Hurtigruten Reviews 424

This company appears to have a monopoly on cruises in and around Norway and as such there is no imperative to refund, when a cruise goes wrong. Very disappointed with them and would never book again.

Our trip to the Falklands was unfortunately shortened by one day. While this might seem like a minor adjustment to some, for many of us, the journey to Antarctica and the Falklands represents a once-in-a-lifetime experience, especially considering the significant cost of AUD1000 per person per day. When the captain announced the early return of the ship due to an anticipated strong wind condition two days in the future, it sparked a wave of concerns and questions among the passengers.

It’s important to note that the captain may not have realised that all passengers had internet access on board. After the decision to return was made, we promptly checked the weather conditions and found no indication of strong winds in the forecast. Additionally, having already crossed the Drake Passage, we were left feeling confused about the rationale behind the captain's choice.

The weather during our return journey to Ushuaia was absolutely perfect. The next day, as we disembarked, we were greeted by clear skies and no indication of impending bad weather. Later in the evening the following day, rain and wind arrived, but it felt like just another typical rainy day in Ushuaia. Clearly, the conditions were not severe enough to prevent Hurtigruten from departing once again with the next group of passengers.

The objective seems to be returning the ship on time for the next group of passengers, and it has nothing to do with our safety. With a new vessel like the Roald Amundsen, if it cannot manage moderate wind conditions, it should not be operating in Antarctica and the Falklands.

Additionally, during the initial briefing, the expedition crew promised their passengers two activities each day in Antarctica. While two activities were conducted on the first day, for the remainder of our time in the Antarctic Peninsula, we were limited to only one activity per day.

This raises the question: why?

As we sailed from one location to another, the captain appeared to navigate at a deliberately slow pace without justification. Upon reaching the next destination, which was often not far away from each other, we found ourselves with insufficient time to engage in more than one activity before the day concluded. For example: The journey from Stanley to Westpoint Cove, Falkland Islands, travelling east to west along the northern route of the islands, consumed the entire day. This lengthy travel time implies that strategic decisions were likely made well in advance of our arrival at Westpoint Cove. It was here that the captain chose to return the ship during that night’s briefing.

The financial implications are substantial, especially given the funds gathered from 400 passengers. With an average collection exceeding AUD1,000 per person per day, this amounts to at least half a million dollars. This is a considerable sum that has been taken from the passengers who have not received ONE full day on the itinerary and at least 4 other activities while in Antarctica. Such a situation casts a negative light on Hurtigruten, and we want to ensure that the travellers are fully aware of what they will receive from Hurtigruten as apposed to what has been advertised.

Worse cruise , MIDNATSOL , service is very bad especially at the cafe bar on deck 8, these 2 men who’s serving customers there are the worse, waited 15 mins to order a coffee!!!! They act like the customers beg them for coffee….. Breakfast, lunch buffet are basically the same everyday! And a la carte is like they bring the leftover food from buffet and present it differently on a plate LOL!!! Don’t waster your money on this cruise !!!!

Beware do not book with this cruise company
The worst company and cruise we have ever had
We felt like we were on a refugee ship.with the tiny double bunk cabins you can't move in Poor quality food
Poor hygiene we caught covid on this cruise The staff were very arrogant especially the officers
The cruise was also extremely expensive sigh it was a terrible holiday

Allocated cabin 365 by Hurtigruten.Booked via ROL. Juddering and noise from ship stabilisers were intolerable.Good job I have my own teeth) Asked for somewhere else quieter to sleep.Aha! Only upgrades available 2000kr on another card , (clever),later two
journeys with bags to cabin 521 in a storm.The reception manager said I would be refunded, if I move room again.2 trips to 621 lifeboat in front of windows.say no windows.Its dark all day anyway.Senior manager a few days later.No refund, you got what you paid for. Charged for beverages on drink package.Check bills carefully peeps. Had to find catering manager in the kitchen to sort that out. Dreadful customer service.Food became repetitive.No promised allocated bus on the 26th Dec from terminal include. Dumped in Bergen to Christmas day. Customers beware no help on board prison ship "With". Awful , "Put up and shut up attitude" from reception,Stops impossibly short , weather dependent, just like the lights.
Eventually got 3 different bills all different amounts. Charged for beverages apparently included in the drinks package. Check everything, they will rob you! It's now March 2025 they still haven't compensated me for room move or extra beverages I paid for. Never allow Hurtigruten or ROL travel agents pick your cabin! Lesson learned.Avoid 365 Richard With!

