RCCL VISA rewards question

[Those people3836]

I have RCCL Visa rewards that are expiring soon so I was wanting to redeem the points for the free 3-4 night cruise. My question is A) has anyone redeemed the points for this cruise? And B) can you apply the rewards to a longer cruise?  

 

 

[Clarea]

We have redeemed points for the free 3/4 day cruise.  I don't believe you can redeem for a longer cruise.  Instead, redeem the points for OBC or a straight discount.

[cruiseguy1016]

Bob is correct, of course. With the way RCI plays games with their pricing, your points will have more cash value if you use them to reduce the cruise fare once it's booked or use them for OBC. Both of those scenarios give you dollar for dollar value on your points. While a "free" cruise sounds like a great idea, using your points for that "free" cruise will not give you nearly as much value.

[libertybelle41]

Another rewards question.  I will be using my points for OBC. My cruise is May 18, 2019. When should I request them? I don't want to do it too far in advance in case something happens and I have to cancel our cruise, but don't want to wait till the last minute either. 

 

Thanks

[RSLeesburg]

Quick question on this.  I was just looking at our points, and was wondering how you could apply them to pay down an existing booked cruise - can this be done through the rewards site, or do I need to call RCI?   

[Clarea]

3 minutes ago, libertybelle41 said:

Another rewards question.  I will be using my points for OBC. My cruise is May 18, 2019. When should I request them? I don't want to do it too far in advance in case something happens and I have to cancel our cruise, but don't want to wait till the last minute either. 

 

Thanks

 

Technically you can do it a week before the cruise, but I like to apply about 3 weeks before so I have some time to confirm and fix if necessary.

[Clarea]

6 minutes ago, RSLeesburg said:

Quick question on this.  I was just looking at our points, and was wondering how you could apply them to pay down an existing booked cruise - can this be done through the rewards site, or do I need to call RCI?   

 

That can be done using the redemption website.  Just look for the cruise discount redemptions.

[libertybelle41]

8 minutes ago, Host Clarea said:

 

Technically you can do it a week before the cruise, but I like to apply about 3 weeks before so I have some time to confirm and fix if necessary.

Great! Thank you.

[RSLeesburg]

16 minutes ago, Host Clarea said:

 

That can be done using the redemption website.  Just look for the cruise discount redemptions.

Awesome.  Thanks.  

[sjb317]

51 minutes ago, libertybelle41 said:

Another rewards question.  I will be using my points for OBC. My cruise is May 18, 2019. When should I request them? I don't want to do it too far in advance in case something happens and I have to cancel our cruise, but don't want to wait till the last minute either. 

 

Thanks

If you have to cancel , OBC from Visa points can be transferred to another cruise. I just did that this morning moving OBC from our cancelled Oasis TA.  Was a very easy phone call.😀

 

Sherri🙂

[marydill]

We applied $200 worth of points to a 7-day cruise we had already booked.  We had to do it by phone--not online.  Only problem was, it does not show on your amount due for that cruise until after the billing date--so you don't know how much to pay.  However, if you call them and explain the problem, they will go on and post the points as a payment--but it still takes them a couple weeks.  Bottom line, it works, go for it.

[Clarea]

Another idiosyncrasy of applying a discount to a booking.  In our case, they applied the redemption as a one-time reduction in price of the category we had booked.  Later, we wanted to upgrade our category, they did not take into account the Visa points redemption.  They wanted the difference between what we had paid, and the price of the new stateroom.  The Visa point redeption for discount would have been lost by upgrading.  We declined the upgrade.

 

So, I prefer to redeem for OBC, as long as I am intending to spend the amount of OBC anyhow, like for gratuities.  OBC that comes from Visa points can be applied to another cruise, and does not enter in the price difference when uograding.

[cruiseguy1016]

2 hours ago, marydill said:

We applied $200 worth of points to a 7-day cruise we had already booked.  We had to do it by phone--not online.  Only problem was, it does not show on your amount due for that cruise until after the billing date--so you don't know how much to pay.  However, if you call them and explain the problem, they will go on and post the points as a payment--but it still takes them a couple weeks.  Bottom line, it works, go for it.

 

 I'm not sure why you had to call. We always book our cruises a year in advance. We always use points to reduce the cruise fare about 2 or 3 weeks before final payment is due.