Refunds

[JohnK6404]

9 minutes ago, Cruising Family said:

Hi Matt. Did you post anything? I can’t find it. Thanks!

Hi @Cruising Family !

I believe Matt posted the info here under the "Royal Caribbean Blog" tab up top on the page...

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2020/04/29/royal-caribbean-offers-updates-refunds-odyssey-of-the-seas-and-the-presidents-cruise

... and here...

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2020/04/30/royal-caribbean-apologizes-guests-refunds-taking-longer-expected

 

[Cruising Family]

5 minutes ago, JohnK6404 said:

Hi @Cruising Family !

I believe Matt posted the info here under the "Royal Caribbean Blog" tab up top on the page...

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2020/04/29/royal-caribbean-offers-updates-refunds-odyssey-of-the-seas-and-the-presidents-cruise

... and here...

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2020/04/30/royal-caribbean-apologizes-guests-refunds-taking-longer-expected

 

Thanks so much!

[Iron]

Got e-mail today for refund DID NOT get 200  deposit back or airport transfer

[Cruising Family]

I previously posted our scenario on this forum and wanted to share that we finally received all refunds for taxes, fees, gratuities and cruise planner purchases. There IS hope!! It just took way too long! 

 

Cruise planned on March 14th on Symphony.

Cruise cancelled By RCCL on March 13th as part of voluntary suspension.

Received 125% FCC email on 4/6/20.

Called and emailed several times about cash refund for remaining items.

Cruise planner cancellation email received on 4/14/20.

Refund received TODAY 5/7/20 - 17 business days after receiving the cruise planner cancellation and 39 business days after our cruise was cancelled.

The biggest insight I have on timing and advice is to make sure you’ve received a cruise planner cancellation email (if you prepurchased anything). That means the process has started. No email goes out if you are only waiting for taxes, fees, gratuities. And, there really is no rhyme or reason on when they are processing because our traveling companions had very similar refund coming to them and received it within 2 weeks of the cancelled cruise.

[vanelli56]

On 4/25/2020 at 11:34 AM, vanelli56 said:

Glad to hear some refunds are starting to trickle in. That give me some hope... as I was starting to really worry and thinking about the CC chargeback route. But will give it at least 45 days. We were a part of the 2nd wave of cancellations.... The email from RCI said to give 30-days for the refunds and that FCC would be issued by 4/30.  

Here's my status this far and will update as they change:

Ovation May 22nd Alaska cruise.

Cancelled by RCI on or around 3/23 or 3/24.

Contacted TA to discuss options. 

official cancellation email received from TA on 3/30. (Starting my clock)

I think the cruise was finally removed from my account on or around 4/18 (ish). 

Cabin 1 (Inside); 100% cash refund option... target date would be 4/30 (30 days+/-)

Cabin 2 (Balcony Gty); 125% FCC option... target date would be 4/30 per RCI original email. 

Cruise planner purchases (Internet and 3 night dining); 125% OBC option  (Received the automated email of cancellation on 4/20 that others received, but not counting it as we opted for the OBC, not the CC refund it was indicating.)

 

If or when I see refunds and credits... I'll update accordingly. 

Take care and stay safe. 

KCCO

Keep calm and Cruise on. 

 

UPDATE: Just received Taxes and fees refund for Cabin 2 today. Everything else is still floating off in the void. Most likely somewhere near the Bermuda triangle, somewhere between an old sunken ship and Royal Caribbean Math.... all are mysteries awaiting to be figured out.

KCCO

Keep Calm and Cruise on!

[TAM]

I just received my full refund today!! Woop! Woop! It was in 4 separate refund amounts. I’ve read that a few have come through for people recently, so for those of you that haven’t yet I would hope that it will soon.

[SteveinSC]

are they refunding the travel protection? 

[Kcusack89]

Still patiently waiting for my future cruise credit after my cruise was canceled on March 23 or something like that. The second round of cancellations. Many from my cruise have already received theirs but I know their not going out my cruise date.

I did get the email about coming in by may 15 I just think royal had a hidden agenda. I applied for the 125% cruise planner credit too and the email I got said we'd get both the same day. I'm assuming sometime next week is when all cruise planner items will skyrocket in price bc they know everyone from the second round of cancellations will be getting their extra 25%

[nova_gal]

3 hours ago, SteveinSC said:

are they refunding the travel protection? 

