Non-Dreams Unlimited Travel Agent Claims September Cruise Can’t Be Canceled Currently

[monkeydawn]

Not saying it is inconvenient. The volume of calls may make it impossible for the TA to get through. I suspect Disney will refund all money. I don't understand the loan comment, though, sorry.

Yet that is not what the TA conveyed to the OP. OP said that TA was told by DCL that they wouldnt discuss refunds on a Sept cruise right now and I call BS on that.

The loan comment was because they are keeping the OP's money when she has expresses a need to have it available to her. They, either DCL or the TA, shouldnt get to change the terms of the original contract without offering comparable compensation. I.e., a "loan" if they wont even try to refund the OP's money.

I hope the OP will give us a hint to what TA because this is really crappy and I'd like to know who to avoid in the future.

 

[tvguy]

Yet that is not what the TA conveyed to the OP. OP said that TA was told by DCL that they wouldnt discuss refunds on a Sept cruise right now and I call BS on that.

The loan comment was because they are keeping the OP's money when she has expresses a need to have it available to her. They, either DCL or the TA, shouldnt get to change the terms of the original contract without offering comparable compensation. I.e., a "loan" if they wont even try to refund the OP's money.

I hope the OP will give us a hint to what TA because this is really crappy and I'd like to know who to avoid in the future.

Well, as Judges say in court, "What would a reasonable person do in this situation?" Is it reasonable for the OP to expect DCL to handle their request ahead of others with cruises before OP? In essence, cutting in line? IMHO, that is unreasonable.

 

[monkeydawn]

Well, as Judges say in court, "What would a reasonable person do in this situation?" Is it reasonable for the OP to expect DCL to handle their request ahead of others with cruises before OP? In essence, cutting in line? IMHO, that is unreasonable.

You seem to be missing the point that the TA flat lied to the OP. That's the issue.

 

[tvguy]

You seem to be missing the point that the TA flat lied to the OP. That's the issue.

I think the TA is just being honest.

EDITED: Actually, THIS is on the DCL website. "Given the higher than normal call volume at our Call Center, we ask that affected Guests and travel agents wait to contact us until after they receive an email from us. As a reminder, Guests who booked their reservation through a travel agent should contact them directly to make any modifications." https://disneycruise.disney.go.com/guest-services/advisory/

 

[DisneyWishes14]

I suspect DCL is swamped and I for one find it entirely reasonable that DCL would not want to deal with a September cruise now when they have roughly 120 sailings between now and then ahead of you, roughly One million reservations ahead of you.

DCL has never said they don't want to deal with September cruises now. The TA is making that up.

Well, as Judges say in court, "What would a reasonable person do in this situation?" Is it reasonable for the OP to expect DCL to handle their request ahead of others with cruises before OP? In essence, cutting in line? IMHO, that is unreasonable.

They aren't cutting in line. If they call, they may wait on hold and then will speak with a CM regarding the reservation. There are not designated dates for people to call in based on their sailing dates.

I think the TA is just being honest.

EDITED: Actually, THIS is on the DCL website. "Given the higher than normal call volume at our Call Center, we ask that affected Guests and travel agents wait to contact us until after they receive an email from us. As a reminder, Guests who booked their reservation through a travel agent should contact them directly to make any modifications." https://disneycruise.disney.go.com/guest-services/advisory/

That quote from the DCL website pertains to guests whose cruises were cancelled and were offered FCC or a full refund. They wanted those guests to wait until they received that info via e-mail to call in. OP will not receive an e-mail because her cruise was not cancelled. Nowhere in that statement from DCL does it say guests on other, unaffected sailings should refrain from calling in. The TA is making all of this up, most likely, because she doesn't want to wait on hold. Sorry, that's the job right now. OP wants her money back now and has every right to get it back now.

 

[tvguy]

DCL has never said they don't want to deal with September cruises now. The TA is making that up.



They aren't cutting in line. If they call, they may wait on hold and then will speak with a CM regarding the reservation. There are not designated dates for people to call in based on their sailing dates.



That quote from the DCL website pertains to guests whose cruises were cancelled and were offered FCC or a full refund. They wanted those guests to wait until they received that info via e-mail to call in. OP will not receive an e-mail because her cruise was not cancelled. Nowhere in that statement from DCL does it say guests on other, unaffected sailings should refrain from calling in. The TA is making all of this up, most likely, because she doesn't want to wait on hold. Sorry, that's the job right now. OP wants her money back now and has every right to get it back now.

We'll just have to agree to disagree. But to be honest, I can't believe that you are giving no consideration to the volume of work DCL call center folks are doing to get the 60,000 plus passengers with cruises that have already been canceled refunds or rebooking. How many people does the call center have? Lord, the phone load must unbelievable. I think the Travel Agent is just being reasonable.

