10 minutes ago, Blue_Flame said:

For those who have received their refunds (or FCC’s) and have been made whole, have you found that your canceled cruise drops off this list? If so, it might be a way I can check that and then know my refund is forthcoming. 

No, it stays there even after they issue FCCs, at least in my case it did.  They issued FCCs on one cancelled cruise a couple of weeks ago and that cruise, along with the other still appear in the list of past cruises.  

Not sure if state consumer protection laws would even apply to cruise lines but I did find this to be an interesting resource:

https://www.fmc.gov/databases-services/consumer-affairs-dispute-resolution-services/

1 hour ago, cruisnuts said:

We were booked on the April 11th ABC Cruise on Summit.  We did not request a refund and understood if you did nothing you would automatically receive the 125% FCC.  We have not received any notice yet.  When logging into our account on Celebrity website and viewing past cruises it’s listed as if we actually went on the cruise.... Is anyone else also seeing this?  Also wondering if I should contact them or just sit tight a little longer. 

I just logged on for kicks and our two cancelled cruises also show up in the past cruises records BUT they have no points assigned to them so I think they must just have a glitch in the system.   Probably just a placeholder since they tend to re-use the same reservation number when you re-book a cancelled cruise and assign the credit to the new one. 

Having said that I would still call them about the MIA FCC because eventually you'll want to use it and no point in having to wait then for them to straighten it out. 

22 minutes ago, onyourmark said:

Cruise date May 11 on Solstice Hawaii to Vancouver.  Celebrity cancelled in the second announcement of suspensions and we selected full credit vie email link on March 24.  I made a screen shot of the instant confirmation, but didn't get any subsequent email for that.

After a few weeks they still sent FCC.  My emails to have this corrected were ignored. 

  

They can only blame it on incompetence until a clear pattern emerges...

For two months you were one of the 55% who "chose" to accept FCC.

43 minutes ago, BridgeMates said:

 

You're definitely not the only one!  I've been getting the run around for weeks on the 25% promised.  Sent another email yesterday. 

 

They managed to charge my CC for the balance we owed on our shipboard account by 1PM on disembarking day, hours before we got home but now, some ten weeks later they are still making excuses as to why they can't give us that refund. 

I've said it before, the number one reason people don't pay what they owe is because they just don't have the money. 

They are bragging about how "most customers opt for FCC instead of refunds" to reassure their investors and the public, however, as has been seen here many times people are getting FCCs when they did opt for refunds.  Celebrity's system never confirmed when people asked for refunds so now after weeks and weeks and people receiving FCCs that they didn't want they are forced to get back on the end of the refund line and all the while X can brag how these loyal customers "opted for FCCs".  More delays and lies. 

I'd love to know the true percentage of customers who ACTUALLY CHOSE to accept FCCs.  By making it an "opt out" system they knew some percentage wouldn't even read the notices or know they had a choice and therefore would get FCC by default.  Oh, but those people "chose" FCCs too, right 😉

And the longer this shutdown goes on and the more precarious the cruise lines finances become makes it more likely that when they do open up there will be policies in place to limit the way FCC's are used.  I don't expect it to be open, published policies but more like they will blackout certain cabins on the most popular cruises to cash only customers.  Or the best "guarantee" cabins will go to those who paid with cash.  After all, they already have the money from the FCC's.  Just like the airlines and their points programs, I predict many will find they will find that using FCC's won't be as easy as using cash.  The lines have complete control over who books what cabins and so they can easily control the sale of them. 

People holding FCC's might not want to hear that but mark my words, they may find out the hard way that FCC's, even at 125% of cash refund value are worth less because they will either be forced to use them on off-season cruises or maybe forced into higher category (more expensive and profitable) cabin classes.  We all know the games they played with pricing in cabin credits and "perks" and how some TA's seem to be able to offer a lot more than booking through Celebrity directly.  Nowhere have I read anything that guarantees you can use your FCC on any cruise for any cabin and even if they said it I wouldn't believe them when their systems are so opaque.  No thank you, cash is king, and when the cruises start sailing again the lines will want to see as much new money coming in as possible to prop up their bottom lines.

2 hours ago, Argo. said:

No he is the one that got shafted because Celebrity gave no options to cruisers within 48 hours of getting nothing or an FCC while already having the announcement ready the next morning to people who then got the better deal.  We were on Silhouette B2B2B and experienced the same pain.  It's like asking someone if they want a blindfold before the execution.

