hajekfam

We really lucked out with the Founders status. We signed up and authorized payment for $30 p/p to join. Before the charge hit my credit card, I got an e-mail saying the program had changed but we would still be enrolled as Founders.

Can't remember how much it cost when we joined after our first Celebrity cruise on the Zenith its inaugural year back in 1992.

But there was only one fee that covered all immediate family members including children who cruised - not a p/p fee. And I remember them telling us that they gave credit for any Chandris Fantasy cruises.

I still have my old silver cards with the blue and white anchor and writing with really low membership numbers.

Don't expect to see the green bean casserole! :)

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For those of you who are having a problem printing an Xpress pass (it says not ready), check to see if the website update is causing your reservation to show an outstanding balance.

I had been unable to print my Xpress pass - it said not ready. When I checked my reservation it showed a small outstanding balance. As we are paid in full (cruise is in 2 weeks), I called and they verified that we were paid in full. I still was unable to do the Xpress pass. So I called again this morning and asked if the website showed that we had an outstanding balance even though we were paid in full, would that prevent me from getting our Xpress pass. The rep thought that might be the problem so he said he would take care of it and email me when he got it fixed. I went on tonight and sure enough, our outstanding balance was gone and I was finally able to print our Xpress pass.

But on our Baltic cruise this summer, our cabin was directly above the ship entrance and we sat on our balconey while the departure was pushed back over 45minutes because a ship sponsored tour bus was caught up in a traffic jam.

 

Just some added piece of mind when the distance is as long as it is in Rome or Florence. We do local transportation most ports, but only when the trip back to the ship can be made by foot or easy taxi service.

Have to agree with the peace of mind - in fact that is one of the selling points of ship's excursions. But it wasn't always that way!

I sailed on the Century maiden voyage back in 1995 before Celebrity had you key card off and on the ship - you could come and go at will while in port. We were in San Juan at Christmas and DH & I were on the top deck watching passengers running to make the ship. We left on time and in the middle of the night DH woke me up saying we arrived at our next port and were tendered. We didn't have any tenders on this cruise so I told him he was dreaming and go back to sleep. The next morning he looked out the window and told me that wasn't what he saw in the middle of the night and we were docked. After talking to several staff we found out what happened. Evidently one of the ship sponsored tour buses got caught in holiday traffic and missed the ship. The ship didn't know it as there wasn't a Celebrity staff on the bus and nobody knew that a whole busload of passengers didn't make it back to the ship as they didn't track goings and comings. So the captain had to turn around and head back to San Juan. He couldn't dock as Celebrity would have to pay another docking fee, so he tendered and they had to bring those stranded passengers out to the ship on the pilot boat. After they got those passengers, we still made it to our next port early.

Thank you for the replies. I am hoping they offer on the 11/24 transatlantic. I know we could get to Florence by bus/train but I would rather pay a little more and have the ship be responsible for getting us back rather than an independent operator or myslef.

I was able to download the shore excursion booklet for the Constellation 11/24 transatlantic today (we just booked this cruise 2 weeks ago) and they offer a Florence on your own, Pisa on your own, and a Florence and Pisa on your own.

It also states that if you miss the bus, return to the ship is your responsibility.

Since I'm booked, paid, confirmed and have received my luggage tags for my cruise in 4 weeks I can look at the site with amusement.

 

My booking appears with the right cabin but the total cost is now stated as $700 on the front page. When I view my reservation the real amount I paid is accurate but the cost is listed as $7 more than what I paid and I now have an amount due of $7.

 

I decided not to purchase any excursion or addons to avoid having to call and only pay the amount of the add on.

 

I think the $7 price difference might be a difference in gratuities. As the quoted price for Select gratuities $168 is different than what they quoted in the fare $175. I have no explanation for the $700. LOL.

 

If $700 is the real price...I want a refund of more than $1800! hahaha!

My reservation for our cruise in three weeks appears with the right price but with the wrong amount of taxes and fees and therefore shows a balance due. I called as the documents I printed last night showed us as fully paid. They did tell me that they were having problems with the website and checked with Celebrity and we are fully paid.

We have cruised Celebrity exclusively since 1992 and have never gotten an upgrade. Celebrity rarely gives free upgrades.

Commonly Used Acronyms on Cruise Critic

CC - Cruise Critic

DHJoanie

CC on the Celebrity board can also refer to Captain's Club (Celebrity's past passenger club).

I was told by my travel agent it is called "the daily"????

 

I gues your travel agent hasn't cruised Celebrity in a long time. It used to be called "The (Ship's Name) Daily" but was renamed "Celebrity Today" sometime after 2002.

My doctor told me that I should get it done if it interfers with my activities and causes pain. We dance and it definitely was interferring as my foot hurt and I found it very hard to find dance shoes and even regular shoes that would fit over the bunion. Mine was so bad that my big toe was actually bent over the next two toes.

One of the reason you get bunions is hereditary and other causes are poor fitting shoes. Since no one in my family ever had bunions, the doctor thought it might have been caused by those pointed stilletto heel shoes that I wore in my late teens and twenties. Back then you wore them everywhere, even if you had to walk a distance - you didn't change into walking shoes to go to and from work like you do today.

