publicpersona

I can live with the plastic wine glasses, but the outside bars tend to keep their white wines in a dish pan full of ice. The idea of serving chardonnay at 36 degrees F makes me want to clutch the pearls and shriek. The outdoor bars also are more prone to do what is done sometimes in all the bars (less so in dining rooms) and interpret your order as "whatever is open and somewhat the same color as was ordered." Sadly, Celebrity doesn't cater well to wine drinkers. It is cheaper to store and manage stock of hard liquors than wine, I guess.

I guess there's no accounting for taste. I always take a bar of soap with me as I've encountered times (not necessarily sailing Celebrity) where bar soap was not offered. I can't imagine taking a shower without bar soap .. it would take twice as long. Each to his or her own.

Understood. And I was not intending to criticize your very good list. I wanted to emphasize clarity on this point since many people have a misconception, promoted heavily by FBC's use of weasel words like "Assured Arrival" or "we will be there for you", that booking through FBC means they are responsible for getting you to the ship. No more so than any other travel agency, which is what they are. But I know you know that.

As will virtually any travel agent you use, including booking directly with the airline.

You're right. I didn't read it carefully and somehow joined the "our" with the name of the cruise, but that's not what you said at all.

I know this sounds cynical, but I suspect the agent's incentives for your current booking might be affected if you cancelled it and repurchased under the standby program. You could find out for sure by starting the process of purchasing your cruise standby anonymously and see what they say.

As much as I like to disparage Flights by Celebrity, the one time I would definitely check them is for international flights. They occasionally have consolidator fares that are incredible. It doesn't cost anything to see what the options and prices are. Also, for your flight to Florida, check to see if booking travel to New York or Boston, and flight from there to Florida as separate record locator helps. For example, it may be $1600 from London to Orlando, but $600 London to New York and $200 to Florida .. and could even be the same flights.

I am interested in all aspects of being on board a cruise ship. I don't confine that interest to the cost of an extra lobster tail, the happenings in the karaoke contest, or the source of a musty smell in the shower. Today I learned (or rather, was reminded and assured) that the medical facility on a ship might seek transfusion donors if needed. I was also reminded that a cruise ship isn't a 100% safe environment and care should be taken in all activities and movement on the ship.

Let me summarize my post, as you didn't read it. They can add a supplemental fee for unanticipated expenses such as a fuel surcharge. They can choose not to honor pricing mistakes. But they can't say as the post I was responding to implied, say they've changed the fare for your cruise up up to embarkation day just because they wanted to increase fares.

Do you realize what you posted is EXACTLY what I said?

Say what? While they do reserve the right to add a supplemental charge relating to unanticipated occurrences (such as fuel surcharge), there isn't leeway in the contract to simply raise the fare after your purchase. Of course, someone who purchased the booking discussed in this thread may or may not have the booking cancelled. The relevant verbiage is below: Prices posted on the Site may be different than the prices offered or displayed in person, onboard our vessels, by our travel partners, or tour operators. All prices, discounts, and promotions posted on the Site are subject to change without notice. The price charged for a product or service will be the price in effect at the time the order is placed and will be set out in your order confirmation email, where applicable. Price changes will only apply to orders placed after such changes. Posted prices do not include taxes, or gratuities, except in certain countries where applicable law requires these charges to be included in the posted price (e.g., the EEA, Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand). To the extent prices do not include taxes or gratuities, all such taxes and charges will be added to your total and will be itemized in your shopping cart and in your order confirmation email, where applicable. We strive to display accurate price information, however we may, on occasion, make inadvertent typographical errors, inaccuracies or omissions related to pricing and availability. We reserve the right to correct any errors, inaccuracies, or omissions at any time and to cancel any orders arising from such occurrences.

Perhaps all the Prime Concierge have been snagged. I still see the low price when first viewing the cruise but on the select category of stateroom, a concierge is $1500 or so. No mention of Prime Concierge.

I'm trying to resolve a curiosity about security photo upload during check-in. From my experience doing this with Celebrity/Royal, I'm about 0 for 12. I've also had no success with another cruise line. So here's the story ... The best and clearest photos I have for spouse and I are our (relatively recent) passport photos. The photos were professionally taken per passport specifications, and I have the digital raw files. The files I upload during online check-in are absolutely of the correct format, within the specifications for resolution and file size, and unaltered. The files upload and display just fine with no cropping necessary. Yet at check-in at the terminal, they always want to take new security photos. I go along with it, of course, but do ask what the problem was. Inevitably the response is "You took a picture of a picture and you can't do that". No, I didn't. What I uploaded was the original digital photo. "Well you can't take a picture of a picture" they continue. They then proceed to snap a new photo that is low-res, blurry and a thousand moving bodies in the background. No, isn't a big deal. I'm just curious what others have experienced. One explanation is that I'm expecting too much of Celebrity/Royal's IT systems. But there could be a rational explanation such as they require the metadata of the uploaded image to match the date of the upload, which may be true but why not reject it at the time of the upload?

Wow, this ship is going to be moving fast ...

The sailings available for the standby program has just been updated to include sailings from additional ports, and out through November 2024. With few exceptions, the Caribbean sailings are longer duration up to 42 days. Standby List Program | Holland America Line