Carry forward a cruise credit ?

[roger b]

 On a B to B can I carry forward my cruise credit on to my second cruise , or buy wine in advance ? or is my first segment closed and a new one started ?

[Flatbush Flyer]

43 minutes ago, roger b said:

 On a B to B can I carry forward my cruise credit on to my second cruise , or buy wine in advance ? or is my first segment closed and a new one started ?

Let’s first clarify the meaning of the terms you’re using.

On O, a “cruise credit” is what you “earn” when you take a cruise. The number of credits depends on the length of the cruise. Earn a set number of cruise credits and you move up the perks ladder in the O Club.

 

The term “B to B” (back to back) is too generic for O cruises. In fact, if you’re talking about two adjacent segments booked separately (each with its own booking number), it’s rarely done that way (unless you are changing cabins) since the total of the two fares will always be more than if the segments are booked as a published “extended journey” or as an unpublished “custom” cruise (each having a single booking number and discounted fare as well as perks that may vary dependent on which type of multi-segment cruise you are on). 

 

What and how many O perks (O Club SBC, gratuities, cruise credits, et al.) accompany each type of booking can get a bit confusing. But, if you Search here on CC, you’ll find some detailed explanations that I and others have posted.

That said, I’m guessing that what you are asking is whether any non-refundable SBC (shipboard credit [$$]) you have received from O is useable across an entire multi-segment cruise. If you are talking about a cruise with a single booking number (i.e., “extended journey” or “custom cruise” or the recently reintroduced “grand journey” of 3+ segments totaling 2+ months), the answer is YES. However, if you somehow managed to book two adjacent cruises separately (i.e., each with its own booking number), the answer is NO.
 

Of course, if the SBC you’re talking about was a perk added by your TA, it may be refundable and you would get any left over back at the completion of the itinerary associated with a specific booking number.

[roger b]

51 minutes ago, Flatbush Flyer said:

Let’s first clarify the meaning of the terms you’re using.

On O, a “cruise credit” is what you “earn” when you take a cruise. The number of credits depends on the length of the cruise. Earn a set number of cruise credits and you move up the perks ladder in the O Club.

 

The term “B to B” (back to back) is too generic for O cruises. In fact, if you’re talking about two adjacent segments booked separately (each with its own booking number), it’s rarely done that way (unless you are changing cabins) since the total of the two fares will always be more than if the segments are booked as a published “extended journey” or as an unpublished “custom” cruise (each having a single booking number and discounted fare as well as perks that may vary dependent on which type of multi-segment cruise you are on). 

 

What and how many O perks (O Club SBC, gratuities, cruise credits, et al.) accompany each type of booking can get a bit confusing. But, if you Search here on CC, you’ll find some detailed explanations that I and others have posted.

That said, I’m guessing that what you are asking is whether any non-refundable SBC (shipboard credit [$$]) you have received from O is useable across an entire multi-segment cruise. If you are talking about a cruise with a single booking number (i.e., “extended journey” or “custom cruise” or the recently reintroduced “grand journey” of 3+ segments totaling 2+ months), the answer is YES. However, if you somehow managed to book two adjacent cruises separately (i.e., each with its own booking number), the answer is NO.
 

Of course, if the SBC you’re talking about was a perk added by your TA, it may be refundable and you would get any left over back at the completion of the itinerary associated with a specific booking number.

 Hi, Thanks for this I have booked on board two cruises B to B same cabin with a discount from O for booking  as this was recommended by the Club Ambassador.

  I have approx $1000 for each cruise , I am always scrabbling round on the last day for something to spend it on .

        My Idea would be to buy wine in advance do you think that would work ? any other ideas ?

         

[LHT28]

5 hours ago, roger b said:

 On a B to B can I carry forward my cruise credit on to my second cruise , or buy wine in advance ? or is my first segment closed and a new one started ?

They usually carry  any OBC forward  to the last  full day of your cruise

If they are non refundable  OBC's then  spend them early 

It is a nightmare trying to buy stuff the last day

 

Buy wine & have the bottle sent to the cabin (you can take it home)

spa treatments

cooking classes if available

If you are not a big drinker it is hard to use it all up

DH bought a watch last cruise  just to use the  credit  (he did not need it)

JMO

 

[Flatbush Flyer]

5 hours ago, roger b said:

 Hi, Thanks for this I have booked on board two cruises B to B same cabin with a discount from O for booking  as this was recommended by the Club Ambassador.

  I have approx $1000 for each cruise , I am always scrabbling round on the last day for something to spend it on .

        My Idea would be to buy wine in advance do you think that would work ? any other ideas ?

         

I still don’t know if you have one or two invoices.

If the Ambassador said  “we’re putting them together to get approx 5% discount,” and you agreed, you have a “custom [aka “combination”]  cruise” (NOT called “B to B,”which is a “different animal” in terms of fare, perks, etc).

