Looking for advice, please - cancellation charge for mistaken booking?

We just booked two Azamara cruises for 2020, while on board a Celebrity ship. We had talked to the consultant briefly about a third cruise, but decided not to book it. The consultant told me the deposit amount, which sounded about right for two cruises. She said she couldn’t give me the confirmation paperwork immediately, but would send it later.

When I got the confirmation by email (still nothing on actual paper) a few hours later, it included the third cruise. I immediately went back to the future cruises office to say that there had been a mistake. I was told that cancelling that third cruise (that we didn’t even know we’d booked) would incur a cancellation charge.

I can’t see any reason for charging me to cancel a cruise I didn’t want to book, but they seem determined to charge me anyway. Does anyone have any advice for convincing them not to charge me a cancellation fee?

And yes, I guess I’ll know next time not to leave the office without printed confirmation in my hand!

Do you have a travel agent? If so I suggest you have them pursue it. It is the onboard personnel who is at fault here. If they insist on charging move up the ladder until you are satisfied

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Lisa, I'm just back from a Celebrity cruise where I booked an Azamara trip for the booking onboard benefits and had terrible trouble. I purposely booked early in the cruise to gain the extra $100 OBC that now applies if you secure in the first half. I got paperwork showing the standard $200 OBC would be applied rather than the correct $300. I went back to query it, was fobbed off by the sales consultant who made out she knew more than me and never did get the correct paperwork. I was charged the full deposit instead of a 50% reduction as a UK booker, but by that time I'd had enough, knew the cruise wasn't too far away and left it as it was as it was insisted I'd been charged correctly.

My advice? Take it up the line yourself now by writing to the LCV desk of Azamara and outline what happened and you aren't happy with the way it was dealt with onboard Celebrity. Fortunately I had a contact at Azamara I emailed whilst still on the ship who was very helpful in sorting it out. Hopefully you'll get the same person. It wouldn't be fair to share the name here though.

Good luck. I was left feeling very frustrated by the whole thing on Celebrity and the sales consultant was awful. Just interested in selling cruises rather than doing what the customer wanted.

Phil

I’ll see if we can help you tomorrow.

Thank you, Laurie, Phil, and Bonnie. My agent has said she’ll work on it tomorrow too, so hopefully it will get corrected shortly. I think it would be really helpful for Azamara to leave a short time to straighten out mistakes before charging a fee.

As a further development, I have now received paper confirmations for the two cruises we wanted to book, but only an email copy for the one booked in error. If I hadn’t checked my email, I wouldn’t even know about that one yet!

Had a similar issue almost 2 years ago booking on board the Quest. Got the paper confirmation the next day and it was for a completely incorrect cruise from the one we told the Azamara cruise consultant to book. Was semi fixed on board as a few days later got a correction to the correct cruise but, OBC was different than what was promised on the original confirmation (nothing to do with the cruise). Got that fixed just before disembarkation but, when we got home some LCV benefits weren't what we asked for.

Contacted Nicole and after 2 tries in conjunction with other LCV staff, finally got a correct invoice. Was easier than using our TA as that would have just added one more person to have to explain the entire problem and you know what happens if you sit in a circle and tell a joke to the next person and by the time it gets back to you it is completely different. So a total for 5 invoices to get a correct one to what we originally told the consultant we wanted. Provided a step by step story of what was asked for vs. what the various invoices said. Worked out in the end except Azamara later cancelled our cruise for financial reasons.

Don't work thru Guatemala (customer service) only go direct to the LCV desk and more than likely the correct invoice will be sent. Not sure what you mean by paper confirmation vs. email copy; in my book they are the same as both are in writing and once the email is printed, it is the same as a hard copy by snail mail.

By the way, during this ordeal, no mention of any cancellation charges so confident your much simpler issue will be successfully resolved.

Thank you, Laurie, Phil, and Bonnie. My agent has said she’ll work on it tomorrow too, so hopefully it will get corrected shortly. I think it would be really helpful for Azamara to leave a short time to straighten out mistakes before charging a fee.

 

As a further development, I have now received paper confirmations for the two cruises we wanted to book, but only an email copy for the one booked in error. If I hadn’t checked my email, I wouldn’t even know about that one yet!

Hi lisiamc,

Your agent is already on the job this morning! I understand the third (erroneous) cruise is being cancelled. There will be no CX fee.

I’m sorry this happened to you, and I also apologize on behalf of the Celebrity future cruise person.

Hi lisiamc,

Your agent is already on the job this morning! I understand the third (erroneous) cruise is being cancelled. There will be no CX fee.

I’m sorry this happened to you, and I also apologize on behalf of the Celebrity future cruise person.

Thanks for your help, Bonnie! Yes, I’ve had confirmation from my agent that all is now well. We’re really looking forward to our cruises on Pursuit.