Last minute rates

[beloum]

I know, especially during peak months, cruises are usually sold out.    I was just wondering how common it is to offer last minute rates on unsold cabins right before cruises?    If so, is there a special place on their website or somewhere else to look for these?    Also, if they do offer them, usually how good are the deals.  Thanks in advance.  

[Xport]

44 minutes ago, beloum said:

I know, especially during peak months, cruises are usually sold out.    I was just wondering how common it is to offer last minute rates on unsold cabins right before cruises?    If so, is there a special place on their website or somewhere else to look for these?    Also, if they do offer them, usually how good are the deals.  Thanks in advance.  

 

Every Tuesday morning, Celebrity publishes a listing of upcoming "Exciting Deals"...  You'll find it here; the weblink does not change from week to week...

 

http://www.creative.rccl.com/Sales/Exciting_Deals/XcitingDeals_cel_tues.pdf  

[beloum]

Thank you

[peter1956]

Thanks from me too. Very useful for us retiree's 🙂 

Edited October 3, 2019 by peter1956

[MaryZ]

We booked the Equinox for 11/30 a few weeks ago for $494 pp for a guarantee inside.  They assigned us a cabin on deck 8.
This morning I switched to a hump slant 1A cabin that was $604 pp.
Both fares were NY resident discount fares.   And the balcony was less than a min bid on the bid scale that they sent last week.
This ship is empty, so perhaps pricing will go lower but we like the cabin we choose. 

[wrk2cruise]

Remember that Xciting Deals,  Senior and Resident discounts generally come without any bundled perks so keep that in mind when evaluating the value of the deal.

 

In general I've been successful with finding deals anywhere from a couple of weeks before final payment up to 30-45 days past final.  They seem to try to fill most of the cabins in that timeframe.  Later I generally find that prices return higher and I think they use MoveUp to fill the higher categories late in the game.  Maybe the lower cabins are still a deal later, I just don't look at them.

[Hlitner]

We generally grab one or two last minute deals (every year) as well as booking other cruises.  The key to last minute deals is being flexible regarding cruise lines, ships, cabin categories, itineraries, and even dates.  If you start out looking for a last minute deal on one or 2 particular cruises the odds are not in your favor.   There are times, when I am looking for a last minute deal, when I will have one computer looking at prices (through various high volume cruise agencies that routinely offer good deals) while I am using another computer to look at air options that would work for those same cruises.  When it all comes together we will sometimes book within minutes (hesitation is often a complete loss).  This can mean a last minute deal out of Florida, Europe, Asia, whatever.  

 

A simple rule of thumb is that the more flexible you are....the better chance of snagging a great deal.  In fact, we had given up on cruising with Celebrity (we have a lot of issues with how LLP is ruining the line) and had no intention of booking any future Celebrity cruise....when a few months ago we stumbled on a very good last minute deal for a Summit cruise to Bermuda and Canada.  Within seconds after seeing a good price we booked (and it turned out to be a decent cruise).  Currently we would not even consider booking any Celebrity cruise other then a last minute special because we no longer think that X is competitive with their pricing....given the rapidly declining quality of the line.  But if we find a last minute budget price with X then we might pull the pin.  Meanwhile. our next 5 cruises are with Princess, MSC, and HAL.  Seabourn, Oceania and Viking are also under future consideration with zero Celebrity cruises under consideration.   The new add-on cost to the drink package perk is a complete joke (and fiasco).  First Celebrity tosses out a promotion..and then they decide to do an add-on cost to their own promotion!  It makes little sense.    It is like selling a cruise cabin and then charging another $15 per day for a bed, $5 for a towels, etc.

 

Hank