Once again, Royal Caribbean is giving its customers more time to take advantage of its flexible cancellation program.
Cruise with Confidence has been extended again for bookings made through March 31, 2022 on sailings departing on or before September 30, 2022.
What this means is you can cancel a booked Royal Caribbean cruise for any reason for a 100% future cruise credit.
In an email travel agents, Royal Caribbean explains the Omicron variant impact to its business, "With the rise of the Omicron variant, we have strengthened some of our health protocols to ensure that we mitigate the spread of COVID-19 onboard. We are confident in our approach as Royal Caribbean Group has carried 1.1 million guests since the restart of cruising from the US in June of 2021. We remain in constant communication with various government health authorities and will continue to work collaboratively with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)."
"At the end of the day, we want to ensure that planning your clients' vacations is as worry-free as possible. Therefore, we've made the decision to extend our popular Cruise with Confidence program to reservations confirmed on or before March 31, 2022 on sailings departing through September 30, 2022."
Prior to this extension, the Cruise with Confidence program was set to expire on January 31, 2022.
When a guest cancels their cruise past the final payment date, they can get a future cruise credit worth 100% of the cruise fare paid as long as they cancel at least 48 hours before the sail date.
It was originally introduced right before cruises began shutting down due to Covid-19 as a mechanism to give guests piece of mind they could change their plans after the final payment date.
Without the Cruise with Confidence program, there would be a penalty if you cancelled a cruise after the final payment date.
Included with the ability to cancel a cruise under Cruise with Confidence is the Best Price Guarantee, which allows guests to reprice their sailing up to 48-hours prior to the sail date if the price drops.
If you have a cruise booked already, then you qualify automatically for Cruise with Confidence. Going forward, you have until at least March 31, 2022 to qualify for Cruise with Confidence.
Do all sailings qualify for Cruise with Confidence?
Cruise with Confidence is applicable to all sailings.
It is not available to guests booked on chartered sailings or residents of mainland China.
You simply need to book a cruise before March 31, 2022. Existing bookings automatically qualify for Cruise with Confidence.
Why are they extending Cruise with Confidence?
The reason Royal Caribbean has extended this flexible cancellation program again is to give consumers more time to change their mind if they are worried about going on a cruise during the pandemic.
Traditionally, the final payment date would be the point in time when you would have to cancel without incurring a penalty fee.
At the onset of Covid-19, people were uncertain what to expect and cancelled their bookings early out of concern they could not predict if they would want to sail or not.
As a result, Cruise with Confidence was introduced so that anyone who has a cruise booked could wait longer to make a decision if they want to sail or not.
