Paid Upgrade on a slow selling cruise

[Suite Susie]

We are on that August 24 cruise also. As final payment has now been made I would expect prices to come down if plenty of availability. Generally prices dont come down prior to final payments as that would encourage people to cancel and rebook better cabins thereby leaving the lower cabins unbooked. I would be interested to hear of anyone upgrading after final payment, it would be good to upgrade to a Suite at little extra cost. We are in C2.

 

Final payment in the UK is not due until 28th June, so I would imagine there will be no change until after this date has passed. Fingers crossed that there is a reduction - it would be good for everybody on that sailing.

[Suite Susie]

Suite Susie

 

You say that you have booked directly with Celebrity UK. Do you have your own contact there? If so, I think that you are more likely to have some success.

 

Back in the days when Azamara was still part of Celebrity and guests booking through Celebrity UK all had their own PCS, we were in a similar situation as you. We decided how much we could afford to pay for an upgrade to a RS or PH [Azamara has no equivalent to a CS but there are a lot more PHs] which was considerably more than we were paying for a SS but also less that the RS and PH were selling for at the time. We rang our PCS and asked if, in view of how unlikely it was that the remaining RS and PH would sell, would they accept what we were offering for an upgrade.

 

Our PCS had to speak to his management and they had to speak to Miami but they came back with a counterproposal price just a little more than we proposed. We accepted. The prices of the remaining RS and PH were similarly reduced and they all but two of them by the time we sailed.

 

We like to think that both Celebrity and we gained from the exercise. I think that you should speak to Celebrity but you are more likely to be successful if you have your own contact [i know most of us no longer do] because you will need someone who will take up your case for you. Call Centre type operations do not encourage personal service.

 

Sue you are right - I don't have a personal agent. Have spoken to 3 different people so far and they have all been really helpful, but are just quoting the fare difference between what I paid and the current on line price of the CS. They've made a note on my file that we'd like a call if they are looking to upsell any of the Suites. Part of me wants to upgrade now and pay the difference (as I did some research on the Angle Hump CS's and I want one) but I know I should be patient and play the waiting game!

 

 

Thanks everybody for your advice and interest. I will post on the outcome in due course!

[Moneypenny105]

Sue you are right - I don't have a personal agent. Have spoken to 3 different people so far and they have all been really helpful, but are just quoting the fare difference between what I paid and the current on line price of the CS. They've made a note on my file that we'd like a call if they are looking to upsell any of the Suites. Part of me wants to upgrade now and pay the difference (as I did some research on the Angle Hump CS's and I want one) but I know I should be patient and play the waiting game!

 

 

Thanks everybody for your advice and interest. I will post on the outcome in due course!

 

We are due to embark on our first Celebrity cruise in 11 days.

 

I looked at the prices a couple of weeks ago and noticed that they had (W) Guarantee Suites at £300 less than we paid for an 1A balcony.

 

Even though it would mean losing the 123go promotion I was quite interested in upgrading. I went to the Travel Agent I booked through who contacted X for me and at that time the person from X agreed that the price would be less than we paid. Because we are travelling with my parents we would have wanted to upgrade two cabins, but as it was a Sunday the person at X said the TA would need to phone on the Monday to see whether Revenue would release another Suite to (W) guaranteed.

 

The TA contacted X again on the Monday, however the new person said that although they were prepared to release another suite there would be an additional cost of approx £3,000 - which was the cost of the S2 not the cost of the Guarantee. My TA tried to negotiate but was told by the supervisor that this was the price.

 

I have looked online today and see that they are still offering the (W) Guarantee Suite £300 lower than we paid for the 1A.

 

Does anyone have any advise as to why they will not let us upgrade for the (W) Guarantee Suite rate I can see on line???

 

Thanks:)

[upwarduk]

Final payment in the UK is not due until 28th June, so I would imagine there will be no change until after this date has passed. Fingers crossed that there is a reduction - it would be good for everybody on that sailing.

 

57 days before (8 weeks) if you book directly with Celebrity.

Some TAs ask for payment up to 16 weeks before ( they used to bank the money, so earning interest) ours asked for it 12 weeks before.

