could change for almost any reason at the discretion of the cruise line.

I can only imagine your disappointment at the changes. Especially stopping at one less island--and reportedly it being the fault of an ongoing problem. Offering to reschedule you when you got on board seems ridiculous.

Cruising is much more popular now so maybe things have changed.

Have you looked at www.cruisecritic.com? You might get some good ideas from them for your next step.

CW

How unfortunate for you ! This is exactly the reason I never book shore excursions through the cruise line. I always "go it alone" and hire a taxi driver to take me to a previously researched place I want to stop at, be it a snorkeling or diving operation, restaurant, particular beach etc etc etc. I always have positive experiences this route and avoid the horrendous lines and charges the cruising industry charges.

Good luck - we were on the Sun Princess over new years and missed 40% of our cruise because of an engine problem that they knew they had. They gave us $100. per person back while on the ship and with 4 letters gave us another $100. per person onboard credit on a future cruise. They will not let you chargeback your credit card because they consider it a service issue and you cannot sue at least on Princess unless you are in LA
We paid $4600. for the 4 of us and it has been 3 months and i am still just as upset but it seems like there is nothing that we can do so good luck I hope you have a different experience! We will not be cruising again after this experience and we have been on 13 cruises - we will spend our money on people who want our business!

We just returned from our cruise on the Star Princess. Our Captain decided to skip Ocho Rios. Thought the weather was too bad. Obviously, we're not Captians of a ship, but the weather was fine in our opinion. Whatever. Read the fine print in your cruise contract. Cruise lines have the right to change iteniaries and skip ports at their discretion. Seems unfair and we were just as disappointed, but we new that going in and decided to cruise anyway and take our chanes. No more cruises for us though. We'll stick to AI land vacations.

Unless you want to be flamed, I would stay away from Cruise Critic with your complaint. Otherwise, put on a good pair of flame retardant pajamas and get ready.

having taken 7 cruises (NCL 2x, Holland America, Celebrity, Oceania, Carnival and a defunct one)Only one line had a lot of problems: NCL. besides having the worst food they seem to have "engine problems" and even more obnoxious fellow passengers than Carnival which is quite a feat. Certainly a bad experience can turn you off for life unless you have had good ones or are willing to risk it again. About shore excusion I agree book on your own, always cheaper but I think some operators are catching on and raising, even doubling rates, when ships are in port to match the rates of ship- booked tours. One time in St John I found a snorkel tour that was less than 1/2 the price of the cruise ship tour (what a fool, I did not retain the name of the biz or contact info) . Anyway we showed up and turned out to be the only ones booked. The boat was huge- a cabin cruiser and I assumed they would cancel. -nope they decided we would go forward and since we were willing and strong swimmers, even try some new spots in addition to the usuals in order to get our feed back. As we were returning we sipped shots of local rum compliments of the capt. and we ran into the cruise ship snorkel boat. they were spilling over the edges, completely packed shoulder to shoulder with many screaming kids. they paid 55.00, we pd 25.00. you decide if it is worth the effort! On only one occasion has a cruise booked tour matched in price what I could have found myself (a Celebrity key west snorkel trip) so I went for it. I say this with caveat that I have an adventure/thrift gene running through me...I love taking the risk and I have not had a problem yet!