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Yes, if I inform the airline I will not fly 6 months from now, in October 2023, then I lost all the money as the ticket is not-refundable. Then I will get only $500 for a ticket that costs $1000s. Most people in this situation would wait with cancellation because they may still go to Japan, albeit with no cruise. So here Celebrity is showing good-will and just asks to show that the ticket is non-refundable. Celebrity does not ask to prove that I actually cancelled in advance. It's fair. My travel plans were ruined and I am stuck with a ticket I probably do not need and will not use. Even if I go to Japan, I now need to work on a new vacation plan ($$$ and time) for a different vacation in Japan. Thanks.

Totally agree with you! Only if you lose money, you should place a claim. But if I have a non-refundable flight to Japan, for October 2023, 6 months from now, I will not realize a loss of money until October 2023, when I don't show up for the flight. Celebrity / travel insurance will not wait until October for a realized loss of money so I can place a claim. So Celebrity said "if you show us a ticket and it says "non-refundable" on it, you get $500." Not sure what my Travel Insurance would say. In all honesty, I am not sure what I will do with this Japan flight ticket by October. Maybe I will fly. I have another dilemma here, and I need to decide this week. I did not place flight claims yet.

Yes, I am getting 125%, but, to clarify: I am not getting a new 125%. I am getting the 125% I already got from Celerity when I booked this "oversold" cruise due to a prior cruise getting cancelled because of Covid. If I look at the details of my "oversold" October 2023 cruise statement, I can see the lines of the actual $$ I deposited and one additional line which is a 25% given to me by Celebrity. I will still keep that 25% and can use it for a future cruise. If you did not realize: It would be really bad if Celebrity was actually considering, in addition to all the issues they caused to customers, to also take the 25% they gave some passengers in the past for Covid-related cancellations. Thanks

My flight to Japan is in October 2023 and we are now in May. Based on what you say, I need to "cancel" my flight now in May (i.e. inform the airline I will not show up), to get some kind of a letter / screen "you lost all your money on this flight". In contrast, FYI, Celebrity told me today that for their $500 refund on flights, all they need is a picture of the ticket with the words "non-refundable". Then, I need to ask Celebrity for an official letter for my Travel Insurance claim about my Cruise being cancelled. When Celebrity hears that, they should say "no $500 refund for you!" because "you have Travel Insurance!". And technically they are right. All this seems like me spending days with back-and-forth arguments between Celebrity and the Travel Insurance about who pays what and if to pay. All I was hoping is for "peace of mind" when I got Travel Insurance.... Wish me luck!!!!

I just spoke with Celebrity and our personal CSR at Celebrity. First, quick background: we booked directly with Celebrity and our October 2023 cruise was "oversold". We had to cancel for a refund because we cannot switch to October 2024. The official compensation offer from Celebrity (for anyone?) was $450 / person and up-to $500 for other expenses such as flights. It seems that Celebrity is sweetening the deal!!!! In our case, we get: 1. More than $450 / person, and half of the total will be refunded to our credit card - not a Future Cruise Credit. I got a very complicated story why we get more, and honestly I did not understand it. I was just happy that we get more than originally I thought. It was something about us putting an additional down payment on the cruise because we had to rebook it due to Covid cancellation. I did not even remember we did it. 2. Due to even prior cancelation due to Covid, Celebrity gave us 125% of the original amount paid for this cruise. As part of this current compensation, we will still get that 125% of the money. Note: this is still has to be approved by Celebrity management, but most likely it will happen. So, being much more happy with Celebrity I went ahead and told them I am booking a Bermuda cruise with them, 2 cabins, once we know the final future cruise credit. Thanks.

We bought travel insurance, not through Celebrity, well before the cruise got "oversold". We always do, due to some incident in the long past with my father, where THANKFULLY(!) we had insurance. How can travel insurance help here? For the cost of the cruise, I cannot honestly place a claim with the insurance because Celebrity offers refund (cruise credit) or S&L. For other costs, such as flights, maybe I can place a claim with the insurance ... but Celebrity also offers some refund ($500). It will be messy, a lot of time. I really wonder if people who bought travel insurance through Celebrity can get anything. Thanks

The Sept/Oct 2025 cruises for Japan are not even planned by Celebrity. We had an October 2023 "oversold" cruise, and we would probably go for an October 2025. All we were offered was October 2024, and we have other obligations for that month. So we had to cancel.