We went on a Coastal Express trip with Hurtigruten in November (second trip with them, this time traveling South to North). The whole experience was wonderful. The booking process was efficient, with helpful and prompt responses to questions, the environment and service on board was great, including the food. It is true that excursions are expensive and probably not worth it if it is for instance a city tour, which you could do yourself, but there are some trips which would be difficult to organise on your own without risking missing the boat departure time. Best of all was the crew's and company's response when there was a problem. Our trip had to be curtailed on our last day due to bad weather - obviously unavoidable - and we could not get to Kirkenes, which is where we flew home from. Hurtigruten organised coaches to get us to the airport on time (a 7 hour trip), gave us food for the journey, a generous meal allowance for the airport and reimbursement for the night we lost on board. The claim process was clear and straightforward and we had the money within 2 weeks of our return home. I can see others have had a different experience of Hurtigruten's response to problems, but in our case we were very impressed and would certainly recommend this company.

Totally disappointed with Hurtigruten

We embarked on our trip " follow the lights" on 10 Nov 2024 and boarded the ship from Bergen.

Firstly, the last minute change of cabin from the one we originally booked and we had no choice but to accept we we had made numerous other bookings with respect to hotels , flights etc to go to Europe before the actual cruise. The credit offered by your company was an arbitrary sum which can only be used on board . That is a bit rich considering it was no fault of ours that there was a change of ship.

Secondly, we were told on board that the ship had just come out maintenance and to our disappointment the hot tubs were closed.

Thirdly, the information given to us by all your staff with regards our day excursion to Tallinn was completely incorrect. The name of the ferry , the location and the timing was all wrong. This had put considerable stress on us as we had to check with the guide on board and reorganise our schedule. For your information ,the ferry named in your email is the one that goes to Sweden.

I understand that this is a ferry operated service but to shortchange your customers who paid in full is totally unacceptable.

Would never travel with hurtigruten again. Dreadful customer service, and communication when things go wrong with the schedule, when there are cancellations or delays. Total disregard for clients. Disgraceful. One of the most stressful, disappointing and expensive holidays we have ever had. We were totally mis-sold, ie the holiday was nothing like what was advertised. Compensation promised has not materialised and we are out of pocket due to hurtigruten 

This holiday was supposed to be a trip of a lifetime and was really really expensive!!!

Trip was delayed due to technical faults on the ship requiring extra days in dry dock for repairs before we boarded. We lost 1/3 of our holiday. There was an appalling lack of communication from Hurtigruten and the truncated holiday totally failed to deliver the holiday that was sold to us.
During the delay, we were stuck in a hotel abroad without minimum subsistence, little information and no customer care. The emails from customer service were inaccurate, failed to acknowledge the situation and no attempt was made by Hurtigruten to improve our situation.
On our return we had to battle for compensation and eventually receive a little compensation which didn’t in any way reflect the car crash of a holiday.
The service on the boat is good but quality of service and willingness to sort out issues by the sales, guest feedback, disaster management team, customer service is just dreadful.

Absolutely amazing holiday.
I travelled the round route, so 11 nights on board
Staff were excellent, everything was so well organised, food was amazing. Everything was so clean, cleaners moved around the house in stealth mode, hardly saw them but rooms were cleaned, all public toilets always had toilet paper and clean.
Cannot recommend this trip enough.