And I am also "the one" STILL waiting for the 25% refund we were all promised on that 3/6 sailing.

Promises, promises.

I finally put in a CC dispute on 25% of the fare against the charge for that cruise last week too.  I didn't want to have to resort to that but after over two months (and Celebrity's attitude that they won't speak to me directly about any of this because we booked through VTG, our TA) forced me to take that step to elevate this as well. 

Someone here posted the story about what great guys the two board members were who loaned the cruise line $100M and how it showed what great confidence they had but what they don't mention is how those guys are getting 11.5% interest from Celebrity and have the collateral of their cruise ships as security while all of us loyal customers get no interest and are given IOU's (FCC's) and are unsecured creditors should they go belly up.  I mentioned it once but it bears repeating. 

Why does X handle their cancellations like this, so they can get headlines like this on the Motley Fool today:

Royal Caribbean Expects to Return to Service on Aug. 1

We all know that cancelling cruises through July isn't really the same as expecting to return to service in August as this headline implies.  If you read each of the four cancellation letters X has issued each says they expect to return to service but it's another lie. 

The fact is these cruise lines won't sail again until there's either a vaccine or effective proven treatment to prevent death from COVID-19, period.  Why?   Because most of their customers fall into the high risk of death category.  Elderly, overweight, diabetics and people with other comorbidities are their most loyal customers and even if some of them would sail there's no way the attorneys who work for the cruise lines or their insurance companies are going to let them onboard before there's a reasonable chance they won't contract the virus and die during the trip.  Plus the ports aren't going to let them dock, so where are they going to go?  To their private islands? 

And so, my friends, denial ain't just the river they cruise on.  Expect cruise lines to be parked for a long while and at least one of them to run out of money before they start again.  And then where will all those FCC's be used?  Cat box liners, I suspect.

And for anyone who thinks that Celebrity's careless wording of their cancellation notices isn't ambiguous I would refer them to the wording of Holland America's notice:

"Guests who are currently booked on a cruise listed above will automatically receive a generous Future Cruise Credit (FCC). Guests who require a refund in lieu of the generous FCC offer are encouraged to inform us through our online cancellation preference form by June 1, 2020."  (Italics added for emphasis)

When offering an entitlement, there is NO question that "guests who are currently booked" is a different statement from "all booked guests", which is how X worded their offer.  HAL's wording makes it crystal clear they intended to extend the offer only to those guests who were booked at the time the offer was extended while X's offer can be open to a different interpretation; namely that by using the past tense "booked" combined with "all" the statement can be interpreted to mean that this new offer is for anyone presently or who had been previously booked and cancelled prior to the offer being extended.  In short, "all booked guests" does not mean the same thing as "guests who are currently booked" and it is that subtle difference in the offer that opens X up to having to extend it to everyone who received the notice of cancellation.  And, as I pointed out previously, the burden in making a contract unambiguous is on the party who drafted it.  So, by leaving it up to interpretation I am able to interpret it in my favor and that would tend to tip the scales in my favor under a "preponderance of the evidence" rule in small claims court, IMHO.  Offer, acceptance and consideration (refund).  It's a contract, and I intend for them to live up to it.

2 hours ago, JennAngel9 said:

I'm not disputing that's a correct summary of Celebrity's position, but I do not think it is actually a legally defensible position (I'm a contract litigator), given that they simply delayed cancelling many cruises and our TA told us this was the only way to avoid paying another $20,000 in final payment for a product that was never going to be delivered.  For the moment, I am curious if anyone else has had success either via Celebrity or the credit card company.

And it's the pattern of waiting until the last minute and putting their customers under duress that is their downfall.  They have now done the same tactic at least three times.  Telling people they had to act in a way that wasn't in their self-interest or risk losing more, just as they did to me on 3/12.  I am sick of people who think X is acting in good faith, they have calculated to the day when it is most advantageous for them to cancel hoping people will take them up on the CWC and then once they do finally cancel and they deem some lucky ones worthy of refunds of their hard earned money they stall (by making "mistakes") and wait until they absolutely are forced to pay refunds before they finally do.  I am tying them up in knots with both credit card disputes and a small claims case - fighting on two fronts simultaneously so I get refunds instead of FCC that I don't want or need.  I hope someday someone does start a class action suit against them, I will be the first to join and will open a third front!

