Price Match Question on Early saver Rates

[uttu]

Hi

We have a cruise booked on early saver rate under my VIFP number. My wife is in the booking also and in cabin with me but her VIFP number is not added in the booking right now.

 

Her number now got some really good offer which brings the price down almost $250 though we lose some OBC. The offer says new bookings only though.

 

So my question is will Carnival give this new rate for her VIFP number once we add her number(the TA we used just did not do it) or is it really for new bookings only? I thought Early saver rate qualified for all price drops.

 

I cannot get a good answer from the TA and he is difficult to communicate with. Can I call Carnival directly and check?

 

Thanks in advance!

Edited July 30, 2018 by uttu

[SGervais]

I would call carnival to ask those questions. Although to get the new price your TA may have to fill out the form. Maybe you could switch your cruise booking to carnival and not deal with the TA. I hope someone else can answer this for you.

[Nic6318]

Hi

 

I am quite certain the answer to your question is "No".

 

You would have to cancel your booking with whatever penalty, and rebook. That is one of the drawbacks/restrictions of booking "early saver rate"...you will always pay a penalty if you change your booking.

 

You really shouldn't expect that they would give you the lower rate just because your wife is in the same cabin.

The offer is made to one person, not a couple.

After all if you had booked under her name because she had a better offer and then some time down the road you got a better offer, it wouldn't be fair to the company to just give you the better rate. Imagine you add me to your booking, and look I have a very special casino offer. It just wouldn't be reasonable. It might be nice, but not reasonable. You would have to cancel the one and make a new booking. The only problem for you is that you booked the "infamous" early booking rate, with it's accompanying restrictions. The booking rate and it's rules is always something you need to consider when booking.

[TravelE]

It doesn't hurt to have your TA add her VIFP number to the booking and then call Carnival to price match.

[Tiger0613]

On 3/8/16, I booked the early saver rate for a 12/26/16 cruise for me and my mother using my VIFP number. Her VIFP number was on the booking as well, but I was the primary guest.

 

I listed my email address for my mother when checking in for a previous cruise, so I was getting all of her "sales" emails. On 3/10/16, she got an email with an actual offer. The offer was basically what the future cruise program is now. The offer was the early saver rate with 50% off the deposit, a two-category upgrade, and $50 OBC. The fine print said new bookings.

 

I called Carnival, and they applied my mom's offer to my existing booking. The half deposit was irrelevant since I had already put down the full deposit. The total fare dropped $60.

 

When I got to the terminal, I put cash on the Sail & Sign account. All of it was assigned to her folio number. That wasn't an issue since we both had charging privileges, but it was annoying. I didn't realize until just a few months ago that applying her offer likely made her the primary guest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

On a side note, I got my one and only price drop so far on 10/7/16. The total fare went down an additional $60, and the total taxes went down $12. Once onboard, we got back a total of $14.76 due to the usual overcharged taxes. With my mom's offer, the price drop, OBC, and refunded taxes, I saved $196.76. I was very happy.

[uttu]

Thank you everyone for the replies! I appreciate it. Finally, my TA came through and he could get the offer applied on our booking. So it does work! We saved around $250 on the rate thought lost the $150 OBC we had. Still came out ahead!