Fargo man has warning for other cruise goers after website says he doesn't owe anything

(KVLY)
Published: Nov. 14, 2018 at 3:42 PM CST
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It’s a bit of a strange dilemma that you might have even found yourself in. A Fargo man has been planning a cruise for almost a year. But when he tries to make payments on the trip, the website tells him he doesn't owe a thing. And now, he wants you to know that it might be too good to be true, that's why he called our Whistleblower Hotline.

Imagine this, you're trying to plan a trip of a lifetime but you keep running into this.

"I go in and hit the submit button and all of a sudden, I get this error message on the screen saying, 'no connection'," says Fargo Resident planning cruise, Bill Grams.

And that's not all.

"There's wording underneath that link that now says, 'you have no balance due.' And I’m going, 'wait a minute, I know I have a balance'," says Grams.

Bill Grams is a longtime cruise goer. In fact, he's hopped aboard a Royal Caribbean cruise ship for the past several years. And this year is no different.

"We like Royal Caribbean, we've always had very good luck with their ships. The people, the employees on the ship have been excellent," says Grams.

He started planning another cruise for next spring. But this time around, things aren't sailing so smoothly. Grams says particularly with Royal Caribbean’s website.

"There was a new dashboard rolled out sometime this summer," says Grams.

He says, whenever he tried to pay for the trip it wouldn't let him. And there's more to the story. He says he no longer has access to the details of his trip, like when his ship leaves port. So he contacted customer support.

"She said, 'okay we know the issue." and I said, 'well lets discuss this issue'," says Grams.

And on top of everything, Grams is an IT expert. He tells us he has over two decades of experience as an IT analyst. And now he has a warning for other people who might be getting ready for a cruise.

He wants to make sure they don't get the same runaround.

"There's a deadline 90 days prior to that cruise sail date that if you don't make the final payment, they will turn around and not qualify for you to have that cruise and then you'll only get a percentage of that," says Grams.

Finally today, success. Grams made his final payment on the cruise but he says, it wasn't easy. Because he is an IT expert, he found a way around the problem that you and I might not know about.

We reached out to the media relations person for Royal Caribbean cruise and have yet to hear back.

We also contacted local travel agencies to see what you can do in this situation. They tell us that's what they're in business for, to help people avoid getting stuck in these situations.