Celebrity shore excursions, rules and policies?

[Maui Girl]

We have been on several Princess cruises in the past, but have just booked our first on Celebrity. On Princess I was able to book shore excursions at any time prior to sailing, and was able to cancel with no problem if we changed our mind, usually up until a couple of days prior to the excursion. The charges for them were put on our shipboard account.

Apparently with Celebrity, I have to pay by credit card for each excursion as it is booked. Our cruise is still nearly 9 months away, so I'm wondering about the pro's and con's of doing it this far ahead of time. For experienced Celebrity cruisers, what are your experiences as far as price increases, refunds if you cancel, how quickly excursions fill up, etc?? Some of the ports I have looked at so far, don't really seem to have a big variety of excursions to choose from even now, so I'm not sure how or when to proceed. Thanks for your advice.

Edited December 30, 2014 by Maui Girl

[WestLakeGirl]

It might help to know what ports you are looking at

[michaelxjw]

We also have used Princess extensively in the past, and are now booked on a first time Celebrity Reflection 10 night Mediterranean cruise departing May 29, 2015. Our ports will be Messina, Sicily; Mykonos, Greece; Ephesus, Turkey; Rhodes, Greece; Santorini, Greece; Athens, Greece; & Naples, Italy. We are faced with the same issues as the OP; given that with Princess you can reserve all your ship excursions in advance and then pay when on board using your shipboard credits. Unfortunately. this does not apply to Celebrity where you must pay or charge for your Celebrity excursions in advance (unless you reserve on the ship). So we have the same concerns as the OP; i.e; how far in advance to book our excursions and are they likely to sell out so we will not have a good choice of excursions to choose from. As with the OP, we too, would appreciate any advice you could provide. Thanks for your help!

[cle-guy]

I've never noticed price increases on shore excursions.

 

You can cancel celebrity excursions generally up until 24 hours prior to the excursion time and get a refund. If canceled 4 days or more prior to sailing, it will refund to your card, if canceled while sailing, it will post as a credit to seapass account on board, and you will get the refund net of any other on board spend to the credit card on your seapass account.

 

As to how soon they fill up, that is the gamble here. If it sold out last cruise, it may not sell out next cruise. If you have a ton of OBC you want to use to excursions, book now, and cancel a few days out.... then rebook on board.

 

X has some sort of promotion of granting 10% OBC for rebooking excursions right now, so it may entice folks to book now for that little extra....

[Maui Girl]

It might help to know what ports you are looking at

 

we are sailing September 19, 2015 from Istanbul to Barcelona. So ports are Ephesus, Mykonos, Athens, Dubrovnik, Rome, Florence, Nice and Provence. (on the Equinox):)

[AntjeG]

My 1st Celebrity cruise is still upcoming but I have a little experience to share.

If you cancel a booked excursion pre-cruise they refund really quickly to your credit Card. I had my money for the cancelled excursion back the next day.

 

For non-US citizens the good thing about booking pre-cruise is that you pay in your own local currency. I saved quite a bit as I booked when the Euro had a much better exchange rate than now and I didn´t have to pay the fee my credit Card charges for using non-Euro currencies.

I know the OP is from the US but this might still be interesting for other people who read this thread.

[NJCruisers]

I have an issue with that too. We wanted to pay for some excursions with our on-board credit, but we can't. I know that we can reserve and pay by credit card, but then can we cancel and re-book with the OBC? what will happen to our credit card refund, we are all said and done? We have free gratuities, free drink package and I believe $200 in OBC. So I am wondering we would truly get the refund? Anyone know?

 

Pat

[michaelxjw]

NJ Cruisers,

 

As someone had posted earlier, one suggestion is to cancel close to departure (up to 4 days prior) & then rebook your excursions when on board ship. By doing this, you can use your OBC. Of course, you are taking the very slight chance that your chosen excursions may be fully booked by the time you attempt to rebook on the ship.

