Frustration and disappointment with Celebrity booking process

[JudithLynne]

My DH and I are Elite but have not been on a Celebrity ship in 3 years. We are hoping to book a 12 day Hawaii cruise for April 2018 on the Solstice. I looked at the Celebrity website as well as two others and then called our TA, a big box warehouse,and can’t believe what I am seeing. There are very few veranda staterooms listed as available and none on Deck 7 or 8. The ship looks like it is about 90% or more sold. The TA called Celebrity and was told that a good portion of cabins are “guaranteed” and must be booked that way

What has happened to their booking process? It was not like this when booking for our past many Celebrity cruises! At this point we are not booking due to lack of choice cabins. This cruise is over a year away! We are so disappointed.

I would appreciate any insight or feedback as this is very frustrating.

[Karynanne]

This cruise is in big demand, due to many passengers taking the cruise prior to this cruise. I'm not surprised at all that there aren't many cabins available.

 

 

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[CYNSport]

I think one issue is this Hawaii cruise a one time only cruise that is moving the Solstice to Alaska for the season. It follows a repositioning cruise ("Tahitian Treasures") and, in a sense, is the continuation of the repositioning of the Solstice. It must be nearly full, as you suggest. Because it is the only cruise of its kind, cruisers must have jumped on the booking the minute it became available, thus leading to a guarantee only so early. We have cruised many times on Celebrity and haven't encountered this situation, but I know that "one off" cruises sell out very quickly.

[benjaminhuf]

It might be worth trying to call Celebrity directly.

[grandgeezer]

I just checked celebrity.com and it shows limited availability in almost every balcony category. I didn't check deck plans. Pretty pricey though, about $3,500 p.p. The big online agency shows the same thing.

[Azulann]

Hope the OP comes back and thanks everyone for their insight and facts.

The title of this thread is a little over the top at first blush

 

 

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[Nic6318]

Hi there

 

This is my first booking with Celebrity, so I can't say from experience, but I have seen others who have posted that they booked a guarantee cabin and the after being assigned their cabin (and didn't like their location) were able to switch to another cabin in the same class without paying an upgrade fee. This isn't allowed with other cruise lines that I have sailed with, but if Celebrity allows it, it would be an good way to get a better cabin location without paying for the privilege.

[sanger727]

I'm on this cruise. Yes, even though it's still a year out you are nearly into 'late booking' now; we tried to take this cruise last year and found that by the time we went to book it was too close to sold out so pushed it back to this year. We ended up booking in sept 2016 to get the room choice and prices we want.

 

Just a combination of a popular itinerary that is only offered twice a year. Not a celebrity cruises thing, the cruise we missed out on for last year was royal's version. It's just this itinerary.

 

 

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[JudithLynne]

Thank you all for the clarification on what underlies our booking problem, I appreciate all of your comments. After the first few replies, I looked at the roll call and it really told the story.

It looks like there are some cabins on Deck 6 and one is above the photo gallery which should indicate a quiet cabin and more central than other available cabins on higher floors. We may go ahead and book that one.

Again...much appreciation for your input.....