I received my refund today on my April 4 cruise which Royal cancelled. It came in 2 separate transactions - one for cruise fare, other one for taxes, fees & port expenses. Note: my cruise fare refund was $39 less than what I paid, so make sure to check it against your booking confirmation. I did not see a refund for Royal's travel insurance. I'm hoping that it will be refunded & have asked my TA to help follow up (and also about the cruise fare discrepancy).

[Selene]

It's been 48 days now and I still have received nothing back.  I also have not seen the promised update of May 6th yet.

[cobra614]

My cruise was supposed to me may 17th, I called my TA less than a month ago and she said it was sure to be cancelled. I told her I wanted the refund option when RC did cancel the cruise. She advised me in the meantime to cancel my cruise planner purchases myself. I was fully refunded on everything within weeks, I was expecting it to take months!!

 

Thanks Stephanie from MEI.

[Kcusack89]

5 minutes ago, cobra614 said:

My cruise was supposed to me may 17th, I called my TA less than a month ago and she said it was sure to be cancelled. I told her I wanted the refund option when RC did cancel the cruise. She advised me in the meantime to cancel my cruise planner purchases myself. I was fully refunded on everything within weeks, I was expecting it to take months!!

 

Thanks Stephanie from MEI.

Cruise is supposed to be may 11 still waiting on a FCC ...said April 30th now may 15th so we shall see

[Leroyr55]

Question the on board credit refund does it show up in your cruise planner? If not how do you know when you receive it. 

[Kcusack89]

5 minutes ago, Leroyr55 said:

Question the on board credit refund does it show up in your cruise planner? If not how do you know when you receive it. 

That's a great question...no one's received it back yet it's supposedly coming may 15 . Here's the email I got from them regarding my FCC and my cruise planner credit 

[SCP]

Hi everyone,

I'm going to share my experience so far:

I cancelled via "cruise with confidence" Vision of the Seas, 21st March 2020 

    The FCC vouchers have been already provided.

    I'm still WAITING for Taxes & fees CASH refund as agreed.

Regarding the cruise planner, without any explanation RCCL refund me a lower value, I call the pre-cruise team and they acknowledge the situation and will sort it out. 

My advice to everyone, ALWAYS check your refunds to see if it match what you have payed and call them if something is missing.

Good luck and stay positive.

 

[Chris Capson]

Good news i finally got my refund for Port Fees, Upgrade, and Cruise Planner Purchases today for my March 14th Cruise that was cancelled on March 13th. Almost 2 months.

[CrznTxn]

Called Royal yesterday directly after TA said she could not help. The person informed me my March 22 cruise that was still showing in my Past Cruises was cancelled in the books May 6. Not sure now when we will receive our Port Fees, Taxes, Gratuities and Insurance back. Did not receive a letter or email as other folks have. Guess the 45 day refund countdown starts for me 3 days ago. Disappointing since we received our Shore Excursion refunds within 2 weeks of the cancelled cruise. Especially disappointing since we have booked a replacement cruise in July. Was going to use the previous monies to pay the CC charges for that cruise. Maybe we will get the refund before we depart on that one.

[vanelli56]

On 5/7/2020 at 8:18 AM, vanelli56 said:

UPDATE: Just received Taxes and fees refund for Cabin 2 today. Everything else is still floating off in the void. Most likely somewhere near the Bermuda triangle, somewhere between an old sunken ship and Royal Caribbean Math.... all are mysteries awaiting to be figured out.

KCCO

Keep Calm and Cruise on!

Update: FCC for one cabin was sent over the weekend.... but it was wrong. (sigh)

[Kcusack89]

2 minutes ago, vanelli56 said:

Update: FCC for one cabin was sent over the weekend.... but it was wrong. (sigh)

Welcome to the club. You must call to rectify it and unfortunately the phone lines have been jam packed and often randomly drop the call.

Good luck my friend

[The Cruise Junkie]

Well This Came In My Inbox This Moring.... 

 

[RichardMexico]

Finally! Yesterday I received the last refunds from my cancelled cruise. At the end it matched the total amount. A couple of advices for you that are still waiting:

1) Dont try to match the amounts to the individual payments you did or the costs of each cruise planner activity. It seems their system just throws some random amounts.

2) In my case, I got my money back in the 30 days range, but starting from a date they told me the cruise was really cancelled in their system, not the actual date I cancelled (via web and sending the format), so make sure you know which date to start counting from.

3) In my case, all my refunds were divided in 3 days of payments, each of the days consists in several quantities, and the dates were exactly 1 week apart.

Good luck those who are still waiting!

