New Celebrity Promotion (1, 2, 3 Go !) Returns March 15, 2013

[Andy]

Can this be combined/used with an Open Passage?

 

Hi Jade,

 

Several CC members have reportedly asked, and were told no. I will see if I can get confirmation.

Edited January 8, 2013 by Host Andy

[missminnie]

Hi Missminnie,

 

I was advised the 123 Go promotion is not available in the UK. Regarding your comment about UK guests receiving this offer, I suppose it's possible they are booking via US TA's. In your case, if you were to cancel & rebook, it would likely result in penalties, so I'm unable to determine if it makes sense for you.

 

I wish you all the best of luck in determining the your best path. Enjoy your Cruise !

 

Boo! Thanks for trying though.

 

I will still enjoy the cruise but would have been nice with free drinks!

[welshfamily]

Celebrity UK are not doing the latest offer.

After reading these boards I tried again this afternoon. A new booking for a cruise in July on the Reflections Aqua class cost over £2200 per person and we want 2 cabins. The chap I normally deal with couldn't even offer me any OBC. The offer in Europe should be flights for £49 but only if you want to fly off peak ..in May.

My chap couldn't get flights for less than ...... He wouldn't even tell me .. He just said they were expensive. To be fair this was because I wanted to add a couple of nights in a hotel in Rome. He couldn't even waiver the £20 deviation fee. If I just did the cruise he could give me flights at £199 but I could do this independently for £150.

He did point out that Celebrity is giving the drinks package offer on some sailings from the Uk but a lot of past passengers including us have done the Baltic/Iceland cruise.

I felt sorry for him a booking worth almost £10,000 and he had nothing to sweeten the deal.

In these days of the Internet Celebrity need to sort out their price/offers as I am sure those from the US would feel as cross as we do here in the UK/ Europe if we had good offers which they could not take advantage of.

[welshfamily]

Thank Andy, I see you had replied as I was posting.

Maybe it's time to try another cruise line which appreciates guests who are not American.

[durberville]

Well I'm thrilled!

 

I have a May sailing to Bermuda booked. Although the fine print says "new bookings only" I thought I'd call my TA and see what could be done.

 

TA just got back to me and said that Celebrity will replace our orginal booking incentives of $100 plus free gratuities, with the Classic Beverage Package for two. Our TA will be covering our prepaid gratuities, which is above their original offer of $100 OBC.

 

We were planning on purchasing the non-alcoholic package before this offer, so this is a great deal! I"m very impressed with both Celebrity AND our TA. :)

 

(Kept our cabin and reservation number - no cancellation or re-booking hassle.)

[missminnie]

Thank Andy, I see you had replied as I was posting.

Maybe it's time to try another cruise line which appreciates guests who are not American.

 

 

Well said! I'm booked on 3 cruises this year and got very little OBC on just one of them. That was it! The price did drop on our back to back one which he did manage to get but only after cancelling and rebooking and by doing that we lost our original OBC offered.

 

I'm thinking it's definately time to start cruising with someone else from 2014. Very disappointed in their pricing lately and find it really unfair that one country has different offers to others - both ways by the way whereby American's can't take advantage of ours and we can't take advantage of theirs. Yet we have to pay just as much to fly to USA for some of these cruises and get nothing to help sweeten that extortionate airfare.

 

:(:mad:

[Andy]

Thank Andy, I see you had replied as I was posting.

Maybe it's time to try another cruise line which appreciates guests who are not American.

 

Hi Welshfamily,

 

I understand your frustration, but I feel it's important to note that it may not be Celebrity's fault. There have been many comments on other threads, about laws varying in different countries - so it may not be as easy to apply specific elements of a promotion, as one might think.

 

I've also learned that Celebrity UK is currently running other promotions for UK Guests, which are not available to US Guests.

 

Just some food for thought. I hope we can leave it at that, and return to being on topic. Thank you !

