Priority Tender Service

[kasowell2]

I know that Celebrity uses terms in the Captains Club tiers that are mostly just wording but was wondering about priority tender service for elite. We’ve sailed to tender ports such as Grand Cayman in a suite but that was truly priority service but how does it work for elite. We will be in Concierge class so do we meet somewhere and then escorted or some other way to get the advertised perk?

[jelayne]

In our experience there is a place to meet when you are ready to get off and Elites and above are escorted to the tender lines.  The meeting place can vary from port to port or ship to ship.  
often the meeting spot was in a MDR.  This is a nice benefit but as the number or Elites and above grows there are times when we have had waits of 30-45 minutes before being escorted to a tender.  They were taking use in groups of 25-30 per tender.

[the penguins]

8 hours ago, jelayne said:

In our experience there is a place to meet when you are ready to get off and Elites and above are escorted to the tender lines.  The meeting place can vary from port to port or ship to ship.  
often the meeting spot was in a MDR.  This is a nice benefit but as the number or Elites and above grows there are times when we have had waits of 30-45 minutes before being escorted to a tender.  They were taking use in groups of 25-30 per tender.

on S class the meeting point has always been Celebrity Central - the little venue outside the theatre. Only go there when you and all your party are ready to disembark. 

[jelayne]

4 minutes ago, the penguins said:

on S class the meeting point has always been Celebrity Central - the little venue outside the theatre. Only go there when you and all your party are ready to disembark. 

We have had the meeting place in the MDR on some of our as and M class sailings and also in Quasar.  It may depend on how many E and above.  Our last cruise there were 500+.  

[the penguins]

9 hours ago, jelayne said:

We have had the meeting place in the MDR on some of our as and M class sailings and also in Quasar.  It may depend on how many E and above.  Our last cruise there were 500+.  

Thanks looking at my Post I intended to put "our" meeting not "the" meeting. With 500+ Elite, plus Suites plus everyone on ship's excursions the number of "priority" passengers must be around 50% of the ship.

Worse in our experience is that as soon as the ship has "issues" the whole priority system is abandoned. At one port in South America the only gangway to the tenders was so weak it would only take 5 passengers or 1 wheelchair at a time. The average wait time in the line was around an hour the only "priority was for passengers on Celebrity excursions

[hcat]

when everyone has priority..no one does!

 

  We generally avoid tender ports, but if we do pick one, we def book an excursion so we can go off with our  group...usually ahead of most non- excursion cruisers 

 

Once at Gr Cayman on Reflection,  we were staying on board &  having a nice lunch with a view in B on 5.. ..  Around 1:30 pm we heard them call the last tender number group..kind of a late start.  

[ReneeFLL]

On 6/22/2024 at 6:29 AM, hcat said:

when everyone has priority..no one does!

 

  We generally avoid tender ports, but if we do pick one, we def book an excursion so we can go off with our  group...usually ahead of most non- excursion cruisers 

 

Once at Gr Cayman on Reflection,  we were staying on board &  having a nice lunch with a view in B on 5.. ..  Around 1:30 pm we heard them call the last tender number group..kind of a late start.  

1:30 seems crazy late to get tendered off. What time did they start and was the ship going to be there till later in the evening?

[gold1953]

When the number of elite is too high there is no priority tendering. It ahs happened on 2 of our cruises. Also when we have gone to the meeting point we have been taken right away without waiting for others

[keesar]

On 6/21/2024 at 8:24 AM, kasowell2 said:

I know that Celebrity uses terms in the Captains Club tiers that are mostly just wording but was wondering about priority tender service for elite. We’ve sailed to tender ports such as Grand Cayman in a suite but that was truly priority service but how does it work for elite. We will be in Concierge class so do we meet somewhere and then escorted or some other way to get the advertised perk?

We were on the Ascent in Grand Cayman and had priority service for Elites.  Met the hostess at the  Tuscan MDR and she escorted the 2 of us directly to the tender area.  Yes, there were only 2 of us.  We were in one of the first tenders.  Worked well.  What probably helped was that there were only two ships in port.