 

So, do you have a single booking number (upper left hand corner of the O invoice) and on the right upper side of the O invoice do you see two cruise ID #s separated by a “/“? If YES,  any of O’s non-refundable SBC is available to use for booze, gratuities, added excursions, etc until the end of your whole multi-segment itinerary.

 

For the sake of newbies reading this, please confirm whether this is a single booking number on a single O invoice.

 

Also, though you don’t mention it, from where is the $1000 coming? Is it O Life, O Club, TA...?

Again I mention this because most TA SBC is refundable and most O SBC is not. Also, as a reminder for other readers here: O SBC (O Life and/or O Club) can be spent pre-cruise for O excursions and other onboard options.

BTW:, since you said you “booked onboard,” I hope you transferred the booking to a TA during the 30-day post cruise transfer window. NOTE to newbies: If your current cruise was handled by a TA, onboard bookings will be auto-assigned to your TA for the current cruise unless you specify that you want it self-assigned which allows you time to change TAs if you so desire.

 

As for buying wine with SBC: If your O provided SBC (O Life and/or O Club) was not used pre-cruise for pre-purchased excursions et al., get the wine “bin end list” once onboard at embarkation and pre-buy any discounted items that interest you. They will then be available to you as needed during the cruise. There’s also the “7 bottle plan” which is another list of mostly mediocre (though an occasional “loss leader” is in the mix) from which you pre-select 7 bottles at about $45 each (we’ve sometimes done this on a long cruise with 7 bottles of the same better wine).

 

[LHT28]

suggest you go to Reception/Purser  a couple of days before the end of your  1st segment & ask if any unused  balance is carried over

 

Let us know how it went for future reference

JMO

[roger b]

3 hours ago, Flatbush Flyer said:

I still don’t know if you have one or two invoices.

If the Ambassador said  “we’re putting them together to get approx 5% discount,” and you agreed, you have a “custom [aka “combination”]  cruise” (NOT called “B to B,”which is a “different animal” in terms of fare, perks, etc).

 

So, do you have a single booking number (upper left hand corner of the O invoice) and on the right upper side of the O invoice do you see two cruise ID #s separated by a “/“? If YES,  any of O’s non-refundable SBC is available to use for booze, gratuities, added excursions, etc until the end of your whole multi-segment itinerary.

 

For the sake of newbies reading this, please confirm whether this is a single booking number on a single O invoice.

 

Also, though you don’t mention it, from where is the $1000 coming? Is it O Life, O Club, TA...?

Again I mention this because most TA SBC is refundable and most O SBC is not. Also, as a reminder for other readers here: O SBC (O Life and/or O Club) can be spent pre-cruise for O excursions and other onboard options.

BTW:, since you said you “booked onboard,” I hope you transferred the booking to a TA during the 30-day post cruise transfer window. NOTE to newbies: If your current cruise was handled by a TA, onboard bookings will be auto-assigned to your TA for the current cruise unless you specify that you want it self-assigned which allows you time to change TAs if you so desire.

 

As for buying wine with SBC: If your O provided SBC (O Life and/or O Club) was not used pre-cruise for pre-purchased excursions et al., get the wine “bin end list” once onboard at embarkation and pre-buy any discounted items that interest you. They will then be available to you as needed during the cruise. There’s also the “7 bottle plan” which is another list of mostly mediocre (though an occasional “loss leader” is in the mix) from which you pre-select 7 bottles at about $45 each (we’ve sometimes done this on a long cruise with 7 bottles of the same better wine).

 

Thanks for your reply  , I have 2 booking numbers  this what I was sold , I am in the same cabin for both cruises. 

[Flatbush Flyer]

1 hour ago, roger b said:

Thanks for your reply  , I have 2 booking numbers  this what I was sold , I am in the same cabin for both cruises. 

So, two different “booking” numbers (Upper left corner of page 1 of the Oceania invoiceS (one invoice for each cruise). Correct?

By any chance does the cruise ID # upper right side of page 1 on either or both cruises have a single number with an “A” at the end? 
If “A” (or even another different letter is there), even if only for one of the bookings, is there OR if either invoice has the aforementioned two cruise ID numbers separated by a “/“, that would explain why you had to have two different bookings. And any “discount you were told you were receiving would be built into the fare of whichever cruise(s) were booked as a bona fide multisegment cruise.
Why?

 

You can’t put already discounted multi-segment cruises together as a “custom cruise” made up of two other “custom cruises” or two “extended journey” cruises (or one of each).

That would be a “double dip” which is not allowed by the O “revenue” folks.

If what I have just described is the case (we have this situation this coming autumn - two adjacent individually discounted  “extended journeys” booked separately because they can’t be combined as a “custom cruise” (re: double dip) for you, your account at the end of each cruise will be settled to $O of any $ due from you or returned to you from refundable sources. Any non-refundable SBC (e.g., O Club   SBC) you received for each individual cruise cannot be carried over to another cruise even if it’s the next segment. After all, it’s “non-refundable.”

