Solstice TA October 2011 Code Red

[islandgirlejfan]

Islandgirlejfan,

 

Just out of curiousity, did you book this cruise prior to May 17th of this year? My DH and I were also treated rather rudely and "encouraged" to cancel our transatlantic. The cruise was delayed,shortened by one day, and one port was dropped. No price reduction was offered , only 100.00 total OBC. Yet fellow CC'ers booked on the same cruise were offered very nice compensation to transfer to the rescheduled TA. I am beginning to think that the old bookings (pre May17th) are worth hanging on to because they have to honor all price reductions.

JMHO. Thanks!

 

We booked in September. My travel agent has been dealing with this since all of this started happening last week and he received an email confirming everything this morning. He was very surprised that all the ppl that had the Western Caribbean canceled were only offered $200 and nothing else, so I know he would take issue with your situation. I personally think the offer made to you was a slap in the face and really doesn't leave a good taste in ones mouth.

 

I'm waiting to hear what happens with mine....our TA is on the way to LAX, but told me that he will be in touch with me later on this evening.

 

Best of luck....I really DO hope it works out for you:). If I was doing this on my own which thankfully I am not, I would be working myself up the ladder.

[CTKath]

We have a cruise booked for the Solstice Nov. 13, 2011 Western Caribbean sailing. I phoned Celebrity yesterday to inquire about all the cabins being sold out. The first Celebrity rep indicated that the Nov. 6 and Nov. 20 cruises were cancelled for maintenance but that my cruise on Nov. 13 was still sailing. I knew this was not correct so I called back and was told the cruises are on hold and no more info is available at this time. Still not satisfied with the answer I phoned our Celebrity PVP and she indicated that it was a revenue/accounting maintenance issue and would be corrected soon. I'm still not sure I have the correct answer.

 

I'd love to know because I was planning on booking this particular cruise.

[WNcruiser]

We were booked in a AQ hump for the 10/23/11 T/A on Solstice. We were offered the $200 OBC but November 28 is just too late for us so we cancelled.

 

I did like the 12 night Med itinerary with the overnight in Venice, but Celebrity offered us nothing to stay with the 10/23 cruise:confused: and wanted full price, about $600 more per person than the T/A. I guess it wasn't meant to be...:(.

 

Steve

[islandgirlejfan]

I thought the price had went up on mine since this morning, but it looks like we are still good

[prim8keeper]

We were on one of the Western Caribbean sailings (Nov 27) and were able to move our reservation over to the Dec 11th sailing at the same price we paid for the Nov sailing and got $100 OBC pp. We were booked in AQ class.

[SusieV]

We were booked in a AQ hump for the 10/23/11 T/A on Solstice. We were offered the $200 OBC but November 28 is just too late for us so we cancelled.

 

I did like the 12 night Med itinerary with the overnight in Venice, but Celebrity offered us nothing to stay with the 10/23 cruise:confused: and wanted full price, about $600 more per person than the T/A. I guess it wasn't meant to be...:(.

 

Steve

 

Wait a minute, they aren't even honouring your price for the sailing the same date? I thought they would at least offer to do that or allow you to move over to the new transatlantic (our friends were on the Equinox 11/7 sailing).

 

My TA is investigating but she says she has not received any concrete info from Celebrity yet.

[islandgirlejfan]

Celebrity hasn't made this easy.....we are still not rebooked.

 

Our TA called me at work yesterday and read the corporate email with the *selected dates* to me. We had already decided on one of them which will be the 12/3 Eclipse sailing. As much as we wanted to do the 12/11 sailing of the Solstice as it is cruiing the Western Caribbean, it's just too close to the holidays for us. The killer is, we really WILL be on the ship yet again for my hubby's birthday! The cruise was suppose to be on my birthday.....oh well.:rolleyes:

 

I told our TA that I had talked DH into selecting AQ because the price is actually lower than the C1 we had initially booked and, but of course I expected that as it seems we just normally select that week to cruise....it's always been one of the cheaper weeks for whatever reason. It wasn't a hard sell to hubby as he loved the spa on the Pearl. It would have been nice if we could have gotten our aft as well, but others here have told me that the aft on S-class ships is not as pleasant as it is on other ships and AQ is the way to go, so we are going to give it a shot.

 

A net acquaintance gave me a few recommendations for an AQ stateroom that I emailed to my TA to look into. TA was on his way to LAX, but was going to handle our issue once he got to Dulles. He texted me to make sure of our room selections. About an hour later, he phoned and said that he was unable to make our reservation because our reservation was made under a group and they were not prepared to handle group bookings yet! What the heck? TA made it under a group booking because we are hoping to talk a few of our friends into going with us...one couple in particular.