15 minutes ago, Argo. said:

Now that June and July cruises are cancelled as of today, let us see if credits are issued faster for the requests already in the system.

Anyone who thought they would be sailing this summer was delusional.  My bet is there won't be any North America sailing anytime this year or well into next. 

I read the transcript of the call.  Somebody should ask the boss why they continue to be able to take reservations (and deposits) in a timely manner but refunds "are taking up to 45 days" (this is the latest version of the lie).  If they can take your money TODAY then they should be able to give it back today. 

18 hours ago, hcat said:

Update:

Heard back from BOA on one of our disputes.. A letter indicated  that  the Cruise Line  gave us our refund.  Any temporarily restored credit to our account  ( which we may have cashed out) will be adjusted as a charge back on a future statement.   That's fine.  Just wanted to get our refund, not make a profit!  We assume this will happen with other pending disputes,

 

  Have not filed a dispute on the last cancellation of a deposit,  but X is a real pokey puppy after advising us it has  "gone through"...but  gone through to where?

Trying to understand the post - did you actually get the refund twice?  A refund from X plus the dispute credit? If so, then I can understand them re-charging you but if not then why would you allow them to charge-back until you get the refund?

41 minutes ago, bellemiche said:

Still waiting for a FCC for March 15 sailing. We cancelled a couple of days before. 😡

Received our refund from Delta for our flights, but nothing from Celebrity.

Have any Canadians tried going through their credit card company instead? 

 

We were booked on the 3/15 and 3/27 Silhouette sailings both of which X canceled on 3/13 (less than 24 hours after I canceled).  I disputed charges for both being unwilling to accept 100% FCC when we received an email on 3/13 which I interpreted to be offering us the 125% FCC/100% refund offer.  The 3/27 dispute has been accepted and settled in my favor while X tried to fight my dispute of the 3/15 cruise fare by stating to the CC company that the service was either "used or made available to me to use" so I have had to re-dispute that one just a few days ago and submitted the booking records and email of 3/13 showing the cruise was canceled and therefore wasn't used or available for my use.  So, waiting for that one to be re-disputed. 

FWIW I never received FCC for the 3/15 sailing, the one which X has been fighting the credit card dispute over.  I did get a refund on our CC for the taxes and port charges some time ago but no FCC or refund for the fare, nothing.   Also, in showing how X doesn't know what it is doing we got FCC for the 3/27 cruise a couple of weeks after they accepted the CC dispute.  I don't plan on ever sailing on X again so the FCC won't be used but they effectively double-credited us for that sailing (by giving us both the refund and FCC at 100%).

In short, they accepted one disputed charge refund (and then issued an FCC at 100%) for the 3/27 sailing and rejected one disputed charge refund (and haven't issued any FCC) for the 3/15 sailing but have refunded taxes and port fees for both cruises.  No consistency.  Just a lot of headaches keeping track of it all. 

1 hour ago, wrk2cruise said:

Celebrity is paying the agents commission to service the reservation.  Why should they use the employees they pay to service it when they have paid someone else to do it for them?   Yes it's inconvenient at times but that's one of the pros/cons you have to weigh when using a TA.

My take on it is they pay the agents a sales commission to sell the trip, but then, after the sale if you have a question or an issue that needs tweaking making the guest who had been waiting on hold hang up and call the agent (who subsequently has to call Celebrity and then keep you on hold or call you back) just makes the experience frustrating and inefficient.  There's very little the agents can do without calling Celebrity and so the extra step isn't "saving a Celebrity employee's time" it is just wasting a guest and agent's time.  Everyone's (the agent and Celebrity) goal should be to make the guest's experience the best it can be but the system doesn't do that, not by a long shot. But that's just been my experience.

One time I called in to ask if the cabin we had booked had a separate seating area and was told I had to direct any questions to the TA. Now you know the TA isn't going to know that, so why couldn't they just answer the question?  The TA just looks at the photo online and I point out that the photos are often just representative of a typical room and cabin configurations vary otherwise I would not have asked the question.  So they have to call.  Then Celebrity says they can't say for sure anyway, which, they could have told me and saved us all a lot of time.

When you get tired of the run-around, dispute the charges and let the CC company and Celebrity deal with it.

And if they try to bounce the dispute, you can appeal it.  The dispute process puts you in charge and you will have provisional credit immediately while the CC company does its research.

