Cancelled Cruises Refund Tracker/Discussion (merged topics)

[phyllisrf]

30 business days have passed. Canceled 3/22/20 cruise on 3/14 ( 2 cabins). No refund as yet.

[son3cruisers]

2 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

My March 14, 21 and 28 cruises I received my FCC but no Cash refunds of the Move Up refunds, port charges etc    Interesting that up until today the 3/14 cruise was showing points for the cruise and the points disappeared today so something is happening.    Hopefully tomorrow I will see some money hit my credit card.

  So we are opposite.

Received a refund on our move-up , taxes/ fees last week but are waiting on our FCC.Heard nothing but promised 125%. My cruise does still appear under past cruises. I can’t view any details of the cruise, and was not awarded any points. We too were sailing on March 14th.
No rhyme or reason to any of this. 

[AquariusOne]

Cancelled April 1 via TA, reveived 100% refund April 24th. TA charged $100 cancelation fee. Cruise was for 2021. I am OK with paying $100 now than losing a lot more later or getting FCC, for uncertain cruising future into Europe. We had 5 cabins booked on Apex. 

[Ontario Cruiser]

9 hours ago, AquariusOne said:

Cancelled April 1 via TA, reveived 100% refund April 24th. TA charged $100 cancelation fee. Cruise was for 2021. I am OK with paying $100 now than losing a lot more later or getting FCC, for uncertain cruising future into Europe. We had 5 cabins booked on Apex. 

I am not okay with TA cancelling. I haven't charged anyone

Ontario Cruiser

[FlorenceItaly]

12 minutes ago, Ontario Cruiser said:

I am not okay with TA cancelling. I haven't charged anyone

Ontario Cruiser

The cruise cancelled was for April 2021.  Are you saying you would not charge a cancellation fee for 2021 cruises?

[Ontario Cruiser]

Some travel agencies charge for changes and cancellations.

OntarioCruiser

[cleobella]

I cancelled a Sept trip back on March 22.  When I called to check on the refund recently I was told it was "posted"  April 19 and should show up as a credit on my credit card account within

days.  It's now April 26 and there is no sign of the credit.  Does anyone know what "posted" actually means.  I don't understand why the cruise deposit showed up on my card within minutes but a refund that is now "posted" is still not showing up.  I get the delay in processing, but once it's actually "posted", shouldn't I see the refund?

[ZMariner]

Here is my experience for a cruise that was canceled by Celebrity.

On March 21 I requested a 100% refund by phone.

I followed up and was told that the refund Posted on April 17.

The full refund appeared (in multiple credits to my cards) on April 25.

[cjcruiser27]

I have a refund of $100, maybe for the Move up bid?  Then 2 odd amounts that I think are for flights, but they do not equal the amount I paid.  The difference does not equal out to the taxes that were paid on the flights either.  It’s a start.

[Jeremiah1212]

There is a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation about credit card payments in all of these threads about refunds. This article may be helpful in explaining the timeframe for a debit vs. credit.

 

When you make a cruise deposit, the credit card company is checking behind the scenes to make sure you have access to that $500. Celebrity is not getting their money right then. The credit card company is holding that money aside until Celebrity asks for it. But they need to know you are able to cover the charge once Celebrity asks for it. Similarly, if you didn't have $500 in available credit, your card would be declined because you couldn't honor the agreement to pay the amount requested from Celebrity. When you get a refund, it's the opposite scenario. The credit card company wants their money back from Celebrity before they pass it on to you. This can take quite a bit of time even under normal circumstances. 

 

Quote

First, it's important to separate authorization from settlement. When you use your card the merchant receives an authorization from your bank, not the actual payment. This authorization is a promise from your bank to the merchant to pay them as soon as they request the money. Your bank will already take the money from your account and put it in a separate account that will be used to pay the merchant later. But the money doesn't leave the bank yet. 

Second, the merchant won't receive the money until he submits the authorization. After submission it will usually take a few days for the merchant to receive its money. This depends on local laws and and clearing and settlement systems.

That's why for you will see a debit on your account immediately when you pay. But the merchant won't see it until a few days later because the merchants bank will not give the merchant access to funds just because they received and authorization. 

A refund is pretty much the other way around. A merchant submits a refund to his own bank (acquirer), but your bank won't receive the money until after clearing and settlement, and depending on the region this can take several days. And your bank does not want to give you access to the refund balance until they have received the money.