[MDB]

Still waiting after 43 days for my refund.  I really do not believe that RCCL intends to refund our cruise dollars, rather they would just rather keep it and make it impossible to try to get it.  Sorry to say but I am now sad that I have a non refundable deposit with RCCL for 2021 and probably will never see that either because they know that the harder they make it,  eventually you have to cut your losses and give up.  I even have an email from Aurora Vera-Rodriquez saying my refund was completed on by May 8th, but RCCL records do not indicate this!  No one from RCCL returns emails or phone calls as promised.

[Ampurp85]

So I just wanted to leave this here as everyone is complaining about refund times and how RCCI is nefariously holding on to their money etc. I am currently waiting on a refund trough CCL. We brought some items for that cruise from Kohl's we can no longer use, returned on April 3rd. They said 7-10 business days and I just received my refund 5/11. My bank PNC incorrectly deposited a check March 23rd, I used the ATMs because of Shelter in place, they just "found" the money 5/5. Lastly we received a wrong/overcharged order through Doordash on April 20th, was also told 7-10 business days. I was told today that refunds are taking 20-25 business days....aka 5-6 weeks to get processed. So it is not just RCCI or cruise companies that are experiencing this. I was told by my friend who works for Chase that certain banks like Citi and American Express are proactively refunding as soon as the flag hits the system. I wonder if people aren't noticing how long other refunds are taking because they are such small amounts?

[Leroyr55]

Well supposedly the cruise planner sale ends tomorrow. I’m still hoping to get my 125% cruise planner refund to use that before the sale ends. I applied for it the first week of April. 

[MDB]

6 hours ago, Ampurp85 said:

So I just wanted to leave this here as everyone is complaining about refund times and how RCCI is nefariously holding on to their money etc. I am currently waiting on a refund trough CCL. We brought some items for that cruise from Kohl's we can no longer use, returned on April 3rd. They said 7-10 business days and I just received my refund 5/11. My bank PNC incorrectly deposited a check March 23rd, I used the ATMs because of Shelter in place, they just "found" the money 5/5. Lastly we received a wrong/overcharged order through Doordash on April 20th, was also told 7-10 business days. I was told today that refunds are taking 20-25 business days....aka 5-6 weeks to get processed. So it is not just RCCI or cruise companies that are experiencing this. I was told by my friend who works for Chase that certain banks like Citi and American Express are proactively refunding as soon as the flag hits the system. I wonder if people aren't noticing how long other refunds are taking because they are such small amounts?

I do not know about you, but to me the 5400 dollars RCCL is not returning is not "such small amount"

[Ampurp85]

@MDB I don't think you read my post correctly. I was pointing out that every refund I have encountered since the Pandemic went into affect has been taking longer. I asked if people who are getting refunds from department stores (maybe $70), restaurants ($35.60) and other services ($???.??) haven't notice the length because they aren't large vacation sums....such as the $5400 you are watching out for.

[Traveler]

Just called RCL to check about my Tax/port fee refunds  , they told me it should take 45 days from the sailing date (in my case its April 8 ) so I guess I will wait 10 more days and call again (or have a nice surprises) 

[Lizzy B]

I haven't actually received any of this yet, but in theory they have finally agreed to do right by me. 

Over the course of the last 40 days, I've spent countless hours on the phone with royal caribbean each time giving me different information and different expectations.  

• April 5th we call royal caribbean and after speaking it through with the representative select 125%. I'm told this will apply to both my stateroom reservation and my onboard extra purchases (dining, bev, excursions,etc)
• April 23 we call to follow up on our FCC and we are told we will not be receiving 125% for our stateroom reservation b/c we paid for it with a gift certificate. I tell the resolution manager that had I initially been told this info, i would have wanted a refund. He tells me he understands and will process the refund instead of the FCC.
• May 8th I call to follow up on the refund. I'm now told that it doesn't matter that i wasn't given the correct info on April 5th, or that i was promised a refund on April 23rd. I will be only be given the 125% on the additional onboard purchases. I will be given the gift certificate back at the original amount. In no uncertain terms, i will NOT get any refund back beyond an FCC credit. 
• May 8th i get an email with no explanation with a FCC credit with an amount less than a 3rd of the total amount i've paid so far.

I was so frustrated with the situation that I contacted them via every means of communication I could think of: Facebook, Twitter, webform, telephone, vacation planner, etc and finally was put in contact with a woman who is actually helping. Cindy gave me a call back with an update and actually EARLIER than she said she would, which in itself was a pleasant change.