[AMHuntFerry]

5 hours ago, Flatbush Flyer said:

Also, though you don’t mention it, from where is the $1000 coming? Is it O Life, O Club, TA...?

 

@roger b If some or all of the SBC is O-Life, you can drop the O-Life "perk" and reduce your cruise fare by the same amount to cruise-only (or cruise with air); e.g. O-Life SBC of $400 pp increases cruise-only fare by $400 pp. At least we can drop it in the US; the UK may have different rules.

 

If you're on an O-class ship the wine pairing dinners seem popular and run from about $100 to $200 per person. There are also wine tasting and bar tasting (e.g., cognac) events that seem to range from about $35 to $95. As mentioned earlier, the spa is another way to burn through SBC quickly 😉

[roger b]

8 hours ago, AMHuntFerry said:

@roger b If some or all of the SBC is O-Life, you can drop the O-Life "perk" and reduce your cruise fare by the same amount to cruise-only (or cruise with air); e.g. O-Life SBC of $400 pp increases cruise-only fare by $400 pp. At least we can drop it in the US; the UK may have different rules.

 

If you're on an O-class ship the wine pairing dinners seem popular and run from about $100 to $200 per person. There are also wine tasting and bar tasting (e.g., cognac) events that seem to range from about $35 to $95. As mentioned earlier, the spa is another way to burn through SBC quickly 😉

Looks like we are on the same TA in November and you are right I will have spend my OBC before Miami Thanks !!

[AMHuntFerry]

14 hours ago, roger b said:

Looks like we are on the same TA in November and you are right I will have spend my OBC before Miami Thanks !!

I'm not on a TA in November...maybe Flatbush Flyer who I quoted?

[slw207693]

As a long time Oceania. cruiser, we have put “together” 4 continuous cruises - the Club Ambassador put three on one invoice (said that was the max the system could do) and the fourth on a separate invoice. The 3 back to back invoice did not have an A after the booking number.   None of our invoices  ever have.
 

This was done pre Covid, but while onboard Regatta in April, we put several cruises together for in the future and each is individually invoice but has the 5% b2b savings.   (The 4 cruises were this past November 2021 on Marina and we stayed in the same cabin the entire trip.  I think 4 cruises is the most we’ve put together - we started in Barcelona and ended in Miami).  We received O-life shipboard credit for each cruise, we received spa credits for each cruise, we received Oceania loyalty credit of $500 for each cruise.  We also received 4 loyalty credit points  towards our next “free cruise”.   (The segments were 7 days, 7 days, 10 days and 12 days).  

 

  At the end of each segment, they gave us printed summary (because we asked for it) but did NOT total out each segment separately.   Only at the end of the cruise were all the pluses and minuses totaled and due to travel agent giving refundable onboard ship credit for each segment, we ended up getting cash back.  

 

Flatbush flyer - we will be on the Lisbon to NY in a couple weeks and I look forward to chatting with you.   

[LHT28]

4 minutes ago, slw207693 said:

  At the end of each segment, they gave us printed summary (because we asked for it) but did NOT total out each segment separately.   Only at the end of the cruise were all the pluses and minuses totaled and due to travel agent giving refundable onboard ship credit for each segment, we ended up getting cash back.  

 

IME  that is how it usually works

We never asked for the mid segment onboard statement it was always delivered to the cabin just like other pax final statement

 

[Tranquility Base]

On 5/28/2022 at 10:46 AM, slw207693 said:

At the end of each segment, they gave us printed summary (because we asked for it) but did NOT total out each segment separately.   Only at the end of the cruise were all the pluses and minuses totaled and due to travel agent giving refundable onboard ship credit for each segment, we ended up getting cash back.  

So just wanted to clarify please.

 

If we are doing a B2B (separate booking numbers, separate invoices) we can expect any unused non-refundable ship board credit to rollover from the first cruise onto the second cruise?

Of course I will check once onboard, but this is what happened with your continuous cruises ....is that correct ?

Thanks.

Edited February 23, 2023 by Tranquility Base

[Janet-]

Just got off Regatta, B2B with 2 booking numbers. Non refundable On Board Spend (or whatever you want to call it) was carried forward to the end of the second cruise. I've  found this to always be the case. 

[LHT28]

10 hours ago, Tranquility Base said:

So just wanted to clarify please.

 

If we are doing a B2B (separate booking numbers, separate invoices) we can expect any unused non-refundable ship board credit to rollover from the first cruise onto the second cruise?

Of course I will check once onboard, but this is what happened with your continuous cruises ....is that correct ?

Thanks.

That is the way it has worked  for us in the past

Your OBC rolls over 

[Tranquility Base]

10 hours ago, Janet- said:

Just got off Regatta, B2B with 2 booking numbers. Non refundable On Board Spend (or whatever you want to call it) was carried forward to the end of the second cruise. I've  found this to always be the case. 

 

1 hour ago, LHT28 said:

That is the way it has worked  for us in the past

Your OBC rolls over 

Thanks to you both for clarifying that for me.