I was so glad I did this surgery. I only had one foot that had a problem - it got to the point that I could only wear one pair of shoes and even they hurt.

It took me 8 to 12 weeks to get back to normal and return to work, I was afraid of the huge step on and off the train that kept me home that long.

When I went to the doctor, he looked at both feet because if the other one was bad, he would do both at the same time as he said I would never come back for the second one. Well, I was only in extreme pain for one day after the surgery (the first pain medication that they gave didn't work for longer than an hour) - but my foot swelled up so bad that I couldn't get a shoe on and had to wear the surgical shoe for a lot longer than I should have.

The one thing that I did and would recommend to anyone having the surgery is to go for physical therapy afterward. The doctor recommended three months of physical therapy - I really had to relearn how to walk as I walked on the outside of my foot to alleviate the pain of the bunion.

We have done 4 fall transatlantics Barcelona to Ft Lauderdale- one in Sept 2001, one in Oct 2003, one in Nov 2005, and one in Dec 2007. We have had great weather on all. In fact out of all of them, the one in Dec. 2007 was the warmest of all.

But weather is totally unpredictable this far in advance - and even a day can make the difference. We did one transatlantic and left one day later than another ship from the same cruiseline. We had great weather with rain only two nights (late at night) - the ship that left the day before us had rain.

On one of our transatlantics (the year that they ran out of hurricane names and had use the Greek alphabet), we had a smooth but slow sailing as the captain kept us between Delta and Epsilon. If he hadn't had said anything about why we were going so slow, we wouldn't have known that there were tropical storms and hurricanes happening out in the Atlantic.

Our very first cruise was on Celebrity back when it was owned by Chandris. It was 1992 and we cruised on the Zenith in its inagural year. At that time there were three ships in the line - Meridian (formerly the Galileo from Chandris Fantasy cruises), Horizon (which was originally ordered for Fantasy cruises) and Zenith. We went to a travel agent when we finally decided to take a cruise and he asked us a ton of questions about our likes and dislikes and our thoughts of an ideal vacation. He thought about our answers and told us he thought we would like this fairly new cruiseline with a brand new ship. We loved the Zenith and decided that cruising Celebrity met all the criteria for an ideal vacation. On disembarkation day while waiting in one of the lounges with our carry-off luggage, we saw some passengers being escorted off the ship way before everyone else. We asked who they were and were told that they were Captain's club - so naturally we joined paying the $35 fee.

On our second Zenith cruise the next year, at the captain's club meeting we were told about the new ship that was being built. We came home and told our travel agent to book us on that maiden voyage no matter what.

We did the Century maiden voyage in 1995. It was an experience that we will never forget. You had a choice of doing a 10 day cruise out of NY or a joining the ship in Ft. Lauderdale for a 7 day cruise- we opted for the 10 day. The entire Chandris family was onboard including relatives. We sailed out of New York, but a blizzard hit the day before sailing (it was an late moring departure so most had to arrive the day before) and our very early flight from Chicago was one of the last to land in NY before the airports were closed. Because of that blizzard, there were only 300 passengers on board until we hit Ft. Lauderdale where the remaining passengers as well as those that weren't able to make it into NYC boarded. So we got to know the Century, crew, and entertainers onboard very well before we got to Ft. Lauderdale and the ship was full.

The Cova cafe was introduced on the Century. We spent a lot of time there during the day on the three days from NYC to FLL.

We also miss Michael Roux - even though some of the signature presentation items started disappearing after the merger with Royal Caribbean in 1997 - like the scallion tied string beans, etc.

I have high blood pressure (take 2 different meds for it) but find that on a cruise, my blood pressure goes way down.

If your balcony isn't very private, IMHO, you should not be nude out there. However, if you have walls between you and the next balcony, and one can not see easily from above and below, I say "go for it."

 

If someone is going to lean way out, or over, or down, to peek in your balcony, I say, THEY are the problem, not you. If they peek, smile nicely.

We have had one of the angled balconies - in fact we choose it because it is a larger balcony and can hold a lounge chair besides the two regular chairs. On those angled balconies, you don't have to lean way out - you can just stand at the railing and see the other balconies as your balcony does stick out and is angled towards the other balconies.

There are also some angled balconies on some ships - standing at the railing on of those you can see down the other balconies and other balconies can see your balcony.

There are stockholders and there are stockholders --and we aren't the ones they are trying to keep happy.

 

Sixty-five percent of the RCCL stock is held by institutions and mutual funds, who count their holdings in tens of millions of dollars. These are the people to be kept happy.

 

 

 

But they also need to keep and expand their customer base in order to keep that 65% of the shareholders happy.

There has to be a happy medium. Why not offer combinable credits - but any non-purchased credit (shareholder, booking onboard, special sale) cannot be refunded and these credits are not applied until all purchased credits (from TA's, personal purchases, gifts, etc) that the cruiser may have are used? That way, if you don't use the credit which is at the company's expense, you lose it.