Celebrity is playing the game that insurance companies like to play to hold onto your money as long as possible so they can use it while you cannot. Every dollar of yours they hold is one less they need to pay interest on to a bondholder and they know it.  Tell them when they start paying us 11.5% we can be patient. 

1 hour ago, omeinv said:

Your interpretation is quite imaginative.  However, if you cancel a cruise, you are no longer a "booked guest".  You cancelled the booking.

 

Harris

Denver, CO

I guess I will let the judge or arbitrator decide how to interpret it.  You're probably a lawyer so you probably know that a contract that is ambiguous is usually interpreted in favor of the party who didn't draft it.  I interpret an email offer to me that says "all booked guests" to mean anyone who receives this email who was ever booked (past tense used), otherwise I wouldn't have received it (or it would have specifically excluded those who had previously cancelled under another offer, and it doesn't say that).  Plenty of holes in that email for me to use to get my money back.  I guess Celebrity should have exercised more care in who those emails were sent to and precisely what they said.  If they are careless or clueless it doesn't mean that they aren't liable to deliver what they promised.

1 hour ago, omeinv said:

If you wanted to sue Celebrity in Small Claims court, you should not have agreed to resolve all claims through arbitration administered by National Arbitration and Mediation (NAM) under its comprehensive dispute resolution rules and procedures and NAM's fee schedule in effect at he time of the procedure; but you did. 

 

https://www.celebritycruises.com/content/dam/celebrity/pdf/Cruise-Ticket-Contract-Celebrity.pdf  Reading section 10 explains the full arbitration agreement.

 

Harris

Denver, CO

 

 

 

 

 

Since I never received a copy of this from my TA and there is no reference to it in the booking record from them I don't see how it can be enforceable, but I suppose it will be interesting to see how they respond to the suit when they are served.  NH Law is pretty pro-consumer and basically says I can sue anyone in small claims court who does business in the state and who breaches a contract with me as long as I am a resident of the state.  Doing business in the state is very loosely defined and just having a website constitutes it in the eyes of the court.  I successfully sued Samsung and State Farm in the same court - I am sure somewhere buried in those contracts was binding arbitration too but their attorneys just settled after being served. 

They have until 6/12 to return the service or lose by default.  In the mean time I have gotten back most of my money from Visa by disputes already closed in my favor.  I'm basically down to about $2500 left and if I am forced to take that as a FCC I am still way ahead of where I would have been had I not fought at all. 

For those of you who cancelled their bookings prior to 3/13 (when Celebrity officially cancelled cruises) and have been told you only have to accept 100% FCC (under cruise with confidence) for cruises they subsequently cancelled, I would point out that you probably received the same email I did on 3/13 informing you of the cancellation of the cruises which says: "In order to compensate you for this cancellation, all booked guests will automatically receive 125% FCC...". 

The past tense "...all booked guests..." was used which I interpret to mean anyone who WAS booked on the cancelled sailing and who received the email. I WAS booked and received that email.  Note, they didn't say "all guests presently booked" or "all guests presently with bookings", they said "all booked guests".  If they intended it to mean only those presently booked they should have said so and should not have sent the email out to people who were not entitled to the offer.  After all, they changed their cancellation policies by offering CWC before they cancelled so why shouldn't this be interpreted as just another change in cancellation policy?  It's what I sent to Visa and what I intend to present in small claims court if it comes to that. 

If you are in the same boat (no pun intended) and would prefer a refund or 125% FCC I think legally you have a pretty good leg to stand on if you received that same email. I think you should fight for 125% FCC or a refund, as it was offered to you in writing by them on 3/13.  If they made an error in sending the email to you when you shouldn't have gotten it or an error in the wording of it, that's on them.  They made me an offer and I intend on seeing to it they fulfill it.

It seems like they have stepped up their processing efforts.  This morning Visa advised that one of our disputes (for a cruise scheduled to depart on 3/15) was being denied because X claims the cruise was "available for our use" and submitted some 20 pages of mostly nonsense paperwork with nothing to support that claim.  So I called Visa and explained that the cruise in question was not "available for our use" as it was cancelled by X on 3/13 and I have an email from them to support that.  I haven't received any FCC or refund for that cruise after more than 60 days.

