No Refund Policy with Celebrity

[prmssk]

43 minutes ago, stevenr597 said:

Unless you decide not to customize your trip.  Individuals often wait to they board to take options such as a beverage package, and even when to dine. 

In any case, as I have said before, we were of the old school that used travel agents.  For a variety of reasons, which I do not wish to disclose, our travel agent failed us in respect to this booking.  However, when we discussed the problem, he did offer to reimburse us for the loss in deposit. 

The options on the customize page are not options you can choose on the ship (early/late/anytime dining, insurance, or refundable deposit).  Insurance is one you should be thinking about as soon as you put even your deposit down.  

 

Early/late/anytime dining spots fill up so even 6 months before your cruise, you may not have the option available you want.  Anyone who wants flexibility to pick their dining times later, needs to book the anytime option at booking.  

 

And the choice about a refundable or nonrefundable deposit needs to be made at the time of booking.  

 

So all three of the things on that page are things you should be thinking about at the time you book.

[Lastdance]

We have all made mistakes, hopefully learning from those as we move through our experiences and gain important knowledge by always reading the fine print, asking questions and trying to make the best possible decision; however, sometimes you can do everything correctly, but find yourself in a position of having to defend yourself through no fault of your own.  Always keep all paperwork, asking for updates when any changes are made.  Insist on seeing everything in writing before you hang up when a change is made, making notes of dates, names etc.  Buyer Beware!

[stevenr597]

1 hour ago, prmssk said:

The options on the customize page are not options you can choose on the ship (early/late/anytime dining, insurance, or refundable deposit).  Insurance is one you should be thinking about as soon as you put even your deposit down.  

 

Early/late/anytime dining spots fill up so even 6 months before your cruise, you may not have the option available you want.  Anyone who wants flexibility to pick their dining times later, needs to book the anytime option at booking.  

 

And the choice about a refundable or nonrefundable deposit needs to be made at the time of booking.  

 

So all three of the things on that page are things you should be thinking about at the time you book.

Yes and no, you can book a cruise without chosing any of these options, and bypass the page  Perhaps Celebrity should have a box at the bottom of the page that you must check before you can proceed further.

  In any case Celebrity should make it clear that unless you choose otherwise your cruise deposit will be non-refundable.  

[prmssk]

17 minutes ago, stevenr597 said:

Yes and no, you can book a cruise without chosing any of these options, and bypass the page  Perhaps Celebrity should have a box at the bottom of the page that you must check before you can proceed further.

  In any case Celebrity should make it clear that unless you choose otherwise your cruise deposit will be non-refundable.  

I just did a mock booking and at least from my computer, you have to scroll through all the options on this page, with the last selection related to whether you want a refundable deposit, before you can click "Review & Pay".  

 

 

[stevenr597]

18 minutes ago, prmssk said:

I just did a mock booking and at least from my computer, you have to scroll through all the options on this page, with the last selection related to whether you want a refundable deposit, before you can click "Review & Pay".  

 

 

I did a “mock” booking three separate times and you can easily bypass the page.  When you commit there is no warning by Celebrity that your deposit is non-refundable.  

[zitsky]

1 hour ago, stevenr597 said:

I did a “mock” booking three separate times and you can easily bypass the page.  When you commit there is no warning by Celebrity that your deposit is non-refundable.  

Why don’t you explain exactly how you do that?   And show us these pages that never tell you what deposit you have?  That information would be useful both to Celebrity and the folks on this forum.

 

I still think you can’t rely on someone else to tell you everything.  Do you expect your TA to tell you what excursions to book?  Maybe you do.

Edited March 1 by zitsky

[wrk2cruise]

My experience is you can't get to the summary page without traversing the page with the option to select a refundable deposit. 

 

I do agree however that the summary should include the result of the selection on the customization page.   Cruise Care,  Gratuities, and deposit type.

[the penguins]

7 hours ago, stevenr597 said:

I did a “mock” booking three separate times and you can easily bypass the page.  When you commit there is no warning by Celebrity that your deposit is non-refundable.  

But the page shown clearly says you can forfeit the lower rate and choose to pay extra for a refundable deposit. Seems totally clear to me.

[villauk]

46 minutes ago, the penguins said:

But the page shown clearly says you can forfeit the lower rate and choose to pay extra for a refundable deposit. Seems totally clear to me.