In our case, our October 2023 cruise was "oversold" and the only option for S&L is Sept/October 2024. Well, we can't go at all in Sept/Oct 2024 because of another obligation. I am sure that we are not the only ones: many other people may have other obligations for the only choice given by Celebrity. So we had to cancel, our vacation plan was ruined + big financial loss (Japan flights.) If I was Celebrity, and I actually cared about customers, I would offer "any other Celebrity cruise for a big discount to compensate you". Don't you think many will go for that, and actually Celebrity will make money off them, instead of cancellations? Thanks

Yes. You are 100% correct. We all know that. But with airlines this practice is not as bad because normally there's another flight to the same destination few hours later. Can't say that about cruises being over-sold. In any case, this practice of over-selling really hurt people. It actually got worse in the last few years where airlines are allowed to cancel flights because the plain was not fully sold. The issue with oversold flights and cancelled flight became so bad that now I always book a flight 2 days before the cruise starts, paying an additional hotel. And this practice save me from missing a cruise only last year. Thanks.

So this is not the first time Celebrity oversold a cruise. I am beginning to think that all those "oversold" incidents, by Celebrity, also Royal Caribbean (parent company of Celebrity), airlines, etc is really intentional... and the reason it to somehow make more money.

I meant 10 sailings, which is 1000s of people, which are 15% of the passengers.

For sure, this fiasco is costing Celebrity $ while also giving them bad publicity and hurting their business. Sadly, it costs Celebrity only $ and not $$$ because same bad management behind the fiasco is also handling the consequences using their same exact style of bad management: lack of care, lack of planning, being cheap, and shortly, handling customers as if they are cattle. If each booking mismanagement costs $$$ instead of $ then, for sure, incidents will be fewer and no massive fiascos of 10 ships with 1000s of passengers, almost 15% of Celebrity customers just this year. This is the only reason this large-scale massive fiasco happened: it does not cost Celebrity as bad as it should. Am I right? Then comes the government with their own lack of care, and makes sure such incidents cost only $ and not $$$ for corporations likes Celebrity. Anyway, I have the $$$ and I will choose others to give my $$$.

Totally agree with you, except "letter to the executive office". Celebrity and Corporations do not care about personal letters. They only care when issues are exposed publicly on message boards, media, groups, etc. Just here on CruiseCritic, I can see many people who said, including me, that they will not sail again with Celebrity = a lot of $$$$ of lost sales for Celebrity.

This is exactly what we discuss now: all those whose October 2023 cruise was "oversold" are now not(!) able to S&L to an October 2024 cruise ... because the 2024 cruises are full. So all the "oversold" cruisers will now have to cancel and lose the ability to get a 2024 cruise for the same price of a cruise from 2023 (or earlier). Thanks

This is getting worse and worse every day. We also have an October 2023 cruise that was "oversold". We can't go in October 2024, so we cancelled the cruise. Now you are telling us that those who want to S&L / Transfer to October 2024 can't do that because those cruises are completely sold. So everyone who was "oversold" will have to cancel. P/S: I said to Celebrity that I would be glad to go on a Japan cruise for October 2025, but Celebrity still do not have those cruises planned for 2025.

As I said, I booked directly with Celebrity. Yes, I spoke with my personal CVP. I booked through her several Celebrity cruises over the years. Very nice lady. Yes, she would have fought for me, but she can only do things allowed or possible with Celebrity. The policy of what allowed or possible is set by the mismanaged Celebrity management, and not by her. The Celebrity policy, as I told my CVP, is idiotic and hostile towards the customers: A. Not allowing volunteers to cancel their cruise (for a compensation) and thus minimizing the issues and harm. B. Celebrity is very cheap with its compensation for this Fiasco caused by them which ruined people vacations and caused serious financial loss to many. C. Celebrity knew of this problem for more than 6 months and did nothing. D. Not being flexible, allowing people to S&L to other cruises in other areas. In our case, we had to cancel the cruise. We can't go next year. The only offer allowed by celebrity to us is: 1. $450/person future cruise cruise that expires in one year. Hardly a worthy compensation. 2. Full-refund (cash, to the credit card) of all the excursions we paid for since the booking. 3. Future cruise credit with no expiration date of the rest. As for #3 above, they claim I used Future Cruise Credit to book the cruise. Actually I paid cash for that, but due to Covid, I had to rebook 3 times and now it's considered "cruise credit" and not cash deposit. I can't get a refund for this. Thanks

Today we called Celebrity to cancel our October 12, 2023 "oversold" cruise. (We had an assigned cabin and it was a balcony cabin, higher grade, booked directly with Celebrity.) We had to cancel because we can't use the Lift and Shift options for September and October 2024 - we have other obligations for 2024 in October and September. We also can't go on March/April 2024 Japan cruises, if they were even an option. So I asked: 1. "Can we Lift and Shift to an October 2025 cruises, which right now you do not have scheduled, but, for sure, you will have Japan cruises later in 2025?" Answer: "No!" 2. "Can we L&S to another cruise, somewhere else, because we can go in Oct/Sept 2024? (i.e. get another cruise for a special price because of this Oversold incident)" Answer "No!" I really do not understand why the "No!" for this option, if Celebrity is trying to make compensate customers for this mishap. 3. "How long do I have to submit claims for non-refundable flights I made for October 2023?" Answer: "I do not know!" This last answer really annoyed me: for sure some people had to cancel, and until now, Celebrity reps still do not know/told how to submit expenses for non-refundable flights?