Their own paperwork submitted indicates they were ordered to cancel all cruises on 3/14 so how could it have sailed on 3/15?  Visa said to send in a copy of the email with a request in writing to re-dispute the charge and they would take care of doing that, which I have now done.  I pointed out to them that another dispute was "approved" and finalized last week for the cruise scheduled to depart on 3/27 so there is some inconsistency in the way X is handling me.  In any event I have literally nothing better to do than to chase down our money until we get it all back and that's exactly what I plan to do.  One good thing about being locked down is it gives me plenty of time to take care of all of this.

Since I was submitting a written request for the 3/15 cruise refund I also submitted a request that Visa refund 25% of the fare we paid for the 3/6 cruise which we were promised while onboard and which we have not yet received.   I submitted all of the documentation including the letter from the captain saying we would receive the refund.  So in picking one fight with me X now gets to answer two disputes.

2 minutes ago, Shadow9612 said:

Princess is also taking its time....

Probably too busy answering depositions from the stricken passengers' lawyers.  How the CEO of Princess has managed to keep their job is beyond me. 

I did request future cruise deposits from Princess, and, you're right, have not received that money back yet so they too seem to need to reassign more people from the "lying about the virus department" to the "lying about the refund department"

Just now, sandc4e said:

Contact TA this morning who already reached out to Celebrity.  This was a penalty, held in error due to their cancellation, and has been released for refund.  They did say it could take an additional "few" weeks to process.  But, at least my full refund is processed.

 

Glad you suggested to call versus waiting.  We will cruise again, once things calm down and we know more about this virus.

 

Sheila

Seems like every error they make giving refunds is in their favor...hmmm....

8 minutes ago, Ride-The-Waves said:

Its unrealistic to expect refunds from cruise lines until cruising resumes (in some form) and their finial balance sheets are showing decent income from actual cruising.  Cruise lines are hemorrhaging money and to "stay afloat" are using deposits to fund daily operations.  Its all they have except for lines of credit.  And, its gong to be a long time until income and expense begin to balance again.  I'm about $20K in the hole having been caught between final payment and cruising.  FCC is not a help to me since we are facing new guidance on health (existing conditions) and age restrictions not present before March.  Its going to be a long wait...

Every dime I had paid Holland America for cruises in April was refunded within 2 weeks after they canceled.  I also got all my future cruise deposit money back from them within 2 weeks after asking for it.  It's only Celebrity that is having trouble issuing refunds as you can see by the volume of complaints here directed towards them.  With the exception of one person here who has appointed himself an official apologist for X, everyone else either waited a very long time or is still waiting for their money back and is given lots of excuses as to why they can't make timely refunds but there's really only one reason people don't give you your money back and it's because they don't have it. 

I don't see anything anywhere on Celebrity's site that says anything is "fully refundable".  Their CWC program says you can cancel up to 48 hours before a cruise and receive FCC.  Not sure how that applies to deposits you make now but frankly anyone who gives them any deposit (or any other) money now deserves to lose it.

13 minutes ago, BridgeMates said:

I spoke with the Engagement Ctr yesterday regarding a refund from our March cruise on the Silhouette. 

Jennifer explained that previously they only had 4-5 people working refunds in the "post sailing dept."

She says they have reassigned 50 employees from other departments to the post sailing dept and once they are trained we

should see refunds processed more efficiently.  Hope this is true.  I've been waiting since we returned on March 15th for a refund that Capt Peppas promised everyone on board due to several incidents we had on that trip.   I know some people on Cruise Critic have said they got their refund, but all I've gotten is the run-around!  

 

 

It's absolutely laughable.  They had 50 people working in departments other than "post cruise" while they are shut down and didn't think to transfer them to handle refunds?  You should have asked what all those people have been doing for the past 2 months.  It sounds like another lie.  There's one thing the cruise lines are very good at and that is avoiding telling the truth at all costs. 

For what it is worth we were also on that same cruise and also still waiting for our 25% refund.  I added it to the amount I am suing them for so they will probably get it resolved soon as they have to respond to the lawsuit by June 11.

6 hours ago, Sam.Seattle said:

File a dispute with your credit card provider everyone!

Yes, this is the best way to get your issues resolved quickly and you will get provisional credit immediately while the CC company deals with Celebrity.  I would advise anyone who has waited 30, 45 or 60 days or more for refunds and still gets the run around to just take that step and you will get their attention, pronto.