 

So as of now, I have the stateroom that we selected in hold and praying today that he is able to get everything taken care of. Are they making this hard for any particular reason?

 

 

Side note: BIG thanks to all cruisers who have contributed to the spreadsheet of staterooms and to the person overseeing the maintenance of it! That is really a very helpful item. That, along with the recommendation from my net friend really helped me to decide on a new stateroom.:)

[CruisingYiayia]

We were booked on the 11/13/2011 Solstice, western itinerary, and after numerous phone calls to Celebrity, I was transferred to the re-deployment desk where I was finally able to get some answers.

 

If we transfer to any of the following sailings, we would get $200.00 OBC per stateroom, and be guaranteed the price we booked. If the price is lower, we would get the lower price. If we choose a sailing other than one of those listed below, we would not get the OBC and pay whatever the price is p/p. At this point, not sure what we will be doing. :confused:

 

Eastern Itinerary:

Eclipse - 11/2/2011

Eclipse - 11/19/2011

Eclipse - 11/26/2011

Eclipse - 12/3/2011

Eclipse - 12/10/2011

Eclipse - 12/18/2011

 

Western Itinerary:

Solstice - 12/11/2011

[islandgirlejfan]

We were booked on the 11/13/2011 Solstice, western itinerary, and after numerous phone calls to Celebrity, I was transferred to the re-deployment desk where I was finally able to get some answers.

 

If we transfer to any of the following sailings, we would get $200.00 OBC per stateroom, and be guaranteed the price we booked. If the price is lower, we would get the lower price. If we choose a sailing other than one of those listed below, we would not get the OBC and pay whatever the price is p/p. At this point, not sure what we will be doing. :confused:

 

Eastern Itinerary:

Eclipse - 11/2/2011

Eclipse - 11/19/2011

Eclipse - 11/26/2011

Eclipse - 12/3/2011

Eclipse - 12/10/2011

Eclipse - 12/18/2011

 

Western Itinerary:

Solstice - 12/11/2011

 

I'm confused because we actually considered spending even MORE money with Celebrity and actually thought about booking the Silhouette....we booked in good faith intending to cruise, so why should it matter what cruise they are adding the OBC to?

 

My other question is I don't even see the Eclipse listed on the Celebrity site for 11/2....if the itinerary is the same one I selected (St. Kitts, San Juan, St. Maarten) I would positively LOVE that date as the idea was we were doing this special for my birthday.

 

When my TA calls this morning, I am going to have him check into things.

[CruisingYiayia]

My other question is I don't even see the Eclipse listed on the Celebrity site for 11/2....if the itinerary is the same one I selected (St. Kitts, San Juan, St. Maarten) I would positively LOVE that date as the idea was we were doing this special for my birthday.

 

When my TA calls this morning, I am going to have him check into things.

 

Oops...my mistake. I meant to type 11/12/2011.

[islandgirlejfan]

Oops...my mistake. I meant to type 11/12/2011.

 

LOL....it's all good! I guess I'm just destined to cruise on my hubby's birthday!:p

[rwadam]

We were booked on the 11/13/2011 Solstice, western itinerary, and after numerous phone calls to Celebrity, I was transferred to the re-deployment desk where I was finally able to get some answers.

 

If we transfer to any of the following sailings, we would get $200.00 OBC per stateroom, and be guaranteed the price we booked. If the price is lower, we would get the lower price. If we choose a sailing other than one of those listed below, we would not get the OBC and pay whatever the price is p/p. At this point, not sure what we will be doing. :confused:

 

Eastern Itinerary:

Eclipse - 11/2/2011

Eclipse - 11/19/2011

Eclipse - 11/26/2011

Eclipse - 12/3/2011

Eclipse - 12/10/2011

Eclipse - 12/18/2011

 

Western Itinerary:

Solstice - 12/11/2011

 

Zoe1214, I called the redeployment desk this morning and was able to rebook our 11/6/2011 Solstice Eastern Caribbean to the 10/20/2011 Equinox Eastern Mediterranean, at current rate of course, with $200 obc per cabin offer. We were very happy with this offer since we did not expect to get anything based on the redeployment offers for the Caribbean cruises that others reported on CC. Maybe if you select a specific cruise that you want to take and ask again they will do it for you.

[upwarduk]

When we were on Eclipse, Eastern Mediterranean 04.10.10 I enquired about a number of cruises.

