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I was thinking about the fact prices are jumping up for 2021 and '22, and I'm honestly trying to figure out if this is because (a) despite all the bad press against the cruise industry, there are still a ton of people who are sold on cruising and immediately rebooked for next year and beyond, causing the spike as supply rapidly dwindles; or (b) Royal is not fully thinking this through long-term and is trying to get a short-term financial shot in the arm to offset the losses hammering them right now. I'm guessing that it's more A than B, though still a mix, and certainly hope that's the case. Every cruise line has a big black eye after this, even if they've done nothing to warrant it up to this point, simply because the media has decided to dog-pile on the industry as a whole and continue to refer to ships as petri dishes and floating incubators and the like. I seem to recall statements here and quoted from quarterly financial calls noting the high percentage of first-time cruisers that make up Royal's annual booking numbers each year; if they expect to continue to draw in new cruisers and grow their customer base, they can't go and do things like spike prices at a time when people may be looking nervously at whether they should book or not. Thinking of this image that my wife sent me a few days ago:

My June 2020 and August 2020 sailings have dropped in price, while the cruise planner offerings have rocketed up. I just booked a cabin for Thanksgiving on a previous sold out category on the Odyssey, the category is sold out again and these prices seem to be holding, but cruise planner offerings went up since I booked. My Allure 2021 in August remains the same price BUT Sharla at MEI was able to allocate 300.00 OBC. We LOVE to sail, came over as platinum from DCL and were astonished at the amazing experience on RCCL. I personally can not fathom lovers of cruising not returning. I love holding hands with my best friend of 30 years looking out into the ocean, with the breeze and a libation in the other hand. Counting our blessings and being oh so thankful for our incredible lives. This too shall pass, wishing everyone here positive karma, good vibes, amazing health and many happy future sailings to come.......Just please; wash your hands.

One way to know if you were paying the agent commision from the start - who charged your credit card? The travel agents I use now don't charge my credit card. The line item on my credit card invoice comes from Royal Caribbean. When I pay the deposit, it is charged by Royal Caribbean. When final payment is made it is charged by Royal Caribbean. The travel agency simply passes my card number to Royal who charges my card. When you are working with a travel agency that is using some tricks to offer lower rates some of the charges may come from that travel agency. If any portion of the total cost of all charges appears to come from someone other than Royal Caribbean you are probably dealing with one of those agencies. They use group rates or other wholesale commission reduced rates from Royal and then they themselves charge you some portion which is effectively their commision and profit. I avoid these types of travel agencies. Here is the other reason to avoid these types of travel agents. You see the cruise as costing $X - the total of all charges. Royal offers the cruise to the agency not at $X but at $Y. The travel agency turns around and sells you the cruise at $Y + $Z where $Z equals their commision and profit. $Y (they're cost) plus $Z (their commision and profit) = $X what you pay. When a cruise is cancelled and FCC is offered, Royal calculates the FCC based on what they sold the cruise for. In this case they sold the cruise (to the agency) at $Y. That is the number Royal will use to calculate the FCC. You are thinking the FCC will be based on $X - what you paid. Wrong. You get FCC based on the agency rate, not what you paid. When you work with a travel agency like MEI they don't play this game. Royal charges your credit card for all amounts so Royal will see all of your payments and that is what Royal will base any FCC on. Royal pays these types of travel agents their commision on the back end that you never see. Royal typically takes care of travel agencies in times of mass cancellations. They can't afford to upset thousands of travel agents who sell other cruise lines as well. However when certain travel agencies that use commision reduced rates are involved with mass cancellations Royal doesn't treat the the same because there was no commision. These travel agencies resort to not refunding the charges they made directly to your credit card as a means to retain some commision or profit. This is why these types of travel agents should be avoided. Cheap rates look appealing and when everything goes as planned you save some money. However when things go awry you don't get all the money that other people get who used more reputable travel agents.

Here is the day two vlog by @CHRIS WONG. Each day he plan to make a vlog about the day onboard the ship during the 30 day no cruise time.

We cancelled our church service today. I went online and shared a message of encouragement to our congregation. We still do not know for how long we will be cancelling our church services.

Too early to tell. If cruises are still impacted in November I don’t want to think about where society will be.

Thanks for writing this !!! I have the best clients.....

