What happens if you miss your cruise

Have you ever ever missed a flight since you confirmed up late on the airport? It may be a painful lesson within the significance of constructing wiggle room into your journey plans. However, in lots of circumstances, it’s going to solely trigger a modest delay in your travels, with little or no add-on prices.

Not so with cruises.

Late arrivers for flights usually can hop on one other airplane to their vacation spot only a few hours later, generally even with change charges waived as a consequence of quasi-official “flat tire rule” insurance policies. However vacationers who’re even only a few minutes late for a cruise can generally discover their total journey ruined.

On the very least, cruisers who miss a ship’s departure usually face big bills and logistical challenges attempting to meet up with the vessel at its subsequent port of name. In some circumstances, as a consequence of legal guidelines that prohibit the place ships might be boarded, they won’t have the ability to be part of the vessel in any respect.

It is for that reason that just about anybody having something to do with the cruise enterprise — cruise line gross sales professionals, cruise-selling journey brokers and cruise-focused journey writers like me — will inform you to at all times journey to your departure port at the least a day earlier than your cruise, even when you’re touring by automobile. It would appear to be overkill, and it will add to the journey’s expense. However the penalties of lacking a cruise departure might be so disastrous that it is a smart transfer.

For these whose preliminary impulse is to withstand such recommendation, let’s handle a number of the key issues surrounding what occurs when you miss your cruise.

Can I board a cruise ship late?

Not solely are you able to not board a cruise ship late, however the cutoff time for boarding is definitely a lot sooner than the sail-away time.

This can be a case the place the whole lot you’ve got realized about airplanes is true for cruise ships, too. Simply because your ship is listed as leaving at 4 p.m., it does not imply you possibly can stroll as much as the pier at 3:57 p.m. and count on to make it on board.

The everyday cutoff time for boarding ships is a full hour earlier than departure. That mentioned, it may be even longer (and, in some circumstances, shorter) relying on the road, port and itinerary. To be secure, learn the documentation that you simply obtain after reserving (lately, it usually arrives in digital kind) for particular details about boarding instances in your crusing.

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It is also a dangerous transfer to intention to reach precisely on the cutoff time. Take into account that a number of the greater departure ports, comparable to Fort Lauderdale’s Port Everglades, might be jammed with site visitors on departure days, slowing down the arrival course of. I as soon as received caught in a large site visitors jam round one of many guard gates at Port Everglades that added at the least quarter-hour to what ought to have been a fast five- to 10-minute Uber trip from a close-by lodge.

Will a cruise ship depart with out me?

If you don’t arrive on the port earlier than the boarding window ends, the cruise ship will most definitely depart with out you — even if you’re standing on the pier, waving frantically. That is as a result of a cruise ship’s departure time is rigorously deliberate, and extra than simply your trip is at stake.

Similar to airplanes, cruise ships are on tight schedules — a lot tighter than you may understand. If a ship delays its departure by an hour whereas it waits so that you can arrive, it may additionally arrive an hour late at its subsequent port of name.

That is a state of affairs that, on greater ships, can have an effect on hundreds of individuals — not simply passengers who will see their expertise at that port diminished, but in addition dock employees, tour guides and bus drivers on the vacation spot who’ve deliberate their day across the vessel’s arrival.

At many ports, a local harbor pilot will probably be ready in your ship on a ship simply offshore to assist information it in, and they are going to be anticipating your vessel at an appointed time. This service usually comes with a excessive cost, and if the ship arrives too far not on time, it can lead to hefty charges. Ship captains will do all they will to keep away from disrupting the deliberate schedule.

Associated: Can a cruise ship leave without you?

One widespread misperception amongst cruisers is that cruise strains will maintain a ship for late-arriving passengers if they’re arriving on cruise line-booked flights. This typically will not be the case. Even if you’re arriving on a flight booked by means of the cruise line, the ship will nonetheless sail with out you if that flight is delayed and you aren’t on the pier on time.

What cruise strains will do when you miss a cruise departure as a consequence of a delay on a cruise line-booked flight is assist you get to the ship at one other port. That’s, if they will accomplish that legally (extra on that in a second).

