Captain's Club One-Category Upgrade

[ihopfar]

I am a Royal Caribbean cruiser who reciprocal Select status in the Captain's Club.

 

I am thinking of booking my first Celebrity cruise and trying to figure out the One-Category upgrade.  Would appreciate a the proper order of the Veranda category upgrades.  

 

For example, a 1B would upgrade to a 1A, right?  Would a 2B upgrade to a 2A or a 1C?  Is there a full list of the hierarchy of the Veranda staterooms?  

 

Thanks!

Brad

[CEOofVacation]

https://www.celebritycruises.com/captains-club/enroll/

 

One-Category Upgrade

One-category upgrade requests must be made at the time of booking and apply only for upgrades within the supercategory, depending on availability. Example of a supercategory upgrade in AquaClass: A2 to A1. Captain's Club one category upgrade excludes category 12, FV, SV, C1 and guarantee categories, Z, Y, X, XC, XA, W. This offer cannot be used with certain restricted fares including but not limited to travel agent and employee rates. Upgrades apply for one stateroom per cruise. Stateroom assignments only. Not valid on holiday sailings. Upgrades available from categories 11- A1 on all Celebrity ships except Celebrity Xpedition®. Offer valid for members who are Classic Level or higher at the time of booking.

[ihopfar]

Unfortunately, I had already read the terms of CEOofVacation and I am unable to glean the answer for question from that.

 

Can anyone help?   Not sure which categories (specifically within the Veranda supercategory) that Celebrity considers one level upgrades.  What I think is better, may not be what Celebrity considers better. 

 

Thanks!

Brad

[TeaBag]

You can upgrade within a category, like you said 1B to 1A, 2B to 2A, but not to 1C.  You can upgrade form a C3 to a C2, but not a C2 to C1.  You can also go from an AQ 2 to AQ1.

Edited December 16, 2018 by TeaBag

[ihopfar]

Thanks TeaBag.  

 

So then 1C upgrades to 1B?

Do 2A or 1A upgrade to anything or are they considered the top of their category?

 

Thanks again!

Brad

[cruisestitch]

Turn this around and it will be easier to think about. Book the cabin you want. If that cabin is eligible, they will give you the price Of the next lowest category. Don’t think of it as an upgrade. Think of it as a down price.

[Wine-O]

55 minutes ago, cruisestitch said:

Turn this around and it will be easier to think about. Book the cabin you want. If that cabin is eligible, they will give you the price Of the next lowest category. Don’t think of it as an upgrade. Think of it as a down price.

Yeah, most of the time it's about $20 per person, but $20 is $20.  

[ihopfar]

1 hour ago, cruisestitch said:

Turn this around and it will be easier to think about. Book the cabin you want. If that cabin is eligible, they will give you the price Of the next lowest category. Don’t think of it as an upgrade. Think of it as a down price.

 

55 minutes ago, Wine-O said:

Yeah, most of the time it's about $20 per person, but $20 is $20.  

 

I agree.. that is how I am thinking about it.. as the lower price for the cabin I want.

 

I like the 1A either the 2As...depending on how much I want to spend.   

 

The difference in price between 1B and 1A is $50pp on the sailing I am looking at, so $100 savings for the cabin.

The difference between 2B and 2A is $100pp, so $200 savings for the cabin.    So a lot more than $20 in this case -- assuming I am looking at this correctly!

 

I also possibly like the 1C choices.  Is there any category "below" 1C that I could use as a lower price to get a 1C?

 

Thanks!

Brad

[Cruise Raider]

2 hours ago, ihopfar said:

Thanks TeaBag.  

 

So then 1C upgrades to 1B?

Do 2A or 1A upgrade to anything or are they considered the top of their category?

 

Thanks again!

Brad

 

Yes, 1C upgrades to 1B, 1B to 1A.  2D is the lowest balcony category and would allow an upgrade to a 2C.  With 2C, you can upgrade to a 2B, and so on.  The stateroom categories ending in A (or 1 on the case of concierge / aqua class) are in the top of their categories.  But, as the rules state, there is no complimentary upgrade from a C2 to a C1, so that doesn't matter anyway.  And, as Cruisestitch mentions, you might be better looking at the room you want and seeing if there is availability in the category below within the supercategory ... and then look at that pricing.