I will never book again without a travel agent! I do believe the amount of time and effort and stress my husband and I dealt with and spent over the phone would’ve been alleviated had we had a TA. Lesson learned. But we will truly value and appreciate the TA in the future knowing what they deal with!

When we can cruise again the industry will need our help, I suggest we all book twice as many cruises as normal just so we can do our part...=)

Day 1 photos:

I second the comments regarding @michelle I just got off the phone with her about an hour ago.... it was amazing how calm she was in this unprecedented storm. Not only is she having to talk numerous clients off the cliff, she's also having to deal with constantly changing situations on, what would seem, an hourly basis. And on top of it all, she also had to deal with the changes with her own plans that had her going overseas. So, with that being said, thank you Michelle (and this goes for all the TA's out there) ---- you all are amazing and deserve our admiration. Thank You.

I think Carnival has greater impact from this. It was the Carnival brand and Princess name dragged through the mud in the media. With more ships to fill they really need to entice customers back. Royal does as well but Carnival's exposure is greater.

You couldn’t pay me to sail Carnival.

Update from Carnival just came in: We booked the Breeze after we were allowed to change our trip for free but before Carnival ceased operations. I figured we were out the $1200 in OBC (2 staterooms @ $600 each). I just received the email that we get the credit anyway. I just applied for it. Carnival just handed us $1200 we didn't expect. Again, I am partial to both RCCL and Carnival. I know some on here have no use for Carnival, but they stepped up to the plate for us... and the Breeze is a really nice ship.

Check out Chris' vlogs... he's been assigned to Oasis since the amplification and is giving us an idea of what they are doing during this period... he also has a running thread on this forum...

Alrighty now ..... since my March 29th Cruise on Freedom went down the toilet, I've got a few additions and one deletion... Add Oasis - Sept. 20, 2020 Add Freedom - March 13, 2022 (The anniversary of the shutdown announcement --- and Nick Vitani's Birthday -- lol) Delete Mariner - Sept. 21, 2020 Thanks, Mark

You can catch a few on some of these webcams https://www.portmiamiwebcam.com/ Use the drop down menu near the top to change ports. They are all Florida/Caribbean ports though.

This is just a personal opinion....based on nothing more than common sense. It is my belief that the "Dr. note" scenario will quietly slip away. It might have sounded like a reasonable plan when some bean counter devised it, but honestly, it's not workable. As you said, MOST doctors are not going to declare that a passenger is "fit to cruise" - there's no way to truly verify that. What does it even mean ? It's too broad of a declaration. If they quietly change the form to remove that declaration and only ask the HCP to verify any chronic ongoing health issues, it might work. Then the passenger could sign a statement not to hold the cruise line liable (I also realize those are not worth the paper they are printed on) and leave it at that. There is always risk for both the passenger and the cruise line. Ship happens. But this Dr. note thing is not workable in the big scheme. IMO. Is this REALLY the time to be asking HCP to sign silly waivers for cruisers ? I think they have waaay more important things to do right now.

Something to keep in mind. A cruise ship cannot “make” fresh water unless it is underway. I’m sure they probably all have plenty of water, for now, but if they need to make fresh water, they will have to sail around. So chances are these ships are going to have to move about, from time-to-time in order to make fresh water and reprovision. It’ll be an interesting ballet to watch.

Just took this screenshot - the cruise ships are the big, round, blue dots. Left to right: Nieuw Amsterdam, Harmony, Oasis, Nieuw Statendam, Symphony (showing at Coco Cay)

So they're going to wait it out there? damn! That would be an awesome place to stay moored up to for 30 days

@twangster, thank you! I had never even known this existed. Not that I am ever leaving MEI but still very good to know. I appreciate your time in explaining this, just WOW!

Royal did say they were protecting commissions on both the cancellation and the rebooking that an FCC is applied against. The TAs are under a lot of pressure and uncertainty, I’m glad that Royal is doing right by them.

Yeah but they have a Guys Burger Joint........

Cruise fares have always been governed by supply and demand principles. At the end of the day the market decides the price but that doesn't happen instantly. There is no standard price for a cruise. If cruise fares are published too high fewer people will book. It's that simple. If we examine the theory that they are artificially increasing prices to cover losses the risk they take is fewer bookings. This causes a drop in short term revenue with fewer deposits coming in. One thing they need right now is cash flow so if they did raise prices to "make up for it" they run the risk of seriously reducing the cash flow they need to help them weather through this. In the end the market determines the price. If the fares are too high people won't book, period. Cruises are a luxury vacation item, not an essential form of transportation like buying a car. There is no guaranteed booking, people will book when it makes sense for them to do so individually. Royal can sleep about 80,000 guests every night currently. Over the 30 day cancellation there are 2.4 million people "sleep nights" that are being missed. Some of those will take the refund option, some will take the 125% FCC option. Many are now rebooking future cruises.