We had a short cruise, but it was more than enough. Our room was incredibly crammed. The room temperature was very warm and my requests to have this addressed were me with a promise that it would be fixed, but in fact was ignored. The excursion was $140 per person for a 3 hour walk through a small town in Norwegian. Way, way too high. In general, the staff, with a few exceptions seemed disinterested in providing help or customer service. The ship was clean, but old. That however, was not the problem. The lack of interest in providing customer service or charging reasonable prices for their product was the biggest issue

I travelled on the boat for 4 days, that is more than enough. I traveled because I wanted to experience Norway but believe me this is not the way to do it! There is little to no time to see the cities you stop in and if you want to go on any activity arranged by the hurtigrutten company you can expect to pay ridicules prices. You do get to see a lot from the boat, but you don’t really get to experience a lot. There is very little to do on the boat, you just wait for the next meal. The food is good and the waiters, waitresses are very kind. Everything on the boat is really expensive after having already paid an hefty amount.

It’s been my experience that if your cruise actually occurs they generally take good care of passengers. We’ve used them in the past a few times. Our latest experience would be rated horrible. They cancelled the cruise we were booked on. They made several offers to reimburse funds already paid or rebook funds on another HX expedition. Sounds okay correct? Not for us. We attempted to explain cruises available had already been traveled (many with them) thus we wanted a refund for trip insurance and flights paid for the cruise they cancelled. Yes, no, maybe, no, yes, can’t t do that - via numerous customer service agents. Escalated to a senior customer service representative. After months of back and forth - with the last straw being total to attempt repayment via trip insurance (which they declined to pay) then asking for proof we hadn’t used the trip insurance (maybe they would consider payment) we ended our battle with Hurtigruten. Basically they sent us in circles and successful wore us down. DO NOT EXPECT CUSTOMER SERVICE TO RESOLVE ISSUES IN A TIMELY AND FAIR MANNER. We’ve heard people have taken up to a year for resolution, unfortunately I don’t have the time an patience to fight with anyone that long in hopes of reaching an resolution.

The worst cruise trip ever. Never again with Hurtigruten. If you do --think it very carefully and read other people's reviews--, please don't forget to take with you a "calibrated or professional sound level meter". Hurtigruten might need it. Keep reading if you wanna know why.

We'd been in several cruise ships before, but never experienced something like this. We sailed on Hurtigruten's MS Nordlys from Alesund to Bergen and were assigned cabin 364. IMPORTANT: the cabins in that area (and on the opposite side of the ship, I think) have a constant noise level of approximately 80 dB during cruising, which we measured with a sound meter app. Noise was even higher during loading and unloading operations in ports. We could not sleep at all --it was a nightmare--, since 80 dB is similar to the sound of your vacuum cleaner or being near the wings on an airplane. The noise level in the corridors of those areas were over 90 dB. This noise level is much higher than what current Norwegian legislation allows on ships (maximum of 60 dB in accommodation spaces). Other areas of the ship were probably within the legal limits, but considerably noisier than any other cruise ship we had been in the past.

We complaint on board but the hotel manager didn't want to take ownership of the issue. He didn't even offered us a coffee after our terrible night. After what we considered a breach of the contract, we complaint to Hurtigruten's customer service, which --one month later-- denied any responsibility and rejected our request for a full refund (bargaining and offering us €150 instead). We subsequently copied on our emails to Hurtigruten's top management, who didn't seem to care much, since finally a customer service representative --with arguments probably drafted by the legal folks-- declined our request. She offered us instead an onboard credit of €43 on a future trip on Hurtigruten, appealing to the "paramount importance" of customer satisfaction for the company. We felt that offer as an offense.

And, yes, as you --clever reader-- have probably guessed, Hurtigruten thinks that, while smartphone apps can provide an estimate of sound levels, they may not be as accurate or calibrated as professional sound level meters. So, you can buy one in Amazon for around $30 and add it to your luggage ;) For Hurtigruten it is not relevant if customers cannot sleep in some of their cabins due to the constant high noise. Customers are required to prove it with a professional sound meter.

We went from Bergen to Bergen. As we were boarding, they dropped one of our bags into the ocean which had a laptop. After a week, we didn’t hear from the customer service at all, so we initiated the communication. Then we got a reply to submit receipts of the items ruined. Now I had been another week, and we haven’t heard back yet. One of us got sick because of heavy food they fed us. She threw up and had no fever. However, she was quarantined until we disembarked, which was 1.5 days. The problems was they had no doctor on board or any medicine. They just told us to stay in the room and that they would bring us food. As the meal time approached, we called. Then they said they would call us later. Two hours went by and they finally called us back. They don’t care if people are sick. They don’t care if people are needing food. They don’t care. Nice people but terrible customer service and service in general. They also promised 5% back during booking which we never got.

