Celebrity Charging $1,800 Deposits For All Suites For the Last 15 Years?

[jelayne]

We have 3 SS reservations with cruises of 16, 15 & 14 nights the most  recent was booked on 10/15/19 all have a $450 pp deposit.  Did a 15 night cruise on the Eclipse in March in a RS and the deposit was $450pp.

Edited November 21, 2019 by jelayne

[TeeRick]

Wow it looks like this is all over the place!  I just went back and checked some of our cruises.  We paid $450 pp for a Sky Suite on our upcoming Eclipse 14-night S. America sailing Jan 2020.  We paid $900 pp for a CS our upcoming 11-night Iceland & Ireland sailing on Reflection July 2020.  This year we paid $500 pp for a CS on a 7-night Edge sailing this past January.

[Happy Cruiser 6143]

17 hours ago, Lastdance said:

 

Hi Happy Cruiser...do you know why your suites were always half off?  Thanks!  

 

Was never told the deposit was half off.  Was just told it was $450/pp and was charged $450/pp.  I currently have a B2B booked in the PH on Summit, deposit is $450/pp.

[deliver42]

The $500.00 for a 7 night is pretty much a std deposit on most cruise lines, including X.

[Gordoncruickshank]

It sounds that this is one of the first times that booking in the UK costs less as we have never paid much more than £150 each as deposits. I just checked our invoice for our cruises in Feb 2020 and the total deposit is £535 which is for 2 on the Edge for a week in a SS and then 3 on the Silhouette for 12 nights in a CS, each with all 4 perks.

 

That is typical of what we have paid over around 18 suite bookings over the years.

[Jim_Iain]

My experience has been that it varies with promotions but as a general rule AQ and SS $450 pp and CS and above $900 pp.   Having said that I booked a suite with a $25 deposit one a Black Friday sale even though it said for non-suites only (Celebrity IT at it's best). 

 

Celebrity is consistently inconsistent.

[Northern Aurora]

Our experience mirrors that of Jim_Iain.  That being said, yesterday I booked a B2B with both legs in the same SS.   The deposit was $450 per person (per leg).

[39august]

I have only booked cruises while on board. Do suites booked on board not get the reduced deposit? Was planning on booking a couple of b2b's while on Silhoutte Dec. 1. But, if the reduced deposit is not available, I will book an aqua cabin and then upgrade to a SS after I get home. I have changed several future cruises to SS from lesser categories and have not been charged for an extra deposit from my initial $100 per person. 

[TeeRick]

We have not received reduced deposit on board for booking suites in the past anyway.

[coolio]

I have always paid only 900 deposit  for suites. Did not matter which one..

[Lastdance]

I booked a b2b with Celebrity, then decidded to change to a different ship a few days later.  Celebrity made me pay an additional 1,800 and was very slow in returning my money.  Unfortunately, i still do not have it.  I am okay with paying a deposit, but wondering why Celebrity would not just switch my cruises.  They were sure able to take my money quickly enough.  When my TA finally received the cruises, Celebrity had forgotten the beverage package on the suite, so it only showed three perks.  Once again my TA had to call and get the perk reinstated.  I have learned from this experience not to change ships, even if Celebrity still has the booking.  I just want a positive experience, not having to constantly call to have errors fixed.  

 

Has anyone done a b2b and had Celebrity put both cruises together?  That happened when I switched cruises, taking three phone calls to fix.  Thank goodness for a wonderful and efficient supervisor!

Edited December 8, 2019 by Lastdance

[GeorgesGal]

Lastdance, are you by any chance cruising solo?  I had read here a while ago that ~X~ charged a soloist double deposit.  The consensus on that thread was that 'sometimes they do, sometimes they don't'.  Typical Celebrity.

 

By the way, I'm sailing ~X~ next September solo, and I paid only one deposit, not the double.

[CHEZMARYLOU]

I only deal with my CVP with Celebrity and have not had any problems so far.  She was able to cancel one cruise that I had quite a bit of money paid on, upgrade me to the PH after final payment, and move the money from the cancelled cruise to the upgraded suite.  I would not have been able to do the upgrade if she had not moved the money.

 

We were going to be on board when Alaska for 2021 opened up and I had a cruise that I wanted to move to our Alaska cruise.  Spoke to her a week before, she knew the date and exactly what we wanted and took care of everything without me needing to contact her.

 

It seems as though a TA could do this for you also, along with moving a booked cruise to another sailing without needing to do another deposit and wait for a refund.

[Happy Cruiser 6143]

I've moved booked cruises many times with no problems.  I always use a travel agent.  Thus do not have to deal with undertrained phone agents.