[miniyorkie]

Hi. As I understand we are pretty much "stuck" with our first booking choice if we book in the UK. I am often quite envious of US members who seem to be able to amend or cancel without penalty. I am slightly regretting a cabin choice for the September cruise from Istanbul, but as I also booked with Celebrity UK there is very little I can do. Wishing you all the best with changing. So sorry about the loss of your dog.

[docsdrillers]

I've only sailed with X 3 times and all those sailings were European cruises that were early in the cruising season and thus sales were slow.

 

On all 3 occasions I was able to get paid upgrades after final pay.

 

My TA works hard for me and gets in touch with her Rep to get a quote for that upgrade...sometimes we accepted right away and at other times decided to wait until closer to the sailing for a better price.

 

I'm not sure if it works as well if you book directly with X rather than a private TA.

 

good luck.

[DinaS]

We are due to embark on our first Celebrity cruise in 11 days.

 

I looked at the prices a couple of weeks ago and noticed that they had (W) Guarantee Suites at £300 less than we paid for an 1A balcony.

 

Even though it would mean losing the 123go promotion I was quite interested in upgrading. I went to the Travel Agent I booked through who contacted X for me and at that time the person from X agreed that the price would be less than we paid. Because we are travelling with my parents we would have wanted to upgrade two cabins, but as it was a Sunday the person at X said the TA would need to phone on the Monday to see whether Revenue would release another Suite to (W) guaranteed.

 

The TA contacted X again on the Monday, however the new person said that although they were prepared to release another suite there would be an additional cost of approx £3,000 - which was the cost of the S2 not the cost of the Guarantee. My TA tried to negotiate but was told by the supervisor that this was the price.

 

I have looked online today and see that they are still offering the (W) Guarantee Suite £300 lower than we paid for the 1A.

 

Does anyone have any advise as to why they will not let us upgrade for the (W) Guarantee Suite rate I can see on line???

 

Thanks:)

 

They are letting you upgrade for the (W) Guarantee Suite rate you see online - but for ONE cabin. From what you wrote, the issue is when you decided you needed to upgrade TWO cabins.

 

Guarantee cabins are limited in number - so perhaps they only have one available at this rate (or at this time).

[villauk]

I'm checking about 3 times a day - think I'm a bit obsessed!

 

We all are :). TBH, they are probably sick of us all ringing and asking :D. My US TA thinks I'm losing it...lol. It's past final payment there now, so let's see what transpires over the next week or so ;). Fingers crossed we all get what we want :).

[hillsprint]

We sailed on the Solstice in 2012 in the Med out of Barcelona. We had a std veranda booked, but about 4 weeks before the sailing date, I noticed the price of a S1 was only £200 more. I contacted my Celebrity PCS and got the suite. It was a fabulous cruise and well worth it from the official and unofficial perks we got.

 

I'm on the Reflection in August and will just keep checking :)

[quicklabs]

We were in the same "no vacation" situation for three years while we cared for our aged Lab. We lost her at age 14 1/2 in August. I know how deep your sadness is. Wishing you a great healing cruise.

[Suite Susie]

We were in the same "no vacation" situation for three years while we cared for our aged Lab. We lost her at age 14 1/2 in August. I know how deep your sadness is. Wishing you a great healing cruise.

 

Thank you so much for your kind words. Elsa was also 14 1/2 and we miss her every day. Booking a cruise is our therapy and we are so looking forward to it.

[tartantiara]

We are in the UK and are sailing in three weeks time. Yesterday I upgraded from the lowest OV cabin to a C2 Concierge cabin for £120 pp and we managed to keep our free beverage package and free gratuities we booked direct with Celebrity and I have been phoning them every week for the last four weeks until they came up with an offer I liked perseverance pays off

[Suite Susie]

We are in the UK and are sailing in three weeks time. Yesterday I upgraded from the lowest OV cabin to a C2 Concierge cabin for £120 pp and we managed to keep our free beverage package and free gratuities we booked direct with Celebrity and I have been phoning them every week for the last four weeks until they came up with an offer I liked perseverance pays off

 

Well done that sounds like a great deal. Were you booked direct with X and did you see price reduction on line or was it only on the phone? Hope you have a great cruise.

[tartantiara]

Well done that sounds like a great deal. Were you booked direct with X and did you see price reduction on line or was it only on the phone? Hope you have a great cruise.

