Choice Air or Expedia

[buggins0402]

If you find yourself in the middle of the ocean and discover, like I did once, that you have to make different air arrangements you may wish you had cruise air because they will take care of you flights for you.

 

 

Shak

 

And, sometimes you will have made your own air arrangements and be thankful. We were booked on the Insignia 12/7 (ship had a fire in St. Lucia). Thankfully, we had booked our own air and were able to continue our vacation in Miami South Beach, after the cruise line charter flights from St. Lucia to Miami. Those that had included air were flown home from Miami that day with little or no sleep and some still in their beachwear.

Edited December 31, 2014 by buggins0402

[nana541]

Check out Cranky Conceirge, they are NOT a travel agency but have trip services that monitor flights and other details and will rebook, reschedule (remember the volcano mess) make hotel arrangements if flights are not flying.....

 

I also used their FF (airline miles) service, they found me KLM Business Class that I could use my Alaska Airlines miles on (who knew!).

 

I am thrilled with these guys you might just want to cruise their website and see what kind of "peace of mind" their services can offer.

 

 

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[Algebralovr]

I prefer to book directly with the airline if the price is close to the same.

 

An exception is if you are booking a package deal that includes a charter flight. Celebrity is doing a bunch of these for our neighbors in Canada. They are bundling the room, A drink package and the air on chartered flights. They are likely to hold the ship a little bit if necessary, or fly the entire plane to join the ship.

 

All that said, Choice Air was the best solution for us flying to Europe and back but not as a true round trip. We flew to Venice, sailed down the Adriatic then flew home from Istanbul. Those flights were significantly cheaper from Choice Air. It was a hassle getting edocs, as they were not issued until 20 days before the cruise, due to the Choice Air flights.

[LuCruise]

Thank you for the feedback. I talked with DH and we're now thinking that we'll fly in the day before (which works well as our cruise leaves on a Sunday) to avoid any stress / issues of flight delays. And so, we'll book the flight ourselves...either through Expedia using some points or through the air line directly. Will keep my eye open when flights are released as I'm guessing they are typically the cheapest then???

[nana541]

Don't book thru Expedia!!!!!! Book direct, when things go wrong, they can go very wrong.

 

I'd book Choice Air before ever booking thru them, in fact I'd rather cut my arm off before booking with Expedia :(

 

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Edited December 31, 2014 by nana541

[em-sk]

Thank you for the feedback. I talked with DH and we're now thinking that we'll fly in the day before (which works well as our cruise leaves on a Sunday) to avoid any stress / issues of flight delays. And so, we'll book the flight ourselves...either through Expedia using some points or through the air line directly. Will keep my eye open when flights are released as I'm guessing they are typically the cheapest then???

 

You may want to look at booking the flight down and back as one way flights. That will let you book Air Canada one way and WestJet the other. You may find that gives you better schedule or pricing sometimes.

 

Not certain if your flying out of Toronto or a different airport. But American Airlines also has non-stops between Toronto and Miami.

 

Delta also codeshares on WestJet. I have found some weird pricing between the two where from time to time the codeshare can be a fair bit cheaper that the operating airline.

[Algebralovr]

What I often do is price shop using CA and Expedia, then go directly to the airline to see if the price is the same. If it is, we buy directly from the airline.

 

If there is a big difference, I ask why. If it is a fare that is spread out over a couple of airlines, I'm definitely NOT interested. I've heard of crazy situations where people were booked via Expedia on more than one airline, not necessarily even partner airlines. No thank you!

 

For your particular situation, I'd simply book what is best directly through your favorite airline. If you are fairly close to a US city, I'd also look at options available if you drove to a US city and flew from there.

 

Definitely fly down the night before if at all possible! It seems that when Murphy steps in, things go crazy.

[zlato]

Almost always book flight either directly with airline or with Am.Ex. Platinum department. However, on last international trip, wife and I decided to try Choice Air. Bottom Line: we were able to obtain first class tickets to London from Miami at a most reasonable price and had absolutely no problems; i.e., great flight, including service on BA. We did fly 3 days earlier prior to cruise. We NEVER fly on the same day of embarkation. We never use Expedia or similar services. I recommend you explore all your options as relates to prices, flight times, potential problems, etc. I believe that traveling to your destination should not detract from the total experience!

[LuCruise]

Thank you all for the responses. We think we'll skip ChoiceAir then since it doesn't sound like it has any advantage...and we'll most likely fly in the day before. Two advantages of this: (1) less stress and less risk of missing the ship incase any delays (2) we won't be exhausted (i.e. since if we fly in same day, then we'd take early flight so would be up at 3am or so. When prices come out we'll shop around and see.

[LuCruise]

Thought I'd add a follow up to my post. Interesting enough, I just did a compare of Expedia to Airline directly for April of 2015 (we'll be going April 2016)...just to see prices. Expedia cost is exactly the same as the airline's cost (cheapest option through airline). So if we find the same and we have points through Expedia, then we may go that route. But we'll see when airline opens up. We are also going to fly in the day before to avoid any stress of flight delays.