Book direct with cruise line or travel agent

[CRUZBUDS]

We never use a travel agent regardless of the length of the trip, be it land or sea. The planning is half the fun, plus we have control, not a travel agent.

 

We also enjoy the planning and do all of it ourselves with the assistance of Cruise Critic --- When it comes time to book, we use an agent.

 

If giving up "control" gets me $250 to $350 (2 week cruise) on board credit from our agent -- I'll take it! :)

 

We don't believe in leaving money on the table

 

[fleckle]

If giving up "control" gets me $250 to $350 (2 week cruise) on board credit from our agent -- I'll take it! :)

Know what you mean.

Earlier this year we had booked a couple of cabins on a 13 night cruise directly with the cruise line, which is the way we almost always initially book our cruises.

 

But we kept an eye on the offers from travel agents that keep showing up all the time.

 

When it got close to the 60 day transfer cutoff, we transferred the bookings to a well-known TA for prepaid gratuities.

 

With gratuities of $12 per day per person, for 4 people for 13 days, that came to $624.

 

The TA also tossed in some coupons for free specialty restaurant dinners and spa treatments, worth a few hundred additional dollars.

 

If we had booked suites, the prepaid gratuities would have been even more.

 

So we figure it was well worth the nuisance of giving up "control" of our own bookings and needing to go through a middle-man each time to make changes and payments for us.

 

 

I think we each make our own determination at what price point it is worthwhile to give the booking to a TA, or not worth the bother.

Also, some people want more hand-holding from a TA than others.

 

 

 

 

As noted many times before but worth mentioning again for those who are new, travel agents often advertise perks that are actually coming from the cruise line and that you would get anyway without using a TA.

 

So it is important to know which perks are really coming from the TA and which are coming from the cruise line.

 

[JonnyCT81]

I have always booked my cruises through Celebrity directly; I have this one guy that is GREAT and always helps us out. Celebrity usually can match any other offers that you can get from a TA - for example, I was going to book through a TA that was offering $150 OBC for each of our B2B cruises - Before booking, I thought I would give my guy at Celebrity a call and asked if he could match it, as I would rather give the sale to him (I believe they work on commission), I told him the website of the cruise line and he pulled it up on the phone with me and was able to match the promotion. Celebrity Vacation Planners always seem to go above and beyond with service for me - On our last cruise on the Reflection we even got a free Alcove during a sea day as thanks for booking through him :)

[Going Coastal]

We have great travel planner at Celebrity also. In fact, our first was promoted and she passed us on to the wonderful one we have now. Also had a great guy at Royal and he referred us to someone equally great at Azamara.

 

 

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