 

 

We booked direct with Celebrity, I knew the prices were going down but the price we got was not advertised and I didn't think we would be allowed to keep the perks , well pleased

Rosy

[Iamthesea]

We are due to embark on our first Celebrity cruise in 11 days.

 

I looked at the prices a couple of weeks ago and noticed that they had (W) Guarantee Suites at £300 less than we paid for an 1A balcony.

 

Even though it would mean losing the 123go promotion I was quite interested in upgrading. I went to the Travel Agent I booked through who contacted X for me and at that time the person from X agreed that the price would be less than we paid. Because we are travelling with my parents we would have wanted to upgrade two cabins, but as it was a Sunday the person at X said the TA would need to phone on the Monday to see whether Revenue would release another Suite to (W) guaranteed.

 

The TA contacted X again on the Monday, however the new person said that although they were prepared to release another suite there would be an additional cost of approx £3,000 - which was the cost of the S2 not the cost of the Guarantee. My TA tried to negotiate but was told by the supervisor that this was the price.

 

I have looked online today and see that they are still offering the (W) Guarantee Suite £300 lower than we paid for the 1A.

 

Does anyone have any advise as to why they will not let us upgrade for the (W) Guarantee Suite rate I can see on line???

 

Thanks:)

 

If I were you, I would go ahead and upgrade to the one GTY Sky Suite for yourself. Then I would look for another GTY offer to reappear. It has been our experience that the GTY offer will disappear for a day or two, then reappear as they try to sell another. Sometimes, it will reappear within a matter of hours. ;)

 

The last time we upgraded from a 1A to a Sky Suite GTY, the Celebrity rep told me that we were lucky that we snagged the last GTY SS. Sure enough, the GTY disappeared from online after we booked it. However, later that night, another GTY appeared.

 

I find it easier to Bookmark an online TA's website (set to the cruise you are interested in) and check the site multiple times a day to catch a price drop. Or you can register your cruise on a popular "price dropping alert" site, that I am not allowed to mention on here. ;) Both are much easier than doing a mock booking on Celebrity.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Iamthesea

[villauk]

Don't know if anybody can give us any advice. We are currently booked in an S2 on the Equinox sailing out of Istanbul but would really like a CS which is currently just over £1700 (in total) more than we are currently paying. There looks like there are still a lot of empty cabins available - 301 in fact. All of the Celebrity Suites and Royal Suites are empty and we are wondering whether anybody has any experience of Upsells when there seems to be a lot of availability. We sail 11 weeks today and although we are very happy with our S2, we would love to have the chance to sail in a CS again. Not interested in an S1 due to bad knees and the distance to the elevators.

 

Should we just be patient and wait for a possible price reduction or pay the extra now (which will mean stretching ourselves somewhat) and have first pick of the Suites. Any advice would be much appreciated. Very excited about this cruise as it's been 4 years since we were last able to cruise due to looking after our ageing Golden Retriever who sadly had to be put to sleep in April.

 

I take it you decided to take the plunge and upgrade as your old cabin is now available?

[groryjm]

We're booked on X Reflection in under 30 days (have paid in full). I noticed that although the entire ship is nearly all sold out besides 3 C2s and a C1 there are are a few suites unsold - 1 PH, 2 RSs, 3 SGs, 3 CSs and 2 S1s.

 

We are booked in an angled CS and based on the web site the difference between a CS and an RS is £4500. I wondered if I might be able to get an upsell to an RS for a reasonable deal so phoned my TA. They said they'd phone X and get back...... They emailed this morning and said X were asking £6116 to upgrade:eek:

 

If they had simply emailed back to say X weren't prepared to offer us an upgrade I would have just accepted it but is it me or are figures of the like quoted just insulting. Shame we can't name TAs here.:(

 

Would any other UK TA been better or is it a UK thing. Can you transfer a UK booking back to X?

 

(We booked a CS with the same TA last year and have booked 2 CSs and an S1 for 2016 with them. So I think you could say we are quite a good customer for this TA.)

 

Sorry to rant and hope this isn't too off topic

[Project_gal]

We're booked on X Reflection in under 30 days (have paid in full). I noticed that although the entire ship is nearly all sold out besides 3 C2s and a C1 there are are a few suites unsold - 1 PH, 2 RSs, 3 SGs, 3 CSs and 2 S1s.