... another funny one!

I hear ya! In my case, wife went to grocery store on Friday while I hit the liquor store a couple hours later. Good thing I like unpopular beer! ? Ignore the boxes. That’s a case of Weyerbacher’s Merry Monks tripel, a 4-pack of Weyerbacher’s Tiny imperial stout, and a six-pack of Tröegs Tröegenator doppel Bock. Plus 3 bottles of Zinfandel to bolster the three still at home. What’s with those stares? They said we needed supplies for two weeks!

I really do agree Tony. Carnival got the reputation of a frat house at sea decades ago. It's just not true. Sure there is more late late night stuff on Carnival, but truth be told, a blindfolded person would have a hard time telling the two apart. I realize, I'm defending Carnival on an RCCL forum, and I really like RCCL. I guess I've dissed Disney Cruises because of all the kids and I've never been on DCL. Truth is, all the major lines do a really good job, and we may have our preferences, but you can't go wrong in a normal situation on any of them.

It’s nice to have a few laughs! Just a few more...

Shameless display of wealth...

Need to start passing this out!

Just got back from 4 day cruise to Mexico and back on the Brilliance of the Seas. Not sure anyone will care to hear how it went since no one will be RC cruising for at least the next 30 days. Didn't seem like anyone was sick on the cruise. Washed my hands about 49,000 times, give or take a few.

I am going on my first cruise June 21 on Harmony of the Seas. I still hold out hope that things will be ok by then, but if not, well I guess we will just have to take that cruise credit and roll it forward to a different one. I do not think I will cancel. I am going to wait on them to cancel me and hope for some perks..=)

We are on the SOTS on April 11th. We just barely made it. I'm excited that we were not cancelled, but I know in my heart this isn't over, and they are canceling in waves. I dont see this being better until July. With that being said, I am more saddened for all the people in and out of the cruise industry whose livelihood is on the line. We are worried about being on a ship and others are worried about rent and food. Either on a cruise or not, I'm thankful for what I have, and hope all goes well for everyone.

Saw this interesting youtube video from a casino worker on Oasis. Yesterday they were able to eat at JR!

It was only a favorite because of the wonder in the eyes of young (not yet 4 and not yet 2) grandkids. If you're taking toddlers on an excursion, that one's great. Agree that otherwise it would have been just okay.

I hope they let the crew enjoy Coca Cay. It would be a shame if it sat empty for 30 days.

I booked an Owner's Suite on her to get something close to a normal Jr Suite size , lol.

Even 2 people changing in the room was difficult without elbowing each other! Thanks Noodles...but I don't think it was even that big! ?

Yeah..never thought about the completion date, but anything is a possibility right now I suppose. I will hold off for a bit before doing anything...hope I dont lose that cruise...cant handle 2 cruise disappointments in7 months!

Thank you for all of your hard work, Stephanie @ MEI

That's very responsible of you. Sadly there are many groups (of all types) that are pretending nothing is happening.

The only thing I MIGHT change is to be more vocal (and potentially obnoxious) when telling idiots to wash their hands before leaving the restrooms.

I agree!! We just started using Michelle because of the positive feedback in this forum!!! We can all navigate these waters together!!! ????

Does she think the shelves are stocked by robots?

Yes! My wife and talked about this same thing while driving home from Bayonne today. We like to cruise as cheap as possible, so we can cruise more. BUT, one of the reasons we were willing to sail the Anthem last week was the extra comfort of having booked a balcony. By coincidence, our next two cruises booked (Harmony & Anthem) are also balconies. Like @Mljstr, I think we are going dig deeper into our pockets going forward. Also another benefit was the view at 6:32AM on Friday the 13th...

Yes, it's now BYOTP instead of BYOB!

On the surface the $600 OBC seems generous, but for any bookings that are more than $1200 pp, the Royal offer of 125% is better compensation. It appears both companies are spending generously on incentives, just distributing them a little differently.