DYKWIA Posted March 1, 2016 #1 Share Posted March 1, 2016 (edited) So the buy one, get one half price ( plus free classic drink package) sale finally came to an end yesterday in the UK........To be immediately replaced with a new one , the discount of up to £500 and classic drink package. Gulp, not as good as the buy one get one half price. Even worse, I thought, it's only a £200 discount for balconys. So I priced up the exact same holiday (Equinox 19th May) in a balcony and in a suite and the overall price has gone up by about £25 in a balcony and about £45 with the balcony coming in at about £2500 and the suit £4500. No matter how I work it I just can't do the maths....do these words buy one get one half price, £200 free have any real meaning? They state the drinks package has a value of £500, either way it's a constant so can be disregarded for the purpose of comparing the price. If we say X is the supposed pre sale cruise price which again should be a constant, then under the old offer X + 0.5X = 2450, X equates to about £1633 Under the new offer 2X + 200 = 2500, X equates to £1150 Eh? Under the new offer it implies the original cruise price was almost £500 less today than it was yesterday, but this is the same cruise, just 24 hours later...... I'm struggling to see any relation between the wording of the offers and the price that is arrived at. Edited March 1, 2016 by DYKWIA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GUT2407 Posted March 1, 2016 #2 Share Posted March 1, 2016 Short answer no, the terms mean nothing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wiltonian Posted March 1, 2016 #3 Share Posted March 1, 2016 (edited) In the UK, for which the only 'offer' for 2017 cruises was the chance to rebook once if prices/offers improved, that has been replaced by a 'free' Classic drinks package. And one Baltic cruise which was from £2400 under the '2nd half price' offer is now from £1799 a person, a reduction of £1 pp on average! Stuart Edited March 1, 2016 by Wiltonian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DYKWIA Posted March 1, 2016 Author #4 Share Posted March 1, 2016 I do wonder what trading standards would make of these UK offers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liverpoollad Posted March 1, 2016 #5 Share Posted March 1, 2016 My wife & I are also on the Equinox on the 19th May. I have just been on the Celebrity UK web site & our balcony cabin C1 has gone up by £140 each, so our deal, including the Classic Drinks is still better than the new one.:) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigJH Posted March 1, 2016 #6 Share Posted March 1, 2016 ...same with us, ours is now £2300 more expensive for a family of four on our Baltic cruise in July. Strangely the standard balcony cabin is £1200 more expensive than a Concierge cabin?!?! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laslomas Posted March 1, 2016 #7 Share Posted March 1, 2016 In the UK, for which the only 'offer' for 2017 cruises was the chance to rebook once if prices/offers improved, that has been replaced by a 'free' Classic drinks package. And one Baltic cruise which was from £2400 under the '2nd half price' offer is now from £1799 a person, a reduction of £1 pp on average! Stuart I think the Drinks Included in 2017 may only be 'selected' sailings. I cannot see it offered for Europe cruises, but is available for Caribbean cruises in 2017 and some Panama Canal - but not all. Very hard to know when it is included and when it isn't. Not easy to browse for bargains. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timbom Posted March 1, 2016 #8 Share Posted March 1, 2016 Why can't they just offer the best price and forget all of the costly free extra's Have put off booking till the new sale which hopefully won't have all of these free extras. Guess we will know tomorrow in US as was told today is last day of "sale". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ptrpanpens Posted March 1, 2016 #9 Share Posted March 1, 2016 Why can't they just offer the best price and forget all of the costly free extra's Have put off booking till the new sale which hopefully won't have all of these free extras. Guess we will know tomorrow in US as was told today is last day of "sale". New "sale" has already posted on the Celebrity site. I say "sale" because the price of my cabin is $600+ higher with the same choice of two perks that I received a Couple of weeks ago when I booked with the "old" sale. Moral of the story "There's no such thing as a free lunch.":p However, there are much lower resident rates without the perks so be sure to sign in before you cost out the cruise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suzy Smith Posted March 1, 2016 #10 Share Posted March 1, 2016 Why can't they just offer the best price and forget all of the costly free extra's Have put off booking till the new sale which hopefully won't have all of these free extras. Like you, we find these constantly-changing offers are actually a disincentive to book. We generally book a long way out and have switched from Celebrity for our next cruise because it was getting too complicated to work out which was the best deal for us and whether or not a better deal would come along later and we just became bored with the whole game. UK pax can't cancel without losing their deposit and X seem to be restricting most promotions to new bookings only, so we can no longer take advantage of price drops, and it was impossible to know when was a good time to lock ourselves in to a deal. We are Elite Plus and drink little alcohol, but do like our coffees, so the Elite happy hour and Elite+ free coffees give us all the drinks that we need, but most of the X cruises now seem to be priced to include a drinks package, so they are not good value for us. Even without the Elite+ perks, we don't drink enough to cover the cost of a drinks package. We love Celebrity and may book a last-minute deal with no perks at some time in the future, but for the moment their marketing strategy has only encouraged us to look elsewhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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