And, Celebrity has reserved the right to disallow this under certain fares (group rates, guarantees, special fares in which a higher category is at a lower price than the next category, etc) and/or availability of cabins in the next category.  

If you are able to use it, you will save anywhere from $10 pp up to several hundred pp ... usually on the lower end of that spectrum, though.  We were lucky enough to get the super savings from this before, though ... but only once.  Usually, it is no more than $20 pp savings, but hey, that's $40 better than we'd have done if we didn't ask for it.  

Oh yes, speaking of asking for that upgrade, some of the agents we've worked with automatically apply it but you may need to ask for it at the time of booking or you may not get it.  I've had luck upgrading after the fact in the past, once even when Celebrity called to notify us that they would be happy to give us the upgrade once rooms in the next category became available.  But, that is just not guaranteed ... so be sure to check on it when you first book.  

 

 

[keesar]

Upgrades can be great but check out the room location.  That is very important.  We often decline the upgrade due to location.

[Turtles06]

I totally agree with the advice to pick the cabin in the sub-category you want, then see if you can get the price reduced to that of the next lower down sub-category (within the constraints that others have already discussed, e.g., you can't book a C1 for the price of a C2).  And there will have to be cabins available in that lower sub-category in order to get that price reduction.

 

OP:  Are you certain that Celebrity will reciprocate as to your RCI loyalty status for purposes of booking perks (as opposed to shipboard perks)?  I ask this only because, several years ago, when we sailed RCI for the first time -- which was after several cruises on Celebrity --- RCI told me that the loyalty status reciprocity only applied once we were actually on board the ship.   I hope it works out for you!    

 

Enjoy your first cruise on Celebrity!

[Sheal]

We are fairly new to Celebrity but on our first cruise they did give us the upgrade from A2 to A1 at the time of booking along with the onboard perks.  This was about 5 years ago so things may have changed since then.

[MCazer]

I am Diamond on Royal, so Elite on Celebrity. Last year we were upgraded from Aqua 2 to Aqua 1 and again for my 2019 sailing.  Make sure to tell your travel against 

[Wine-O]

With AQ, it depends on the location on the ship.  Some feel that the A2's back aft of the elevators are more desirable because there are suite staterooms above them, whereas some A1's are right below the pool deck where you can hear scraping of chairs in the morning and evening.

[Cruise Raider]

18 hours ago, Wine-O said:

With AQ, it depends on the location on the ship.  Some feel that the A2's back aft of the elevators are more desirable because there are suite staterooms above them, whereas some A1's are right below the pool deck where you can hear scraping of chairs in the morning and evening.

 

I definitely am one of those that like the A2's better than the A1's.  Even when I went with a friend into the future cruise room onboard, the agent there also tried to discourage our friend from taking an A1.  I suppose some itineraries are quieter than others but I steer clear of being under the pool at all costs.  

[varoo]

21 hours ago, Cruise Raider said:

 

I definitely am one of those that like the A2's better than the A1's.  Even when I went with a friend into the future cruise room onboard, the agent there also tried to discourage our friend from taking an A1.  I suppose some itineraries are quieter than others but I steer clear of being under the pool at all costs.  

 

Totally agree.  I think there are quite a few of us who prefer the A2's to the A1's.

We consider the features and location  of our cabin  to be much more important to us than how Celebrity categorizes it.

While it may be desirable to take the one-category "upgrade" in some situations, there are other times when it is not and we would prefer to stay with the "lower" category.

 

Another example would be the "sweet 16" cabins on the M-class ships, which are categorized as 2C (if I am recalling correctly) but which many consider preferable to a 2B.

So even though you can upgrade to a 2B for the price of a 2C,  in that situation many people will prefer to stay with the 2C.

 

 

Edited December 18, 2018 by varoo