[mahdnc]

I am posting on this old thread because I ran into this same problem this week and when I did an internet search on the subject, I found this thread.  So I thought I would post my recent experience:

 

Early last month (Apr) I booked 2 Junior Suites on Xploration for a Nov 2023 Galapagos cruise.  At that time, only the Jan - Jun 2023 portion of Xpedition's schedule had been released with no information on why or when the rest of that year would come out.  I was required to pay $900 deposit per suite.

 

Over the weekend, I saw that the rest of 2023's schedule for Xpedition had been released and it was only going to cost me another $690 per person to move to an Xpedition Suite (XS) for the same sail date and so on Monday I made the switch.

 

My $900/suite deposits were moved over to the two XS bookings and all was good.  However the original Xploration booking number was retained along with the original deposit date and I was concerned that it would not qualify for the current Captains Club Double Points promotion for Galapagos sailings which was for new bookings made from May 1 - Jun 30.

 

So I "astutely" pointed this out to my TA and she cancelled the old booking and rebooked our our Xpedition trip on a new reservation with a May 18 booking date.  The problem was that Celebrity told my TA that a double deposit ($1800) was now required for each XS which surprised me.  She sent me the Booking Confirmation with the applicable fine print at the bottom highlighted.  I don't consider an XS to be a deluxe suite category but it is lumped in there with Celebrity Suites and Royal Suites when the Club Points are handed out.

 

The funny thing is that when you do the booking on Celebrity's website, it only asks for a $900 deposit.  I guess a simple transfer of my old Xploration booking to Xpedition did not trigger the 2x deposit demand.  However my insistence that it be done as a new booking did.  So I authorized the additional deposit money and I got to go home that evening to tell my wife how "smart" I was.......

 

Edited May 20, 2021 by mahdnc

[Gracie115]

Never, we book CS or RS and have never put down more than $900 and that's for cruises up to 16 nights.

 

If you book on line you can do it for $900.00 we've done it within the last 3 months.  

[wrk2cruise]

Yes that's the incompetence of the Celebrity IT department.  I guess they just can't figure out how to charge the double deposit for certain categories.

 

We also have found that it is very inconsistent when you get charged double and when not.   I've found my TA to be more astute at charging the correct deposit vs Celebrity.

[TeeRick]

My past two cruises in a CS and another one booked for next year.  All charged me $900 per person so $1800 for the suite deposit.

[LuvCruzn4Evr]

Our CS for 7/11/21 and 12/13/21 and our PH for 7/18/21 all required $900 each in deposit, $1800 total for each of these suites.  We've had to pay double the deposit every time we've booked higher than a sky suite. When you book online, it does not show 'double' is due but I assumed someone from Celebrity would call later and tell me more deposit is due to keep the reservation.  I haven't booked a higher suite online but will after reading Gracie115's post above!

[Gracie115]

12 hours ago, LuvCruzn4Evr said:

Our CS for 7/11/21 and 12/13/21 and our PH for 7/18/21 all required $900 each in deposit, $1800 total for each of these suites.  We've had to pay double the deposit every time we've booked higher than a sky suite. When you book online, it does not show 'double' is due but I assumed someone from Celebrity would call later and tell me more deposit is due to keep the reservation.  I haven't booked a higher suite online but will after reading Gracie115's post above!

 

Go for it!!!  We have booked at least a dozen cruises in the last few years, all at CS or above and never paid more than $900.00 in deposit.  A couple of them as recently as the last few months.

 

Have also booked while on board and the same was true, never more than $900 was needed.

[TeeRick]

3 hours ago, Gracie115 said:

 

Go for it!!!  We have booked at least a dozen cruises in the last few years, all at CS or above and never paid more than $900.00 in deposit.  A couple of them as recently as the last few months.

 

Have also booked while on board and the same was true, never more than $900 was needed.

In my experience that is not the norm.  But glad you were able to do it!

[boscobeans]

Royal and Sky suites were always 2 X $450  (900) when we booked them. .

[Gracie115]

18 minutes ago, TeeRick said:

In my experience that is not the norm.  But glad you were able to do it!

 

I don't know, have been booking Celebrity cruises for 20 years and have never had to provide more than $900.00.  I do book on line mostly, do not use a TA so perhaps that's the difference.  But even on board Eclipse in 2018 booked 2 Japan longer cruises and only had to provide $900 for each cruise.

[TeeRick]

My last two Celebrity cruises were in Jan 2020 on Eclipse and Jan 2019 on Edge in CS suite both booked on line.  And then two cancelled cruises in a CS.  And my next cruise on Silhouette in a CS Aug 2022 (originally booked on board).  In checking my documents all 5 cruises had a $900 deposit per person.  Perhaps some cruises are reduced deposit but I guess I have not been fortunate enough to find those.  I have never used a TA so maybe that might be a difference?

[JasYHZ]

I have a CS booked on Reflection for September 2022 (booked May 2021) and a CS booked on Edge for October 2022 (booked in March 2021) and both deposits for both cruises were $450pp. 

 

Jason