 

We are booked in an angled CS and based on the web site the difference between a CS and an RS is £4500. I wondered if I might be able to get an upsell to an RS for a reasonable deal so phoned my TA. They said they'd phone X and get back...... They emailed this morning and said X were asking £6116 to upgrade:eek:

 

If they had simply emailed back to say X weren't prepared to offer us an upgrade I would have just accepted it but is it me or are figures of the like quoted just insulting. Shame we can't name TAs here.:(

 

Would any other UK TA been better or is it a UK thing. Can you transfer a UK booking back to X?

 

(We booked a CS with the same TA last year and have booked 2 CSs and an S1 for 2016 with them. So I think you could say we are quite a good customer for this TA.)

 

Sorry to rant and hope this isn't too off topic

 

I take it, from what you have said, that the current price of a CS is higher than when you booked. The price asked for an upgrade is always the difference between what you actually paid and the current price of the higher-grade room.

 

This is the risk you take by not booking the category you really want at the beginning. You loose the advantage of booking early. I know. We have made the mistake a couple of times ourselves.

 

I have noticed that Celebrity appear to reduce the price of the higher-end suites less since the announcement of the new Suite Class perks. My guess is that they are reluctant to undervalue them at this stage. [believe it or not, there were people on our latest cruise who had not idea of the perks they had signed up to!] On our latest two cruises, the prices held up until the ship sailed and Celebrity managed to sell everything but one PH on one of the cruises. Rumour had it that someone did a good deal at embarkation BUT all the crew knew that they had not paid the full price ...

 

Unfortunately, I am not sure there are enough higher-end suites still available on your cruise this far our for you to get a deal at this stage but keep watching. If they follow the routine that I have witnessed recently, they will start offering guarantees. I have seen a RS Guarantee a number of times when a PH is still available - clearly holding out the carrot of the PH - BUT at the price of the guarantee is that of the RS immediately beforehand.

 

They may offer a CS Guarantee at the current price of a CS. This would be more that that you have paid but you MAY get a RS. Then again you may get a less desirable CS. Would you take the gamble?

[excitedofharpenden]

We're booked on X Reflection in under 30 days (have paid in full). I noticed that although the entire ship is nearly all sold out besides 3 C2s and a C1 there are are a few suites unsold - 1 PH, 2 RSs, 3 SGs, 3 CSs and 2 S1s.

 

We are booked in an angled CS and based on the web site the difference between a CS and an RS is £4500. I wondered if I might be able to get an upsell to an RS for a reasonable deal so phoned my TA. They said they'd phone X and get back...... They emailed this morning and said X were asking £6116 to upgrade:eek:

 

If they had simply emailed back to say X weren't prepared to offer us an upgrade I would have just accepted it but is it me or are figures of the like quoted just insulting. Shame we can't name TAs here.:(

 

Would any other UK TA been better or is it a UK thing. Can you transfer a UK booking back to X?

 

(We booked a CS with the same TA last year and have booked 2 CSs and an S1 for 2016 with them. So I think you could say we are quite a good customer for this TA.)

 

Sorry to rant and hope this isn't too off topic

 

This is normal if you paid less for your cabin when you booked than the quoted price now. Has the price you paid originally gone up? If it has then it's nothing to do with you travel agent. It's Celebrity policy. You might think you are a good customer with those cruises you have booked, but it's really quite insignificant in the grand scheme.

 

Phil

Edited June 13, 2015 by excitedofharpenden

[Suite Susie]

I take it you decided to take the plunge and upgrade as your old cabin is now available?

 

Yes lost our nerve as we fell in love with the angled hump cabins and didn't want to risk it. Researched similar itineraries all of which were more expensive so decided it probably wouldn't reduce dramatically anyway. Can't wait now - really excited.

[geric26]

Hi. As I understand we are pretty much "stuck" with our first booking choice if we book in the UK. I am often quite envious of US members who seem to be able to amend or cancel without penalty. I am slightly regretting a cabin choice for the September cruise from Istanbul, but as I also booked with Celebrity UK there is very little I can do. Wishing you all the best with changing. So sorry about the loss of your dog.

 

At last someone has offered sympathy about Suite Susies loss!