 

[jeffbeardreams]

We'll just have to agree to disagree. But to be honest, I can't believe that you are giving no consideration to the volume of work DCL call center folks are doing to get the 60,000 plus passengers with cruises that have already been canceled refunds or rebooking. How many people does the call center have? Lord, the phone load must unbelievable. I think the Travel Agent is just being reasonable.

I'm a TA, and I'm of the opinion that lying to or misleading my clients is a bad business model even if I'm doing it to try and preserve my own sanity or limit the overload at the call center. In truth, I absolutely CAN cancel a reservation for a September sailing and if my client asks me to do that, then I have a responsibility to follow through in a timely manner. Now ... "timely manner" might prompt me to ask the client if they wouldn't mind waiting for a lower volume time when I won't have to wait 3 hours or whatever on hold ... but IMO it does not include the option for me to tell a client that something that clearly can be done cannot be done.

The bigger issue here is why DCL insists that all cancellations be done on the phone. It adds an amazing amount of volume for their call center for no apparent reason. They allow us to cancel WDW and DL reservations online, and while I know those are different reservation systems, that one issue hardly seems to be insurmountable.

 

[cruisehopeful]

Can people ask their TAs to transfer the cruise back to Disney? If that's even a thing, perhaps doing that and then cancelling it yourself is another option.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

The bigger issue here is why DCL insists that all cancellations be done on the phone.

The Booking Terms & Conditions says:
Cancellations may be made by telephone or in writing.

Now, whether "in writing" includes emails, I don't know. I know an email sufficed for our cancellation/rebooking on another cruise line.

 

[wombat_5606]

The Booking Terms & Conditions says:
Cancellations may be made by telephone or in writing.

Now, whether "in writing" includes emails, I don't know. I know an email sufficed for our cancellation/rebooking on another cruise line.

That wouldn't apply to someone working with a TA, would it?

 

[jeffbeardreams]

The Booking Terms & Conditions says:
Cancellations may be made by telephone or in writing.

Now, whether "in writing" includes emails, I don't know. I know an email sufficed for our cancellation/rebooking on another cruise line.

That applies to direct consumer reservations, not TA-booked reservations. We have to call. Terms and conditions don't always match up with actual practices and procedures.

 

[jrabbit]

My spouse booked a Disney Cruise through a recommended travel agent for September 21-25. We’ve been hit hard by job issues re: the virus and thus would like to cancel and have the refund money to help get us through. It’s been paid in full since 2/21 but my travel agent swears that Disney won’t do anything right now and won’t even discuss with her any trips that far out. Can anyone shed some light on this or am I getting snookered? I honestly don’t know what to think. Thanks!

Can you see your reservation on the DCL web site? If Yes, does it show the correct amount paid? If NOT the Amount Paid, then your TA is REALLY giving you the run around ... because they have NOT forwarded the money to DCL. And it will probably be MUCH more difficult to get your money back from them than if it were DCL.

WAAAAAAY back in the day (1980's) we had a TA that booked our airfare, hotel and rental car for a trip for us. We paid the TA for these items. We DID actually have airfare and a rental car, but when we tried to check into the hotel - they never heard of us because our TA pocketed that money and suspensed making the reservation until closer to the time we were traveling, but it got overlooked. So we had to pay for a room again (not cheap on the coast) and then fight with our TA to get our $$$ back. I Truly hope this is NOT the case for you.

Good luck with your issue.

My cruise out of Vancouver to Hawaii has not yet been cancelled, but Canada will not let any ships over 500 passengers (maybe + crew), Hawaii is asking people to postpone until after April any trips there (our cruise is scheduled to be in Hawaii May 5-8). We have only heard from DCL that they will let us know when they know

 

[FigmentSpark]

I think your TA doesn't want you cancelling because she's seeing all her business cancelling. That's all her revenue at a time when she has bills to pay. She's hoping that you'll change your mind in a month when this virus thing looks different. If you can't get her to work with you, perhaps you can call her office manager to do it?

 

[wombat_5606]

I think your TA doesn't want you cancelling because she's seeing all her business cancelling. That's all her revenue at a time when she has bills to pay. She's hoping that you'll change your mind in a month when this virus thing looks different. If you can't get her to work with you, perhaps you can call her office manager to do it?

I thought I read that Disney is still going to be paying her commission though, which is where she would be getting her income, not from the cruise fare.

 

[FigmentSpark]

I thought I read that Disney is still going to be paying her commission though, which is where she would be getting her income, not from the cruise fare.

That won't be true for a cruise that's not yet cancelled by DCL.