What do you mean by "unless you pay for the difference at prevailing rat"? I thought the whole idea of Lift & Shift is the you you get the cruise for the same price.

I am sure that in the last 6 months, many people called specifically about their Cabin Number, when giving Booking number and their name. Maybe they wanted to change cabin, upgrade, etc. Very very hard to believe that in more than 6 months, nobody noticed that the "wrong name" is assigned to a cabin. Anyway, back to the original post: "Celebrity has known about this for months. It has exposed problems in their upper management, accounting, and auditing. Why did not anyone notice such a large issue that should have been caught by both accounting and management much earlier?"

I can't believe that if cabins were double or triple sold for 6 months or more and nobody at Celebrity would notice it quite immediately. Surely, in those 6 months, if person A calls about their cabin, person B would show up when Celebrity retrieves the data. In 6 months, not a single person called about their cabin / name only to be told that another name comes up? Hard to believe!!! (I did not call in the last 6 months) I have a been in the corporate world for too long so I am totally not surprised that despite an army of accountants, auditors, auditing companies, reports, systems, etc, the worse imaginable things happen, or, rather be hidden until they blow up, because nobody wants / afraid to blow the whistle or they are being ignored. I remember setting up a new credit card based ordering system and we processed $millions orders against it. But nobody in accounting turned on the billing process to create invoices to charge the customers. Nobody noticed that Total Sales does NOT equal total income. This went on for almost 9 months with many "happy" customers. End result: the company had to write-off $millions of orders because you can't charge an order older than 3 months on a credit card. Bonus: nobody got fired for this fiasco.

Celebrity, as a luxury cruise line, is being very very cheap here with their $450/person compensation and a miniscule $500 refund for flights while they know very well that flights to Japan are way way more than $500. In contrast, RCL, their parent company, is way more generous. If Celebrity was not that cheap, surely most passengers would take their offer, be happy, and continue to sail with Celebrity in the future. I decided to not sail with Celebrity anymore. Plenty of good competition there. Back to RCL, few years ago our cruise was shortened by 2 days (i.e. it started 2 days later) due to a hurricane, which is not even RCL's fault. We were put in a fancy hotel for those 2 days, very generous per-dim for meals and other expense for those 2 days, generous partial refund for the cruise being shortened and an additional on-board credit, just for that. I was very happy. Clearly, RCL treats customers better than Celebrity!

I would have volunteered!!! Gladly. Our October 2023 cruise was "oversold". But to volunteer, I need a better offer than $450/person.

No, it won't. We booked $1000s worth of excursions 2 months ago for the October cruise... and still got "oversold".

I want to mention for those whose September / October 2023 cruise was "oversold" that if you cancel and your cruise and get refund, you can save your planned vacation in Japan because there are several other cruises by other companies, e.g. Holland America, NCL, Princess, etc at the same time with available cabins.

hello, 1. Did anyone call to cancel for a full refund and than got a better offer from Celebrity for them to keep the business? 2. Reading here about the case of 6 rooms booked and only 3 got cancelled, it seems to me that Celebrity has serious and basic customer service issues. Actually, incompetence! If few rooms on one reservation are doubled-booked, then you cancel those who booked single rooms, rather than create a serious mess for someone with 6 rooms. It's common sense. 3. The compensation offered by Celebrity for ruining people vacations due to Celebrity's mismanagement is minimal at best: $450 per person and $500 for flights which costs much more. Celebrity should know that if I reside in the USA, a flight to Japan is much much more than $500. But if I reside in Korea, the flight to Japan is much less. Not many years ago, RCL had our cruise shortened by 2 days due to a hurricane (not even their fault). I got 2 nights in a fancy hotel (the cruise was to start 2 days later than intended), nice per-dim amount for food for those 2 days, on-board credits and additional money back for the cruise being shortened as a future cruise credit. Very nice, despite all this not being RCL's fault at all. With this incident, Celebrity shows to all of us that they incompetent with bookings, poor customer service/care, and above all, being cheap. Therefore I decide to cancel and cruise with another cruise line. Sorry.