Dear Carnival,
Your fans know the industry is hurting but…
You would be playing a smarter and ultimately more profitable long game by accepting the modern reality that today’s typical cruisers are increasingly exposed to social media and e-commerce oriented digital spaces where your actions and policies will be broadcast literally world-wide within MINUTES of your captain’s & crew’s announcements &/or execution of those policies.
Letters of warning that Carnival will NOT be providing any shipboard credits for denied or otherwise failed attempts to make any given port of call do nothing but increase the likelihood of generating cancellations or pushing potential passengers into looking into competing lines that are choosing to address the same industry-wide challenges in a more customer-centric fashion.
I will not pretend that I have any deep insight as to what the actual financial losses Carnival has suffered total to date.
Perhaps suits, beancounters & shareholders are convincing the decision makers within management that Carnival can not afford to absorb more losses for partial refunds when ports of call are missed…
Even if the gesture amounts to something like a comp’d entree at a specialty dining option, I think you’d face significantly less backlash and online ill will as a result.
We all know that no line can afford to bleed cash forever but… announcing and enforcing policies that push 100% of the financial risk onto your passengers is a very shortsighted way to run your business. In fact, it will encourage Wall Street to short your stock.
Just another VIFP