The OBC that your TA purchases for you from the line will not be affected. You can still combine that with the shareholder credit.:)

 

I feel sorry for the Future Cruise Consultants onboard. I suspect that most shareholders won't bother booking onboard any more because the shareholder credit is always at least equal to the onboard booking credit, better on the longer cruises. Especially on X or Azamara, where the OBC is based on the price of the cruise, not its length.

The booking onboard credit can be more or way less than the shareholder credit - depending on the price of the cruise- at least on Celebrity where the booking onboard credit is cruise fare based instead of cruise length based.

Booking Onboard Credit

On Board Credit Amount………… For Cruisefare from

$50 per stateroom………………….$1 to $2499

$100 per stateroom…………...…...$2500 to $3999

$150 per stateroom………………..$4000 to $5999

$200 per stateroom………………..$6000 to $7499

$300 per stateroom………………..$7500+

Cruisefare which determines On Board Credit amount does not include taxes & fees or any additional options. On Board Credits are valid only for your own new individual reservations made onboard.

Shareholder credit

$250 Onboard Credit per Stateroom on Sailings of 14 or more nights.

$200 Onboard Credit per Stateroom on Sailings of 10 to 13 nights.

$100 Onboard Credit per Stateroom on Sailings of 6 to 9 nights.

$50 Onboard Credit per Stateroom on Sailings of 5 nights or less.

Applicable on any Royal Caribbean, Celebrity Cruises or Azamara Cruises Sailings. (excludes Celebrity Xpeditions)

We believe your opinion is the minority. Not being able to combine captains club coupons IS a big deal. Most will agree, take aways from employees or customers is not a good idea.

Almost always by the time a captains club coupon comes out for a sailing that I interested in, I have already booked it as I tend to book early to get the specific cabin I want and the lowest price.

The part that really bothers me is the fact that the shareholder credit is not combinable with the booking onboard credit - at least since they now offer a "future cruise" booking - cruise to be decided later. When you had to specify a specific cruise, we almost never booked onboard - we tend to book the day bookings open in order to secure a specific cabin.

In other words the investor relations credit is not combinable with Celebrity/Royal Caribbean credits given out free by them (provided that you do specific things - book onboard, book during a special sale, etc.) but it is combinable with purchased credits whether they are purchased by a travel agent, a friend or relative, yourself, or your credit card.

Well I for one will not be purchasing any future cruises on board. I think it stinks that if you are a loyal cuiser that they will not allow you to combine the X coupons with the shareholder benefits. Once again shafting the loyal X cruiser it's bad enough that the Captain's benefits are some of the worse for elite members now this. At this time with the economy in the toilet & new big ships need filling up those cabins this is poor planning on RCI's part. It seems Carnival corp had learned their lesson & resinded their lack of combining coupons with the shareholders OBC.

The Captains club coupons are not a big deal - they went back to only being valid for bookings that were made during a specific time period and the values are actually less than those that were issued back when they were also good for a cruise listed on the coupon that was previously booked.

In our case, it will end up costing them more - we usually use our onboard credits (investor, booking onboard) to try a new (to us) spa offering or do something onboard that we normally wouldn't spend the money to do. If we like it, we would do it again - at our expense. Without the credit, we won't do it at all.

Just returned and noone got a desert tray brought to their table.

Evidently the elimination of the dessert tray on the Millennium is a very recent event - it did not happen a year ago as the original poster's waiter told him.

Your right Richsea. I know that our waiter was not happy with the lack of the desert tray. He told us that they stopped with taking it from table to table over a year ago. I was surprised to hear that someone who was on the cruise 2 weeks ago got to see one. We were on the upper level of the Metropolitan at table 525. I could see about 60 of the upstairs and none of those tables had the ammenities I discussed in my review. I think it is a cost cutting issue and its no secret that the fuel costs have to be significantly hitting the cruiseline's bottom line.

 

I would rather have them charge me a few hundred more and keep the Celebrity difference than let the service slide

Evidently you had a lazy waiter who didn't want to bring the dessert tray around. We had one brought to our table on our back to back Millie cruises this past Nov & Dec. And on the first cruise we sat on the upper level and on the second cruise we sat on the lower level and both waiters brought the dessert tray.

We were also on deck 7 in cabin 7164 for the first cruise and 7166 for the second. We had friends in 7180 for both cruises. All of our cabins were clean and our steward was very attentive - evidently his contract ended or he was assigned a different set of cabins for your cruise becasue he did a terrrific job of cleaning our cabin(s).

However, we did notice that around your cabin number they were working on the plumbing for the bathroom several days (the door to the plumbing is in the hall) and had cleaning equipement outside the room.

There really isn't that much extra special treatment on Celebrity - due to the fact that you can attain elite status in as little as 4 cruises and the reciprocal membership at that level, the number of elite on board is huge so much so that on our transatlantic they had to break down the elegant tea by deck and other daytime events by dinner seating. The priority embarkation and priority tender can really be a joke when there are so many members at that level aboard that those lines are actually longer than non-member lines.