The insurance policies range from line to line on this subject. Some strains are a bit obscure about what precisely they are going to do to assist passengers attain the ship. Others spell it out fairly clearly. Carnival Cruise Line, as an example, says right on its website that when you miss a cruise departure as a consequence of delays in flights booked by means of its Fly2Fun air program, it “will make alternate preparations as wanted for visitors to fulfill the ship at … the primary port of name,” until doing so would violate the Passenger Vessel Providers Act.

The Passenger Vessel Providers Act is a U.S. legislation that limits the place a passenger can board a ship crusing between U.S. ports (extra on this in a second).

If no viable choices can be found to affix the ship, Carnival provides that passengers “will probably be given a Future Cruise Credit score to use in the direction of a future Carnival cruise.”

Can I be part of the ship on the subsequent port?

Even in circumstances the place it’s logistically straightforward to get to a ship’s subsequent port of name, you is probably not legally allowed to board the vessel at that port. Some nations, together with the US, have “cabotage” legal guidelines limiting the variety of ports the place foreign-flagged vessels comparable to cruise ships can choose up and drop off passengers. These legal guidelines are designed to guard home delivery industries from overseas competitors.

In the US, as an example, the Passenger Vessel Services Act of 1886 says overseas vessels can’t transport passengers from one U.S. port to a different U.S. port, both instantly or by means of a close-by overseas port (outlined as ports in most of North America together with most Caribbean islands). The act doesn’t apply to sailings that start and finish in the identical U.S. port, supplied the sailings embody at the least one cease at any overseas port. It additionally has an exception for journeys between two completely different U.S. ports that embody a cease at a distant overseas port.

What which means, in follow, is {that a} cruise line can’t allow you to be part of a ship at a U.S. port comparable to Florida’s Port Canaveral when you later will probably be disembarking at a distinct U.S. port — say, New York or Miami — until a go to to a distant port comparable to Aruba is on the itinerary. This can be a rule that may severely restrict your choices if you wish to be part of a ship partway by means of a cruise.

Associated: Ways you can ruin your cruise in an instant

To present one particular instance: Beneath the legislation, it is completely nice for the Bermuda-flagged ships of Princess Cruises to function Alaska voyages that start in Vancouver, British Columbia, and finish in Whittier, Alaska — a standard itinerary for the road. Because the voyages do not start in a U.S. port, they’re exempt from the legislation.

But when somebody misses the departure of such a voyage from Vancouver, they can not merely board at a later cease. All of the later stops on this route — the Alaskan cities of Ketchikan, Juneau and Skagway — are in the US. Somebody boarding in a type of ports and disembarking on the finish of the cruise in Whittier could be touring between two U.S. ports with out a cease at at distant overseas port, making a violation of the Passenger Vessel Providers Act.

Cruise manufacturers do, sometimes, violate the legislation. As an illustration, it is normal coverage within the business to evacuate a passenger with a medical emergency to the closest appropriate port, even when it means triggering a Passenger Vessel Providers Act violation. In such circumstances, a line would face a U.S. Customs and Border Safety penalty at the moment set at $941 per particular person, until the road was granted a waiver by the company.

Word that some strains will cost you the price of this penalty if you need to depart a ship early as a consequence of a medical situation.

Some strains additionally will sometimes permit waylaid passengers to affix a ship at a forbidden port if they comply with pay the penalty themselves. However it is not widespread, if solely as a result of the penalty is so excessive. A household of 4 would pay $3,764 for the privilege — greater than the price of many cruises.

In case you are legally allowed to board a ship at a later port, you can be liable for paying all the prices associated to attending to that port. One exception, as famous above, could be a state of affairs the place you missed the unique departure due to a delay with a cruise line-booked flight. One other exception could be a case the place you had a sure sort of journey insurance coverage (extra on that beneath).

Associated: Future cruise credits: What they are, how they work and when they expire

Will journey insurance coverage assist if I miss my cruise ship?

In case you miss a day or two of a cruise due to a delayed flight, you may have the ability to get some reimbursement by means of a travel insurance policy, assuming you’ve one. Then once more, you won’t. Most journey insurance policy supply “journey interruption” protection that kicks in after missed connections. However there usually is okay print that limits the circumstances the place it’s legitimate.