[mawsmaw]

Missminnie and welshfamily I feel exactly as you do!!!! We're 8 people already booked for September out of Rome. Continually told its better to book early. Well not now. We in the uk are penalised at every turn and no one seems to bother - we just take it. My query is currently with my TA but expecting the same result. I think our cruise will be devalued due to the number of people on free drink packages, but if we want it will still need to pay the full whack!!!! Not a happy bunny at all.

Ps. Thanks for all the good work Host Andy.

[huskerc]

I may have missed it, but in case no one else has mentioned it, I see today there is a "upgrade from classic" package option in my reservation at Celebrity's website, in the usual place with the other beverage packages. So for those who have taken advantage of this promotion, it looks like upgrading is easy.

[Gordoncruickshank]

Hi Welshfamily,

 

I understand your frustration, but I feel it's important to note that it may not be Celebrity's fault. There have been many comments on other threads, about laws varying in different countries - so it may not be as easy to apply specific elements of a promotion, as one might think.

 

I've also learned that Celebrity UK is currently running other promotions for UK Guests, which are not available to US Guests.

 

Just some food for thought. I hope we can leave it at that, and return to being on topic. Thank you !

 

Hi Andy

 

The cruises that have been on offer in the UK with the beverage packages are only sailings on the Eclipse and Equinox out of Southampton. None of the other ones.

 

The current US offer covers just about every cruise available including the ones already on offer here. I haven't checked the whole list but all the ones that am looking at just now are on it.

 

Pricing is pretty similar on both the UK and the US sites taking into account local differences - No tax in the US sirte and discounts that we can get but the benefit of the beverage package is £446 per head for a 2 week cruise. OK I would lose shareholder credit of approx £150 but would still be over £700 or around $1100 beter off.

 

I think Celebrity in allowing this around the world other than here are in danger of sending, what is a fairly loyal customer base in the UK, to other cruise lines.

[Andy]

I may have missed it, but in case no one else has mentioned it, I see today there is a "upgrade from classic" package option in my reservation at Celebrity's website, in the usual place with the other beverage packages. So for those who have taken advantage of this promotion, it looks like upgrading is easy.

 

Hi Huskerc,

 

The upgrade is mentioned throughout this thread, and in the fine print in my first post. If you enjoy the premium package, it's nice of Celebrity to allow upgrading. Just let Celebrity (or your TA) know, and it will be added to your booking.

 

I hope this helps !

[huskerc]

Hi Huskerc,

 

The upgrade is mentioned throughout this thread, and in the fine print in my first post. If you enjoy the premium package, it's nice of Celebrity to allow upgrading. Just let Celebrity (or your TA) know, and it will be added to your booking.

 

I hope this helps !

 

Thanks Andy. The point I wanted to make (and maybe I didn't make it well, or maybe it's already been explained and I didn't understand) is not that upgrades are possible (which, I agree, is nice), but that the upgrades can actually be purchased directly on Celebrity's website as part of your reservation. Personally I can imagine calling my TA and being on hold for a long time while everyone tries to figure out exactly how they should do that, so to me it's nice to be able to take care of it myself.

[Chirpbird]

I just got off the phone with Celebrity. I have a reservation for the end of April (2013), and the cruise was completely paid for. I wondered if I could apply the 123 Go promotion. Also, I was already in an Ocean View room.

 

Yes, I can is the answer. Since final payment due date is Feb 11, I was able to pay today's price for my room (didn't want to move), and take advantage of the deal. Why would I do that? We wanted to purchase 2 premium alcohol packages. The cost of those would have been 993.60. Instead, I paid today's price for my cabin, upgraded the free Classic with alcohol package and had the $50 Thank you for being a prior customer coupon taken off my booking. The net result? I saved $340.60. :D

[SusieV]

We were told that we could apply this to existing bookings as long as we have at least a balcony. Price drops would be allowed but NOT for senior or resident rates, just regular price drops.

 

I'm still thinking about whether I want to do this for 2014. We booked back when we could combine passages with the Captain's Club offer and have to see what works out better.

[Andy]

Hi Susie,

 

Just as an FYI - according to the fine print, it's Oceanview cabins and above, to be eligible. I hope this helps !

