What happen to the "SUITES"

[Charles Bendaw]

I applied for a suite on the first day of booking, and was told that they were all sold out of suites, but if I get a balcony and used the Royal Up program then I may get a suite. The only thing with that is I will not get double points. Why are travel agents allowed to buy these rooms, sell any unsold suites back to a third company that handles Royal Up, make the customers bid for the suite and then not give the points to the customer. Please help me understand what is going on.

[AshleyDillo]

11 minutes ago, Charles Bendaw said:

Please help me understand what is going on.

RoyalUp collects bids which allows the cruise line to generate revenue from unsold rooms or last minute cancellations. If Royal thinks they can get more money from accepting a chain of RoyalUp bids than reselling a room that comes available, they will go that route.  A cancellation or hold release doesn't always trigger the RoyalUp process. I have seen categories become available after initially being unavailable. You just have to watch the sailing closely and check often to hopefully catch it. 

[BowTieBrigade]

The suites on your cruise are sold out. Royal Up is run directly by Royal Caribbean as a means of selling suites  following late cancellations or for other reasons they are not booked leading up to the sailing. But suites are usually the first rooms to go; I doubt there’s travel agent interference here, as you have interpreted. 

[WAAAYTOOO]

As a general rule, Agencies do not “purchase” suites for group space.  As @BowTieBrigade mentioned, suites are usually the first to go…so Royal has no incentive to permit Agencies to gobble up suites for group space.  Sometimes it is very difficult to even get a suite added into an Agency’s group space.  I know.  I have been a passenger who wanted to add a suite to a pre-existing Agency’s group booking and it took some negotiations.

So IMO it is highly unlikely that Agency group bookings are the reason for lack of suite availability for any particular sailing.

[twangster]

The chances of being successful with a RoyalUp bid is generally low.  Once in a while I'll be successful but more frequently I am not.  It all depends if someone who did book a suite cancels on short notice.  

[Neesa]

@Charles Bendaw If that is the sailing you must have as far as vacation time, ship, itinerary then call and place your name on a waitlist for the suite room category. I am 29 bids and 0 win the ability to pay a bit more with Royal Up. Watch your sailing and if one becomes available book direct, it does happen. I was able to do that 2X on Royal, and landed with the cabin I really wanted. AND WAITLIST WORKS!!

I just booked with another line for June (I know, I know) as I just wanted a change. The week I needed had zero suites "sold out' every time I checked. I went in and booked a nice aft stateroom that I could live with and placed my name on the suite wait list. Probably 2 months later I was sent an email from the cruise line that the cabin category I wanted opened up with one cabin, I grabbed it. The availability on the website never changed, so if not for my waitlist request I would never have known there was one available. 

Good Luck!

 

[smokeybandit]

Suites sell out. They're probably selling better post-covid than before.