This company advertised on mobile games, their adverts are completely broken, no reward is ever given and time spent playing the game is lost as the game requires a restart and progress is lost, every single time (it is in the dozens at this point, extremely frustrating!!). If you can't trust a company to get something as simple as a mobile advert right, I definitely wouldn't trust them to safely navigate me over large bodies of water.

We sailed Hurtigruten from Kirkenes to Bergen with M/S Vesterålen in May 2024. This is the smallest and oldest ship in the fleet, but we found it to be comfortable and charming. There is a certain timelessness where you realize that few things have changed since they started these voyages 130 years ago (internet is one change, and it worked great).

The beds were very comfortable and combined with the humming of the engines and movement of the ship we slept very well on board. On the last night we made several
stops during the night that woke us up.

The restaurant was great. The selection of food in the buffet was good and the service was excellent. All staff was very friendly and professional.

It did rain one day, but most other days the weather was fine, and we really enjoyed the changing scenery from the arctic north to the green south of Norway, visiting a lot of little villages on the way.

The Panorama Lounge was a great place from where to take in the sights and order drinks while doing so.

All Hurtigruten ships are equipped with stabilizers that prevent the ship from rolling. There is still a pitching movement in waves, but that is not uncomfortable
except when you walk. Most of the time is traveled in protected waters, and the unprotected passages are short and announced ahead of time.

Check in and out, and airport transfer, were fast and efficient. 50 minutes after
we docked in Bergen, we were at the airport gate.

This is by far the most hostile customer and staff company I have ever encountered. They have constant "campaigns" where they just increase prices and add discounts on top of it and try to squeeze customers money as much as possible. An average customer is around 75-80 yo and most do not understand that they pay 5-6 thousand euro more depending on how they make their reservation (Travel Agency, website or telefon) for unnessary "products". The managers of Customer Service are some of the worst people I have ever talked with. Extrem focus on personal metrics and zero customer care.

Should I book with Hurtigruten? My wife and I completed our first cruise with Hurtigruten this year. 14-day package which included flights, Hotels, tours, transfers, and a 12-night cruise stopping at 13 ports. Storm Ingunn hit during our cruise and we only managed to make 5 stops when the cruise was cancelled. Cost us £4.468.00p for the package. Was a battle to get the money back from Hurtigruten for the excursions we booked which they did not provide (over £1000). We were only offered £1787.00p compensation for the 8 ports/7 days of the package (+ a tour of Oslo) which was not provided.
The most shocking statement from Hurtigruten was to remind us that our cruise cancellation fell under “force majeure” (an act of God) and they are not obliged to offer any refund. So my wife and I should be grateful that this company who always (we quote) “place our guest's preferences and needs at the forefront of our decisions” was kind enough to make an offer of a refund after we lost 60% of our cruise.
If your cruise is completed in full then it will probably be great, but if you think anything could go wrong on your cruise then we advise you not to book with Hurtigruten, it's cash not customers at the forefront of their decisions.

After doing the coastal cruise last year of which the onboard experience was second to none, we decided to book the Svalbard Excursion, a cruise / expedition costing £15000. Booking direct with Hurtigruten was our first mistake. Last time we booked via Hays Travel who were fantastic.
The whole customer service experience is flawed & the payment system is diabolical - The payment portal link is broken, [+ parts of the website down].
This forces you to speak to an agent who then sends you a payment link. The problem according to my bank, who this morning are launching a fraud investigation after freezing my account, this link is unsolicited and directs you to a third party App which then requests full access to your bank account to withdraw the funds, but with full open access, in fact it could withdraw the total account sum.
At this point, the bank declined the access preventing the payment. In this day and age it is not acceptable to behave in this way and need to ensure customer payment security is guaranteed.

Really difficult to put a rating , first of our Expedition cruise was excellent , 5 stars all the way . However the pre and post service from the office is a shambles and really disappointing . Ages to answer questions if they ever do , broken promises etc .