Edited April 26, 2020 by Jeremiah1212

[hcat]

I  posted a link to this topic  on the Cruise Refund Tracker Thread...to avoid multiple threads for all related refund issues! This was interesting info...

 

Here's a link to that thread

 

 

Edited April 26, 2020 by hcat

[hcat]

Interesting question and answer recent post

 

[drakes2]

21 minutes ago, cleobella said:

I cancelled a Sept trip back on March 22.  When I called to check on the refund recently I was told it was "posted"  April 19 and should show up as a credit on my credit card account within

days.  It's now April 26 and there is no sign of the credit.  Does anyone know what "posted" actually means.  I don't understand why the cruise deposit showed up on my card within minutes but a refund that is now "posted" is still not showing up.  I get the delay in processing, but once it's actually "posted", shouldn't I see the refund?

Refunds take a little longer I'd say you will have your money Tuesday or Wednesday nothing will be posted tomorrow. I have found Visa to be quicker than Mastercard. 

[Tbucs19]

On 4/17/2020 at 6:13 PM, Tbucs19 said:

Starting to get very frustrated. We were scheduled to cruise on the edge March 15 and the cruise was canceled on March 13. Called and requested the refund option versus the FCC.
 

Was told could take 30 days for refund. Called this week and was told refund was approved and processing began April 4 and to allow 7 to 10 days. Still nothing on my card, called back yesterday and was told could be a couple more weeks with all of the volume they are running behind, etc. 

 

I seem to be reading all these boards that others whose cruises were canceled after mine are receiving the refunds?

 

it’s an $11,000 refund so obviously starting to wonder if I’m not alone and whether celebrity has financial means to survive this whole mess and refund their customers?

To update and help people keeping track, all but 250.00 of the refund back on my card Friday, 4/24.  The $250 they said will be another week or two, fine whatever.  

[Briggs99]

We requested a full refund for our March 27th cruise on March 20th.  The full refund was received on April 23rd.  So thankful.

[FOXTROT]

We just received our 100% refund for our 3-15 Eclipse cruise. It appeared Sat. on my credit card statement.

[EMS8]

We have now received the refund for the total cost of our cancelled March 15th Silhouette cruise.  It came back to our cc in three different deposits.  

[Jim_Iain]

16 hours ago, son3cruisers said:

  So we are opposite.

Received a refund on our move-up , taxes/ fees last week but are waiting on our FCC.Heard nothing but promised 125%. My cruise does still appear under past cruises. I can’t view any details of the cruise, and was not awarded any points. We too were sailing on March 14th.
No rhyme or reason to any of this. 

 

 

You may want to give them a call.    Originally I got FCC's for the 3/21 and 3/28 but nothing for the 3/14.    I called in and when the agent looked he said nothing had been initiated on my 3/21/ cruise.   He was able to get special permission to issue it to me while I waited on the phone.   

 

I have a feeling the may be working on the refund for them now as My April 28 Alaska cruise totally disappeared from my booked cruises.    Also originally I had received CC points for my 3/14 cruise and the points disappeared yesterday.

[debkaysmith]

We cancelled a sailing for April on March 11th and received our FCC within one week and shore ex refunds on April 25th.

We cancelled two Alaska sailings for August on March 27th and received our deposits/shore ex refunds on April 25th. 

Huzzah!!!

We cancelled a Japan to Singapore cruise on March 27th and are still awaiting FCC credits for the non-refundable deposit. I am thankful that Celebrity is allowing this!!! 

 

The refunds came in a variety of denominations - none of them matching the deposit amount or price I paid for shore excursions. But... it all came back in totality. 

 

Good Luck Everyone and Be Well until we Cruise Again. 

[nijh]

Got the refund for my 2 March Constellation cruise, that was cancelled half way through, on Friday 24th April

 Bit of a relief, I’m sure X will come thorough this but you never know....

 

 

[DisneyQueen999]

Our Celebrity Apex preview sailing was cancelled on March 15 and we immediately requested a full refund. We didn't have any confirmation of cancellation or acknowlegement at the time but on 11 April we were sent a cancellation invoice.

I messaged Celebrity via their Facebook page last week and received a reply informing me  "It is taking us longer than we would've liked to process our refunds at the moment, as this is a manual process and we have a large number of bookings to work through." and that they "do not have an exact time frame, but as we have already passed 30 days it shouldn't be too much longer now."