[Andy]

I just got off the phone with Celebrity. I have a reservation for the end of April (2013), and the cruise was completely paid for. I wondered if I could apply the 123 Go promotion. Also, I was already in an Ocean View room.

 

Yes, I can is the answer. Since final payment due date is Feb 11, I was able to pay today's price for my room (didn't want to move), and take advantage of the deal. Why would I do that? We wanted to purchase 2 premium alcohol packages. The cost of those would have been 993.60. Instead, I paid today's price for my cabin, upgraded the free Classic with alcohol package and had the $50 Thank you for being a prior customer coupon taken off my booking. The net result? I saved $340.60. :D

 

That's great to hear Chirpbird. Thanks for sharing with us !

[CaroleSS]

Just a quick FYI, I asked about upgrading to the premium and was told that BOTH of us had to do it, not just me. My husband is quite content with the classic as he mainly drinks beer, but for me, the wines are restrictive on teh classic and I'd LIKE to upgrade, but it's not worth it if we both have to upgrade. :(

[sarahc78]

I am so confused lol :confused:

 

If I were to book a sailing in a veranda on the Summit to Bermuda in June 2013 do I get to choose 2 of the offers or just one?

 

Can I pick any of the 3 or just certain ones?

[sarahc78]

Do you know what the price difference was to upgrade to the premium?

[keels81]

Done and booked on Solstice in July - in the Sunset Veranda cabin I nearly booked last week!

 

We went with the Classic Drink Package, but went ahead and upgraded to the Premium package for the extra $161 for 7 days ($11.50 pp/pd).

 

On our last X cruise, we definitely made money on the Premium Package over 5 days, so I have no doubt that we will get our $161's worth and then some.

[Ugaaucruisers]

Good News! Our TA was able to get the drink packages added to our cruise! We lost our paid gratuities, but were able to keep the promotion that we had on our cabin. So, we are thrilled! Plan on booking a 2014 cruise during the promotion for next year!! Sweet!!:):):)

 

Andy, thank you for all of your help!!

Laura

[JToddM]

I was just told by Celebrity that it was $11 and change per person per day to upgrade to Premium.

[Chirpbird]

Do you know what the price difference was to upgrade to the premium?

 

Hi Sarah - Here's the price to upgrade (from the fine print on the promo):

Premium Beverage Package upgrade available for an additional charge of $10 per person, per day plus $1.50 beverage gratuity per person, per day by contacting Celebrity Cruises.

 

And, the only time I saw in the promo where you get to choose 2 of the 3 offers was on European sailings. This is from X's website describing the promotion:

And, it's worth repeating–when you book a 2013 Europe vacation, you'll be able to choose TWO of the three offers for an even more amazing vacation value. So, if you've always dreamed of a Europe vacation, we'll make that vacation even dreamier.

Edited January 8, 2013 by Chirpbird
Doobie Doobie Doo; Beware the penguins.

[huskyla27]

I just got off the phone with Celebrity. I have a reservation for the end of April (2013), and the cruise was completely paid for. I wondered if I could apply the 123 Go promotion. Also, I was already in an Ocean View room.

 

Yes, I can is the answer. Since final payment due date is Feb 11, I was able to pay today's price for my room (didn't want to move), and take advantage of the deal. Why would I do that? We wanted to purchase 2 premium alcohol packages. The cost of those would have been 993.60. Instead, I paid today's price for my cabin, upgraded the free Classic with alcohol package and had the $50 Thank you for being a prior customer coupon taken off my booking. The net result? I saved $340.60. :D

 

 

Did you book your orginal cruise booking with celebrity or did you use a TA? Thank you!!!

[CaroleSS]

I was just told by Celebrity that it was $11 and change per person per day to upgrade to Premium.

 

Well dad-gummit! I was told that BOTH had to upgrade! Did you book through a TA or Celebrity? We booked through a TA and our really good lady has left and now we're stuck with Mr. Unhappy!

 

Would it be possible to upgrade once we got onboard perhaps? I REALLY don't want to talk with Mr. Unhappy again!