From one of your previous posts on this thread regarding the option of a RD, are you stating that we see that page over here as I do not recall ever seeing that option online (only when booking via the US)? The £150pp deposit is greyed out on the first line of the breakdown, suggesting that is NR. Are you stating that this is not the case?

[Homosassa]

15 hours ago, zitsky said:

I'm sorry for the OP but I think it's a big unfair to blame the travel agent for everything.  I've done maybe 5 cruises with my TA.  And every time I managed to know what deposit type I'm getting.  And the details.  And I ask questions.  Usually I pick non refundable and then buy trip insurance.  I understand that non refundable means non refundable.

 

the OP didn't even do the basic homework to make sure they knew what they were buying.

This. 

 

Do your homework on any cruise line before booking.  The cruise line website is an excellent place to start (especially the ticket contract, Terms and Conditions, Conditions of Carriage, whatever name a particular cruise line calls it, the FAQs or description of on board services).

[PH2]

I absolutely hate that Celebrity charges more for refundable. I don't see many other mainstream lines use this practice (although maybe a couple do? I don't price out tons of cruises on every line).

 

So, question... has anyone booked a cruise speculatively on a refundable deposit, and then when they are sure they are going to go, been able to cancel and rebook the same the cabin as nonrefundable? Does the cabin come open quickly to rebook? I realize there is an element of chance in this, but can someone be successful in doing this?

Edited March 1 by PH2

[stevenr597]

12 hours ago, zitsky said:

Why don’t you explain exactly how you do that?   And show us these pages that never tell you what deposit you have?  That information would be useful both to Celebrity and the folks on this forum.

 

I still think you can’t rely on someone else to tell you everything.  Do you expect your TA to tell you what excursions to book?  Maybe you do.

Did explain it, suggest you re-read my posts.  

In addition, as I mentioned I booked through a travel agent, and my inital point is that I should have been notified that the deposit was non-refundable.  

[stevenr597]

1 hour ago, Homosassa said:

This. 

 

Do your homework on any cruise line before booking.  The cruise line website is an excellent place to start (especially the ticket contract, Terms and Conditions, Conditions of Carriage, whatever name a particular cruise line calls it, the FAQs or description of on board services).

Certainly one should do their homework.  I always check on the location of a room and comments about it using web sights such as cruisedecks.com.

However this doesn't take away the responsibility of the cruise lines, such as celebrity, to make clear the restrictions and obligations inherent in putting a deposit on a cruise,

[stevenr597]

6 hours ago, the penguins said:

But the page shown clearly says you can forfeit the lower rate and choose to pay extra for a refundable deposit. Seems totally clear to me.

Only if you scroll down the page.  When you are ready to put down a deposit, there is no warning that your deposit might not be non-refundable.

Remember...competitors do not have such restrictions on their deposits. 

[zitsky]

2 minutes ago, stevenr597 said:

Did explain it, suggest you re-read my posts.  

In addition, as I mentioned I booked through a travel agent, and my inital point is that I should have been notified that the deposit was non-refundable.  

Yea I’ve read your posts.  Others post screenshots.  If you see something different show us what it looks like.

 

If you had asked here BEFORE you booked then folks could have clued you in to the different deposits.  Do your own homework.

[D C]

On 2/27/2024 at 10:45 AM, stevenr597 said:

We had booked a 7 day cruse on Celebrity Ascent for March, 2025.  The deposit for the three of us was $750.00. 

However we discovered that we had a conflict and couldn't cruise that month.  We asked our travel agent to cancel which he did.  All of this occurred over a time period of less than one week. 

After it was cancelled, our agent notified us that we would lose the entire deposit.

We tried to contact Celebrity, but since we booked through a travel agent, they said that there was "nothing they could no."

Our Travel Agent informed us that Celebrity refused to refund our deposit or to use it as a credit for another cruise.

We are Elite Cruisers with Celebrity, but probably this will be our last booking. 

Celebrity's non-refundable deposits are a significant reason why we have no X sailings booked.  Meanwhile, we have multiple fully-refundable future cruise deposits on Princess. 

[zitsky]

3 minutes ago, stevenr597 said:

Only if you scroll down the page.  When you are ready to put down a deposit, there is no warning that your deposit might not be non-refundable.