 

[wombat_5606]

That won't be true for a cruise that's not yet cancelled by DCL.

Gotcha.

If we are both talking about the OP, she's before her PIF date. She should be able to cancel any time she wants. Personally, if I wanted to cancel and my TA said something like this to me, I wouldn't use them anyway. So, they are going to lose my business, regardless.

I can imagine that with the cost of a Disney cruise and people losing jobs, there are a lot of people that want to cancel their cruise and get that money to help with expenses now.

 

[MomOTwins]

Just wanting to point out a possibility here... I mean, haven't we all had experiences with Disney Cruise Line cast members where some less-than-accurate information was given? I wouldn't be surprised if the TA was told by some DCL CM on the phone that they weren't dealing with changes to September reservations at the moment--some CM could have misunderstood the guidance around the recent cancellations and thought they could only talk to people who have cancelled cruises at the moment.

 

[wombat_5606]

Just wanting to point out a possibility here... I mean, haven't we all had experiences with Disney Cruise Line cast members where some less-than-accurate information was given? I wouldn't be surprised if the TA was told by some DCL CM on the phone that they weren't dealing with changes to September reservations at the moment--some CM could have misunderstood the guidance around the recent cancellations and thought they could only talk to people who have cancelled cruises at the moment.

That's certainly a possibility and is most likely. I just hope that if the OP stated that they needed to cancel for financial reasons due to their job situation, that the TA wouldn't have bent over backward to fulfill their request.

 

[DisneyWishes14]

We'll just have to agree to disagree. But to be honest, I can't believe that you are giving no consideration to the volume of work DCL call center folks are doing to get the 60,000 plus passengers with cruises that have already been canceled refunds or rebooking. How many people does the call center have? Lord, the phone load must unbelievable. I think the Travel Agent is just being reasonable.

There is nothing to disagree with. The TA can call DCL and cancel this reservation now. Her telling the OP that she can't is simply not true. If the TA said, "the phone lines are incredibly busy right now, can you wait a week?", that would be another story, but she didn't. This is very simple for the phone CM to do - it literally takes about 2 minutes to cancel a cruise. What takes more time than that is the TA waiting on hold - and that, I will speculate, is the crux of the issue. The TA doesn't want to do it. Too bad. That's the job. I just spent 5 1/2 hours on hold the other night to cancel my WDW trip. Once I got on the line (at 1:30 am), I spoke to a lovely CM who let me know she was being paid overtime that night to service reservations. The call was over in about 2 minutes. I didn't "overwork" the CM - this is what she does every work day. The CMs aren't being overworked and if they are working overtime, they are being paid overtime to do so. They are working the hours assigned to them, picking up the phone and servicing the call. You are making it sound like they are being overloaded with work when they are simply taking calls in the order they are received just as they would any other day. CMs aren't sitting in front of multiple phones trying to pick up as many as they can. That's not how it works. The TA just doesn't want to do the work or lose a commission.

Can people ask their TAs to transfer the cruise back to Disney? If that's even a thing, perhaps doing that and then cancelling it yourself is another option.

Could they? Maybe? Would the TA do this? - most likely, no. What the OP can do is call DCL, ask to speak with guest services, explain the TA won't cancel the reservation and see if Disney will take the reservation back themselves. Then she can cancel.

 

[tvguy]

There is nothing to disagree with. The TA can call DCL and cancel this reservation now. Her telling the OP that she can't is simply not true. If the TA said, "the phone lines are incredibly busy right now, can you wait a week?", that would be another story, but she didn't. This is very simple for the phone CM to do - it literally takes about 2 minutes to cancel a cruise. What takes more time than that is the TA waiting on hold - and that, I will speculate, is the crux of the issue. The TA doesn't want to do it. Too bad. That's the job. I just spent 5 1/2 hours on hold the other night to cancel my WDW trip. Once I got on the line (at 1:30 am), I spoke to a lovely CM who let me know she was being paid overtime that night to service reservations. The call was over in about 2 minutes. I didn't "overwork" the CM - this is what she does every work day. The CMs aren't being overworked and if they are working overtime, they are being paid overtime to do so. They are working the hours assigned to them, picking up the phone and servicing the call. You are making it sound like they are being overloaded with work when they are simply taking calls in the order they are received just as they would any other day. CMs aren't sitting in front of multiple phones trying to pick up as many as they can. That's not how it works. The TA just doesn't want to do the work or lose a commission.

In this era that none of us has ever experienced before, where stores are out of necessities, and people are waiting in line for the basics, I standby my comment that it is unreasonable demand given the circumstances. TA's have families that are impacted just like you and I. OP will get their money back, maybe just not today.