Anyway- she said they are going to honor the money refund for my on board purchases promised to me on April 23, and e en said they are Investigating giving me 125% on the gift certificate. 

 

I understand that times are hard, and that everyone is struggling right now, but it shouldn't have been this difficult to get them to honor their words.

[Lovestotravel]

I am happy to report, that we cancelled our May 31 cruise on April 20th (after RC cancelled all sailings through June), requested a refund not FCC, and today we have received almost our complete refund.  We are a few hundred short, but so far 4 credits have been deposited to my card, with the largest being the full cruise fare.  So, less than 30 days and we basically have our refund.  I don't know if this makes a difference or not, but we booked with a TA and she handled the refund request. 

[MDB]

21 minutes ago, Lovestotravel said:

I am happy to report, that we cancelled our May 31 cruise on April 20th (after RC cancelled all sailings through June), requested a refund not FCC, and today we have received almost our complete refund.  We are a few hundred short, but so far 4 credits have been deposited to my card, with the largest being the full cruise fare.  So, less than 30 days and we basically have our refund.  I don't know if this makes a difference or not, but we booked with a TA and she handled the refund request. 

Happy for you.  We cancelled our April 25th cruise on April 1st and RCCL is holding our refund like a mean dog with a new bone.  Many promises, non of them kept to date!

 

[MDB]

Because RCCL has been less than honest about our $5400+ refund on our April 25 th cruise, we have been forced to cancel a replacement vacation to the western United States.  We asked for a refund from one hotel and it took 4 days from the time of the request to be deposited back to the credit card.  Frontier Airlines took a phone call and it was back with 3 days and they included a $75.  per person flight voucher to thank us for considering them plus the cost of the tickets.  The Marriott hotels we were using have all refunded points or dollars within minutes of cancellation.  

 

RCCL continues to say my refund is coming, check with my bank, but neither the bank or I really do believe that this is coming.

[RBRSKI]

I feel the pain for all of us who are waiting for refunds!  NEVER received one email apologizing! I know email communications from Royal works because I received this from them! I'm sure they have some type of excuse! 

[CruzOnBye]

On 5/12/2020 at 8:31 AM, Jaymac Radio said:

Well This Came In My Inbox This Moring.... 

 

Hey! Have you received anything yet? Mine said 05/14 as well, but no emails. Just curious. My final payment on my rebooked cruise is due Monday so i'm like....antsy LOL.

[TonyK]

Royal  Caribbean  should  be ashamed  of the  way they are handling  refunds. Looking at multiple post on this blog, there  seems that whenever  their is a discrepancy  or problem, that it's  always  in there favor. Im wondering  if this  is a  coincidence  or they are doing  it on purpose.?

[F1guynz]

Today we got our full refund for our March cruise. It took 59 days but I was fine with waiting as I knew they were busy.

prior to the refund we received two emails, the first apologising for the delay, the second, received last week, advising they would be processing the refund that week and to check the account the following week.

It looks like they pay them on Thursday’s as a friend on a different cruise also received his yesterday as well.

[vanelli56]

On 5/12/2020 at 8:21 AM, vanelli56 said:

Update: FCC for one cabin was sent over the weekend.... but it was wrong. (sigh)

Update: Our 125% OBC offer certificate arrived... and was correct! 

Still no corrected FCC cert as promised. 

Refund for our other cabin.... posted to my CC... BUT... it was short 180-ish bucks. 

So... another email sent to our TA. 

[Kcusack89]

4 minutes ago, vanelli56 said:

Update: Our 125% OBC offer certificate arrived... and was correct! 

Still no corrected FCC cert as promised. 

Refund for our other cabin.... posted to my CC... BUT... it was short 180-ish bucks. 

So... another email sent to our TA. 

Same boat over here. Got an incorrect FCC last Saturday. Got an email saying it would be fixed by 5/14 . We did not get the remaining amount yesterday

Was told we'd get the cruise planner credit but 5/15 but we got it yesterday 5/14. It was actually a smidge more then I though we'd get so I'm.happy with that.

 

[MDB]

Today we received a refund of 1903 dollars out of the 5400 dollars plus that our RCCL cruise costs.  How long before the next 3500 dollars is refunded if ever!

 

[Leroyr55]

finally got one refund for the cabin I purchased for daughter and son in law. Waiting for our cabin and 125% OBC refund 

[Matt]

Got my airfare refund for my cancelled Alaska cruise. Now I feel rich!