Remember...competitors do not have such restrictions on their deposits. 

Only if you scroll down the page?  Are you seriously complaining that your travel agent didn’t come to your house and scroll down for you???  

 

Ok so because another company does it a certain way that means Celebrity does it too?

Edited March 1 by zitsky

[weregoingcruising]

Is this forum for debating our to answer questions and provide information?

[chisoxfan]

5 minutes ago, D C said:

Celebrity's non-refundable deposits are a significant reason why we have no X sailings booked.  Meanwhile, we have multiple fully-refundable future cruise deposits on Princess. 

Same here, X is crazy. We were in SS on Ascent in Jan. Same cabin in Jan 25 is 10,800k without 600 OBC. refundable fare added 2000!  AQ with premium AI and non refundable almost 6k.

Basically you can book comparable suites on MSC YC and Princess Sun (both with dedicated suite areas and many inclusions) for about the same as AQ on this Ascent cruise- Fully refundable on Princess and more liberal deposit refund (change at small fee- which I still don't like) on MSC (YC only).  To the point, the stringent NR deposit policy of X just adds insult to injury when evaluating the value X now offers. JMHO

 

 

[stevenr597]

1 hour ago, zitsky said:

Yea I’ve read your posts.  Others post screenshots.  If you see something different show us what it looks like.

 

If you had asked here BEFORE you booked then folks could have clued you in to the different deposits.  Do your own homework.

Like I said, my comments stand, there is no problem in scrolling past the page in which they mention that there are two classes of deposits, and you can indeed put down a deposit and not learn it is non-refundable until "AFTER" you commit. 

[stevenr597]

51 minutes ago, chisoxfan said:

Same here, X is crazy. We were in SS on Ascent in Jan. Same cabin in Jan 25 is 10,800k without 600 OBC. refundable fare added 2000!  AQ with premium AI and non refundable almost 6k.

Basically you can book comparable suites on MSC YC and Princess Sun (both with dedicated suite areas and many inclusions) for about the same as AQ on this Ascent cruise- Fully refundable on Princess and more liberal deposit refund (change at small fee- which I still don't like) on MSC (YC only).  To the point, the stringent NR deposit policy of X just adds insult to injury when evaluating the value X now offers. JMHO

 

 

Celebrity and Princess offer fairly similar products.  But the way they handle deposits is a major advantage of Princess.  

We did not rebook Celebrity, instead we booked Sun Princess.  

[stevenr597]

1 hour ago, zitsky said:

Only if you scroll down the page?  Are you seriously complaining that your travel agent didn’t come to your house and scroll down for you???  

 

Ok so because another company does it a certain way that means Celebrity does it too?

We believe it is the responsibility of the travel agent who makes the reservation and deposit to inform the customer in respect to the terms of the deposit and booking.  

[tupper10]

5 minutes ago, chisoxfan said:

Same here, X is crazy. We were in SS on Ascent in Jan. Same cabin in Jan 25 is 10,800k without 600 OBC. refundable fare added 2000!  AQ with premium AI and non refundable almost 6k.

Basically you can book comparable suites on MSC YC and Princess Sun (both with dedicated suite areas and many inclusions) for about the same as AQ on this Ascent cruise- Fully refundable on Princess and more liberal deposit refund (change at small fee- which I still don't like) on MSC (YC only).  To the point, the stringent NR deposit policy of X just adds insult to injury when evaluating the value X now offers. JMHO

 

 

Agree we gave up on Celebrity because we want a refundable deposit and the differential between refundable and non refundable is absurd.  Also charging me a fee to re book when all they are doing is a ministerial function is not acceptable. There are many other cruise lines with more reasonable policies with cheaper fares for similar cruises; we have been sailing with them.

[stevenr597]

1 hour ago, weregoingcruising said:

Is this forum for debating our to answer questions and provide information?

Agree, I initially started this post to inform people in respect to restrictions on Celebrity Deposits.

By the way, my travel agent is refunding the deposit to us. 

[PTC DAWG]

18 hours ago, Bo1953 said:

I understand... as I do not intend to breach the TOS!!!

 

bon voyage

I must not be good with clues....I have none re your signature...  🙂