Princess, Buy $500 get $25 Free! :-)

[Suncitycruiser1925]

Purchased 3 $500 cards and so far I received via email 2 $500 digital cards and 2 $25 digital cards.  The third says it's being processed.  

[flutprop]

On 6/9/2019 at 11:55 AM, Ombud said:

Yes immediately and they both came thru on the same email. I actually have 4 emails received in that thread with a total of 8 cards (4 @ 500, 4 @ 25). FWIW: this time I bought all 4 with the same Visa, same email address, labeled to me / then FYI / then #3 / and finally #4. So apparently the computer doesn't care. 

 

I have 1 remaining cruise with a $2807 balance due by EOY. Does this repeat in December? 

 

Ombud, they did have a promo in Early December last year, from Dec 1-7 that gave a $50 promo card for every $1000 card purchased.

 

Also, to answer an early question, any leftover OBC from adding gift cards should be refunded to you.

[Suncitycruiser1925]

I received the third $500 digital card that I purchased last night, along with the $25 bonus card this morning via email.  I am going to try to purchase a few more to help pay for booked cruises.  

[RBAlbany]

Bought four yesterday.  May try one more round today.  Have just over $600 left to pay on cruise.  I see the gift card as OBC.  Applying to cruise payment it frees up budgeted money to use on ship.

[Thrak]

On 6/10/2019 at 1:17 PM, Thrak said:

I called Princess this morning and attempted to apply my 4 bonus cards. I got someone who was pretty clueless. First she tried to do it as a $100 credit but, since it's 4 separate cards, she got confused and messed it up. She said "Don't worry" and the tried to cancel the transaction and start over with 4 separate transactions. We got two cards added but then she hit the ones she had already used and messed up. They now show no balance. GAH!!! 

 

She said she would have to get hold of customer relations. I was on hold for another 20 minutes and then she came back and said nobody can fix it and I will need to wait a couple of days or so for the two cards to cycle through the cancellation and have the funds returned to them. I will call again in a couple of days and hope that I haven't just lost the $50 due to her not knowing how to do the transactions in the first place. Mind boggling. Really mind boggling. This was supposed to be a very simple and straight forward deal but she messed it up and it seems that nobody can fix it today.

 

Quoting my own post. Weird.

 

I called back this morning and got through almost immediately. WOW! I got a really nice guy who tried to figure out what the other person had done. While he didn't say anything bad about her he was definitely boggled that she had tried to apply 4 cards to a single transaction. He messed with it for quite a while but the cards still show a zero balance. He confirmed that 2 of the cards had been applied and also confirmed which numbers had been applied. Unlike the previous person, he sent me email confirmation regarding the two cards that had worked. He then asked to put me on hold while he contacted the finance department regarding returning funds to the two cards the previous person had messed up. When he came back he said finance told him it takes 10 - 15 business days for the funds to come back. Sigh...

 

He was extremely apologetic and also extremely puzzled that someone would try to do 4 cards in one transaction. I thanked him for his time and for confirming the numbers and sending the email confirmation for the 2 cards that were entered properly. I've put a reminder on my calendar to check again... on July 1. Hopefully the funds will have been restored by that time. I certainly wish I had gotten this guy the first time rather than the woman who seemed to have no idea what she was doing.

[Ombud]

Flight went down so I overpaid. Adding another $21.12 to OBC (used up $75 OBC with other gift cards as they expire end of July)

[Suncitycruiser1925]

Any disadvantage to paying for a cruise in full before the final due date?  Such as, if there is a price drop is it better to not have paid in full to try to get the lower rate?  Thanks.

[crystalspin]

I have it in my head that there was a disadvantage on HAL (this coming cruise being my first on Princess, do not take me for an expert)... Possibly just that you had to pay for cruise protection at the time of actually paying off the cruise? 

[Pierlesscruisers]

3 hours ago, Suncitycruiser1925 said:

Any disadvantage to paying for a cruise in full before the final due date?  Such as, if there is a price drop is it better to not have paid in full to try to get the lower rate?  Thanks.

 

 Either you can get a change to take advantage of a price drop, or you can't. I don't believe whether having already being paid in advance or not is going to have any bearing on the answer you'll receive.

 

Tom

Edited June 14, 2019 by Pierlesscruisers

[RBAlbany]

Just got two more.  I'm up to six!!

[Suncitycruiser1925]

One $25 gift bonus card would not work.  I called Princess about this about 2 weeks ago, but I have not gotten a reply.  I called and emailed the gift card customer service dept. today.  Anyone have any issues using the gift cards?  If yes, how long did it take to get it fixed?  I know the card expires 7/31, so I want to make sure I use it before that date.  Thanks.

[crystalspin]

One of my $500 cards would not apply (gave me a "your credit card is denied" or similar spurious error). I called my PVP, she saw the same thing and told me to call the general line or maybe it was special for gift card line... the weekend and a few days went by before I had enough time to stay on the line long enough to finally be connected to a live person. That person went through motions and said "That card has been applied." I denied it had been applied; person moved me up the 'tree' to another person, who said the same. Finally, the third person a true specialist in gift cards, read my outstanding balance back to me -- and it HAD been applied! 

 

Apparently my PVP had got someone on the problem the week before and solved it. I was quite embarrassed!!!

[denmarks]

On 6/7/2019 at 5:07 PM, 1emerald1 said:

And pay attention to the expiration date on the $25 card.

 

If you live in California I believe gift cards can not expire.

[neverbeenhere]

42 minutes ago, denmarks said:

 

If you live in California I believe gift cards can not expire.

 

 

Some of the time.

 

To clear this up, free gift cards can expire. 

Edited July 9, 2019 by neverbeenhere