[NJCruisers]

Thanks Michael! I thought of that and I am just wondering how I would get my credit in the end since we have so much( at least to me) OBC. I do think you are right in that we will have to weigh paying up front for the excursion or losing it. The one in particular we are thinking of is going to Trunk Bay. We have been there numerous times both on our own and through an excursion. I know we can do it on our own, but we are going with others who are skittish (missing the ship) and I am not sure that we want to go thru the hassle. Expense wise it seems to be about the same.

 

Pat

[Azulann]

I would suggest first, go to your roll call and see if folks are organizing private tours from some of these ports.You can join them.

I have also taken ship tours in the Med. The ones I really wanted to do I booked and paid for them in advance. I would say that the ship tours to book ahead if you do not want to be wait listed is Ephesus, Santorini, Mykonos especailly Delos tour, some of the tours from Messina, tours from Nice and Provence.

Another factor to consider is if you are on a ship tour and you are late in arriving back at port, the ship will wait for you. Some of the tours are over an hour drive time each way to the site, away from the port.

I used ship tours for a tour of Corinth out of Athens port, Acropolis and 3hours of DYI time in Athens, Delos tour off the island of Mykonos, Avignon in Provence, and Tindari out of Missina Sicily. Each of these tours had only one bus or one time when they were offered.

Having $200. in OBC can be used for specialty restaruants, spa treaments and purchases in the shops,special behind the scence tours on the ship, wine seminars,even in the casino.

Enjoy your cruise and anything you can book ahead of time is one less thing to have to decide once you are on the cruise.

Edited January 1, 2015 by Azulann

[Hlitner]

You might want to give careful consideration to either doing private tours or simply Do It Yourself (DIY) in some of your ports. For example, we always recommend doing a private tour in Kusadasi (for Epheusus) as opposed to cruise line excursions. This port has many excellent tour companies and you can either join with a few from the CC Roll CAll or simply hire your own driver/guide. A port like Mykonos does not really need any excursion unless you want to go over to Delos. In fact all of your ports offer many options other then the large group/oft overpriced cruise line excursions. Take a look at the Cruise Critic Port boards and you will see lots of posts on these ports with some excellent suggestions.

 

Hank

Edited January 1, 2015 by Hlitner

[jb008]

Last year on RCI (same excursion pre-pay system as X) we ended up getting several hundred dollars refunded after our vacation when one of our excursions was cancelled due to weather and we cancelled a 2nd onboard the ship after changing our minds.

 

I'm mixed about pre-paying excursions vs. paying at the end of the cruise like Princess does. On one hand I hate paying early (in some cases many months in advance) but on the other hand it's nice to not have as large of a bill at the end of the trip. I know on one of our Princess cruises our tab at the end (including some excursions) was nearly as much as the cruise fare. :cool:

 

I second checking in with your cruise roll call to see what others are planning at the ports. I ended up getting a TON of great suggestions for our recent sail on Summit from the roll call.

Edited January 2, 2015 by jb008

[alcpa1]

I strongly urge you to join the Roll Call for your sailings. Beyond making connections with your fellow passengers on a personal level the Roll Call is a fantastic planning tool for the entire cruise. One of the most advantageous parts of the Roll Call is the excursion information.

The small group tours are far superior to the bus excursions offered by any cruise line. The tour operators found on the Ports of Call forums have been vetted and recommended by our fellow members. If there's a bad apple out there you will soon know it!!!!

The best example I can site is Athens. A small group tour of 14 or so loads quickly and makes the drive to Athens faster than a bus tour. A van of 14 can access the Acropolis at the steps to the site. The busses generally drop passengers off at the bottom of the hill and/or reload at the bottom. (It's a moderately high hill BTW.) Small group tours have more maneuverability and can change stops in accordance with the tourist load. Small group tours can often be tailored to the desires of the group. The bus tours have a set schedule. If you don't want to make a shopping stop with a small group tour that too can be arranged.

The only advantage of a cruise line excursion for Santorini is the designated tender which takes you to a bus on shore but you still have to return to the ship via the funicular, donkey or steps on the donkey trail. Santorini and Mykonos are both easy to DIY.

Payment issues are another thing. I think the former posts have described your options. In order to book once on board arrive early and handle your requests asap with the shore excursions desk.