I was interested in Century, Vancouver to Australia( mainly for a week in Hawaii)

Itinerary changed to 2 short Hawaii cruises out of San Diego instead. No good for us, as we wanted to visit my sister in Canada first.

Then I wondered about Eastern Canada, on Summit. When I went to future cruises, that varied from a 13/14 night( 2nd option was when we really thought we would book, but air price inflated by £100's overnight)

There were so many re-printed itinerary's that it was unreal. The 1st eddition of the brochure is so outdated, that it needs reprinting!

Now after reading all the above posts, I realise it was no fault of the future cruise girl,I just thought she was incompetant, so much so that I decided not to book, even tho' we would have been allowed one change in 30 days( a cancellation is considered a change, which they had had to introduce, as so few brits were booking cruises- we used to loose deposit if cancelled)

So Celebrity look as though they are re-structuring the entire fleet- Connie is supposed to be Solsticed early next year, so I suppose she will be out of service, so a ship will need to take over her itinerary in Europe.

P S.

Also interested that Shiloutte has had Split taken off, & overnight in Venice added instead. We tendered in Split, but it took us 3 hrs to get off the ship, as Split didn't have the infrastructure to cope with a ship of that size. I know that the Captain went ashore and was cross, as he had asked for the port to supply tenders- which they did not do.

Many pax had decided to 'do' Split themselves- the carrot of " you will get off the ship sooner if you take a tour, " did not tempt 2,200+ pax at Celebrity tour prices.

[TeaBag]

The Connie was solsticized last May.

[bighairtexan]

While onboard the Solstice 10/10/10, I booked a b2b east/west Caribbean for early December 11. On Sunday I received the dreaded email from the Celebrity "Re-accomodations department". (aka the redeployment department) My first cruise (12/4/11 Eastern) was cancelled and =X= offered to move my Eastern Caribbean to a week after the Western, which would interfere w/ my Christmas. My dates weren't that flexible. The next offer was moving to the Eclipse but I didn't want to do a B2B to the same itinerary.

Wound up doing eastern on the Eclipse 12/3/11) then a hotel for a day, then a Western on Solstice 12/11/11. Certainly not perfect but "stuff" happens. They are offering to supply us with a hotel for the day in between, provide transfers (Eclipse is Miami, Solstice is FLL) and gave us an onboard credit on each cruise. Mind you I wish things weren't changed in the first place, but assuming Celebrity provides all they've promised, I'm pleased with their service recovery and I'm sure I'll survive the inconvenience.

I was wondering what happened to the other hundreds of pax on the various ships.

[islandgirlejfan]

While onboard the Solstice 10/10/10, I booked a b2b east/west Caribbean for early December 11. On Sunday I received the dreaded email from the Celebrity "Re-accomodations department". (aka the redeployment department) My first cruise (12/4/11 Eastern) was cancelled and =X= offered to move my Eastern Caribbean to a week after the Western, which would interfere w/ my Christmas. My dates weren't that flexible. The next offer was moving to the Eclipse but I didn't want to do a B2B to the same itinerary.

Wound up doing eastern on the Eclipse 12/3/11) then a hotel for a day, then a Western on Solstice 12/11/11. Certainly not perfect but "stuff" happens. They are offering to supply us with a hotel for the day in between, provide transfers (Eclipse is Miami, Solstice is FLL) and gave us an onboard credit on each cruise. Mind you I wish things weren't changed in the first place, but assuming Celebrity provides all they've promised, I'm pleased with their service recovery and I'm sure I'll survive the inconvenience.

I was wondering what happened to the other hundreds of pax on the various ships.

 

Our cruise was finalized for the 12/3 cruise on the Eclipse by our TA today, FINALLY! We switched our C1 aft to an Aqua Class because the price was nice and the OBC was a plus. We are still a little disappointed about not doing the Western Caribbean, but the 12/11 cruise wouldn't work for us....I work for a charity and Christmas is a very busy time for us.

 

The only part that sort of sucked for me is that the charity I work for had a silent auction at our annual dinner this past weekend and we received two airline vouchers to fly anywhere that the airline had service. They had to be used by 30 November 2011. If nothing would have changed, they would have been used by then. I made a bid on them, but only one.....we have two Miata events in other states planned next year and a bed and breakfast visit in January planned....vacation time wise, I just didn't think that I could swing it, but had the cruise come off as planned, the charity I worked for would have made what I had planned on paying for the tickets.

 

I wonder how many people canceled completely?