“Some plans supply missed-connection protection just for weather-related delays, whereas different plans may additionally cowl delays brought on by … mechanical breakdown,” Stan Sandberg, co-founder of TravelInsurance.com, a number one journey insurance coverage comparability web site, famous in an interview on the subject with TPG.

As well as, whereas the missed-connection protection in lots of journey insurance policy solely requires a delay of three consecutive hours to be legitimate, some much less expensive plans might need a six- or 12-hour delay requirement, Sandberg mentioned. Protection maximums for missed-connection claims additionally range broadly. Some are as little as $250, based on Sandberg.

If it does kick in, missed-connection protection would cowl the price of flights or different transportation wanted to succeed in your cruise ship at a secondary port in addition to “cheap” prices for lodging, meals and phone bills incurred whereas in transit to the ship, Sandberg mentioned. Such insurance coverage additionally would reimburse any pay as you go bills for unused land- or water-travel preparations.

In case you drive to a cruise and miss the ship as a consequence of site visitors delays, journey insurance coverage is not as accommodating. Visitors delays usually aren’t thought-about a coated cause for reimbursement below missed-connection protection, based on Sandberg.

That mentioned, “some journey insurance policy will present journey cancellation protection if the insured is concerned in a documented site visitors accident on the best way to their departure level,” he added.

Even when you have not purchased journey insurance coverage particularly in your cruise, you may have the ability to faucet journey interruption insurance coverage that is a benefit of some credit cards for at the least partial reimbursement of bills associated to lacking a cruise departure. Many premium Chase playing cards, together with the Chase Sapphire Reserve®, as an example, present journey interruption insurance coverage with comparatively excessive most protection quantities for journeys booked utilizing the playing cards.

Simply be warned that this profit usually comes with quite a lot of nice print that may make it robust to gather in lots of circumstances. The nice print on the Chase Sapphire Reserve’s journey insurance coverage profit, as an example, says its journey interruption protection doesn’t apply to “journey preparations canceled or modified by a journey provider until the cancellation is the results of extreme climate or an organized strike affecting public transportation, or until particularly coated herein.”

To our ears, that sounds fairly limiting.

Loads of vacationers lately pooh-pooh the notion of reserving by means of a journey agent. However within the case of a missed cruise departure, a travel agent specializing in cruises generally is a massive assist.

Most of the massive journey company teams do many thousands and thousands of {dollars} of enterprise with every of the key cruise strains, giving them clout they will deploy to your benefit. In addition they have brokers with private relationships with drawback solvers at numerous strains who can soar into motion in your behalf.

“You’ve an advocate accessible to you to assist if one thing would not go as deliberate,” mentioned Jill LaBarre, vp of enterprise improvement at Palm Coast Journey, proprietor of Oasis Journey Community and SmartCruiser.com. “I am undecided the occasional cruiser would know the place to start to salvage their journey [after a missed departure].”

LaBarre recalled the case of a household that missed its flight to Miami for a Norwegian Cruise Line journey by minutes. Whereas the household did not make the flight, its baggage did, making a state of affairs with some difficult logistics to repair.

For starters, she shortly rebooked the household on a flight to St. Thomas, the place the ship, Norwegian Escape, could be two days later. The household would have the ability to be part of the ship there. She additionally booked the household right into a resort in St. Thomas for the 2 days till the ship arrived.

However the extra difficult subject was reuniting the household with its baggage. The luggage now have been stranded on the Miami airport. LaBarre sought assist from the assistant lodge director of the ship, which had but to depart Miami. He, in flip, organized to have Norwegian’s switch firm choose up the baggage and rush them to the vessel earlier than it departed.

Two days later, when the household lastly boarded the ship, the baggage have been there within the household’s room. Talking of the room, LaBarre’s contact on the ship had the household upgraded, too.

LaBarre mentioned she had urged the household to fly to the port a day early and purchase journey insurance coverage. However they hadn’t heeded her recommendation on both depend.

“All of it labored out, however with quite a lot of pointless stress and expense,” she mentioned.