We understand that they have a lot of refunds to make, but we have been waiting patiently now for 6 weeks and there is still no sign of our refund. If they were at least issuing email updates to customers with an indication of how long the refund process is taking at least we would be kept in the loop. Even after contacting Celebrity we still have no idea how much longer we will have to wait for our refund and it appears that even their customer service staff have no idea of how long they are currently taking to process. You would think that if they knew what date you applied for the refund they would know what date they were currently processing.

At a time when many customers are nervous about the safety of cruising in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, Celebrity are not doing a very good job of boosting confidence in the cruise industry if they are not refunding customers money in a timely manner. They are expecting customers to re-book in the future, but if they are taking this long to make refunds then customers are going to lose faith in them despite their "Cruise With Confidence" policy, we have. These are just words without actions to back them up.

A lot of people are facing financial hardship at present because they are unable to work due to the pandemic, they need these refunds more than ever now. A lot of businesses have risen to the challenge that COVID-19 has presented and have found ways to work around problems, what's happening in Celebrity Cruises?

 

[son3cruisers]

3 hours ago, Jim_Iain said:

 

You may want to give them a call.    Originally I got FCC's for the 3/21 and 3/28 but nothing for the 3/14.    I called in and when the agent looked he said nothing had been initiated on my 3/21/ cruise.   He was able to get special permission to issue it to me while I waited on the phone.   

 

I have a feeling the may be working on the refund for them now as My April 28 Alaska cruise totally disappeared from my booked cruises.    Also originally I had received CC points for my 3/14 cruise and the points disappeared yesterday.

Thanks for the reply.

I’ve actually called a few times. 
The FCC is “being processed” so they say each time. So it’s there. Somewhere. 
I think I will call again and ask why it has been processed on other sailings. 

[ladylemondrop]

8 hours ago, DisneyQueen999 said:

Our Celebrity Apex preview sailing was cancelled on March 15 and we immediately requested a full refund. We didn't have any confirmation of cancellation or acknowlegement at the time but on 11 April we were sent a cancellation invoice.

I messaged Celebrity via their Facebook page last week and received a reply informing me  "It is taking us longer than we would've liked to process our refunds at the moment, as this is a manual process and we have a large number of bookings to work through." and that they "do not have an exact time frame, but as we have already passed 30 days it shouldn't be too much longer now."

We understand that they have a lot of refunds to make, but we have been waiting patiently now for 6 weeks and there is still no sign of our refund. If they were at least issuing email updates to customers with an indication of how long the refund process is taking at least we would be kept in the loop. Even after contacting Celebrity we still have no idea how much longer we will have to wait for our refund and it appears that even their customer service staff have no idea of how long they are currently taking to process. You would think that if they knew what date you applied for the refund they would know what date they were currently processing.

At a time when many customers are nervous about the safety of cruising in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, Celebrity are not doing a very good job of boosting confidence in the cruise industry if they are not refunding customers money in a timely manner. They are expecting customers to re-book in the future, but if they are taking this long to make refunds then customers are going to lose faith in them despite their "Cruise With Confidence" policy, we have. These are just words without actions to back them up.

A lot of people are facing financial hardship at present because they are unable to work due to the pandemic, they need these refunds more than ever now. A lot of businesses have risen to the challenge that COVID-19 has presented and have found ways to work around problems, what's happening in Celebrity Cruises?

 

We have not even had a cancellation invoice yet, just nothing, our cruise sail date was 3rd April, cancelled 15 March, requested refund via TA, and nothing since, just ‘wait’ from our TA. Its frustrating to say the least. 

[simonph]

13 minutes ago, louise1809 said:

We have not even had a cancellation invoice yet, just nothing, our cruise sail date was 3rd April, cancelled 15 March, requested refund via TA, and nothing since, just ‘wait’ from our TA. Its frustrating to say the least. 

We received a cancellation invoice from our UK TA o the 26th of April. We had already indicated to celebrity, via the online form, that we wanted cash refund on the 14th of March. I think we were meant to be on the same cruise as you.

[ladylemondrop]

Just now, simonph said:

We received a cancellation invoice from our UK TA o the 26th of April. We had already indicated to celebrity, via the online form, that we wanted cash refund on the 14th of March. I think we were meant to be on the same cruise as you.

And have you had a refund yet? Our TA is in Germany.... we used the online form too but got no acknowledgement.