Discount for Excursions?

[swifs]

we recently asked several agents for quotations on a Celebrity cruise for next year. They all came back with the same quotation, one of them saying that Celebrity line doesn't permit discounting. That said, several of them offered OBC, again all the same amounts. The only one that stood out also offered 15% discount for excursions. I haven't used that particular agent before so while the difference is enticing, it also made me wary. Has anyone else seen that before?

[bajathree]

we recently asked several agents for quotations on a Celebrity cruise for next year. They all came back with the same quotation, one of them saying that Celebrity line doesn't permit discounting. That said, several of them offered OBC, again all the same amounts. The only one that stood out also offered 15% discount for excursions. I haven't used that particular agent before so while the difference is enticing, it also made me wary. Has anyone else seen that before?

 

Yep....certain agencies get exclusives to certain promos at times.

[rjg41]

The discount on excursions is not for Celebrity sponsored excursions. The company you are taking about is offering excursions from a non-cruise line company that offers many of the same excursions that the cruise line offers but you typically not share the transportation, same time to visit the site, etc. as the cruise line.

 

Keep in mind that any excursion not sponsored by the cruise line does have some risk. For example, for a cruise line sponsored excursion, the cruise line will hold the ship if they get back late. The ship will not be held for the non-cruise line excursion.

 

On pricing of the cruise, the only time you will get pricing from an agency that will be different from others is if that agency might have a lower group rate or the occasional special pricing limited to a few top agencies.

[cmtom89]

The only one that stood out also offered 15% discount for excursions. I haven't used that particular agent before so while the difference is enticing, it also made me wary. Has anyone else seen that before?

 

We have twice used an agency that offers the discounted shore excursions, but have never actually used the shore excursions they offer since we did not find them to be worth it to us.

 

One excursion that we wanted to take was actually more expensive on their discounted list than the exact same listing from the cruise line.

Several other excursions we were interested in were only $2-$5 difference, and we chose to book with the cruise line to use our OBC.

 

So while I find the offer legitimate in that you can book shore excursions with them and some may actually be at a bit of a discount from the ship's excursions (in one case as noted, it definitely was not!), I would not give a company my business based solely on this 'perk'.

 

I have given the particular agency my repeat business because they offer me OBC and cash back incentives for repeat business.

[swifs]

Thank you everyone. As always, very sensible. I think I will go back to the agency I was using for my Seabourn adventure as I like her very much and a friend has used her several times.