How are those of you getting approved for shareholder OBC applying?

[Angua]

Got approval for my $100 credit for my casino rate Alaska cruise.  Submitted on 4/29.  Sent request via email.

Edited May 19, 2022 by Angua

[rj59]

21 hours ago, crazy4themouse said:

Just had my October one denied for the second time.. Oh well. It wasn't really that much of a discounted rate but was, I believe, a casino rate with a big chunk of OBC so I think I'll live without the additional $50. It's just the "spirit" of it that rubs me the wrong way as a longtime stockholder, you know?

 

 

It's the short-sightedness of the cost-cutting that I have a problem with, since you're alienating customers loyal enough to buy stock in your company. The risk in that is that they have other lines that own the stock to choose instead, so I canceled multiple Carnival cruises over the winter when my OBC was refused and chose Princess instead, because they offered not only the shareholder benefit, but a military OBC also, along with frequent waiving of single supplements. The money itself isn't that important, it's the principle of the thing and feeling valued. I'm still waiting on an answer for a Spirit cruise to Alaska in 6 days, but it was a $90 solo VIFP offer, so I won't cancel, but if it doesn't come through they'll have lost more goodwill from me, and I'll be more likely to choose other lines for my fall/winter Mexico trips. 

[SgtFalstaff]

Sent mine via email on 4 May and approved on 17 May. Was a VIFP rate, nothing special. 

[joeygold]

Let me start by saying that I have never had an issue on my previous 9 sailings getting the shareholder OBC (whether I sent via fax or email).

 

My recent experience is outlined below.  One OBC was approved as usual and one was originally rejected but ultimately approved.

 

We have 2 rooms booked on Carnival Horizon 8 day Southern Caribbean cruise sailing 5/28/22.  One inside cabin in my name and one balcony cabin in my wife's name (so we can ultimately have our 2 kids use the inside cabin and my wife and I use the balcony).  My wife and I each own over 100 shares, in separate brokerage accounts, each account in our own name.

 

Balcony cabin (wife is primary guest) - OBC approved as usual:

- booked with a "normal" VIFP discounted rate ($2,100 total for 2 pax - cruise fare and port taxes)

- submitted request via email 4/14/22 to "shareholders@carnival.com" with the pdf of March 2022 brokerage statement for my wife's account, and contained all information mentioned in previous posts (Name, Booking #, Ship, and Sail Date).  Received autoreply from Carnival Guest Admin with an "incident/tracking" number (same as previous posters) immediately after submission.

- received email 5/9/22 from Carnival Guest Admin with "boilerplate" reply letting me know that $100 OBC had been applied to my reservation.

- also received an email on 5/9/22 from "cabinconfirmations@carnival.com" showing the OBC on my account.

 

Inside cabin (I am primary guest) - OBC originally rejected but ultimately approved:

- booked with a "special offer" VIFP discounted rate ($600 total for 2 pax - cruise fare and port taxes).  This was a limited time offer (maybe 48 hours - I don't recall) and also included a $200 OBC as part of the promotion.  This was NOT a casino rate or travel agent rate or some "comp" rate, but it is what I would consider a more deeply discounted rate than "normal" VIFP or resident rates.  With OBC offer, net $400 cost for inside cabin for 2 people for 8 days in May is much lower than my past experiences.

- similar to Balcony summary above, submitted request via email 4/14/22 to "shareholders@carnival.com" with the pdf of March 2022 brokerage statement for my account, and contained all information mentioned in previous posts (Name, Booking #, Ship, and Sail Date).  Received autoreply from Carnival Guest Admin with an "incident/tracking" number (same as previous posters) immediately after submission.

- received email 5/4/22 from Carnival Guest Admin with "boilerplate" reply rejecting my request (similar to what others have posted), letting me know that my request for OBC does not qualify because I was sailing on a "reduced rate" promotion.

- followed advice of previous posts in this thread and resubmitted my OBC request via email on 5/5/22 (only difference from original 4/14/22 email is I used April 2022 brokerage statement).  Received autoreply with "incident/tracking" number immediately after submission.

- did not hear anything from Carnival as of 5/20/22.  Since we are sailing in 8 days, followed advice of others in this post and called Guest Admin at 800-438-6744 x 70450.  Only spent 1-2 minutes on hold.

- provided my booking number and "new incident/tracking" number (from 5/5/22 email) to Guest Services rep Diana.

- Diana was able to find my previously submitted email, saw the brokerage statement, agreed that everything was in order, and applied $100 shareholder OBC to my reservation.

- similar to Balcony summary above, prior to finishing my call with Diana, I received the email from "cabinconfirmations@carnival.com" now showing total OBC on my account of $300 ($200 for original promotion plus $100 for the shareholder benefit).

- also received email from guestadmin@carnival.com with "boilerplate" reply letting me know that $100 OBC had been applied to my reservation, signed by Diana (Diana Garcia-Miller)

 

I want to say thank you to all of you that have posted your experiences, suggestions, etc.  By following your information, I ultimately received shareholder benefit for both rooms.

 

PS - while I was on the phone with Diana, I also had her process my $100 shareholder benefit for an upcoming Sept 2022 cruise on Mardi Gras (I submitted the request 5/6/22, but had not heard anything).  That cruise was booked with a "normal" VIFP offer.  Diana did tell me that Carnival is processing shareholder benefit requests for cruises booked all the way out to July 2023.  Thus, once OBC is applied, I guess it doesn't matter if you actually own the shares when you sail. 

 

 

 

 

[bobsfamily]

Sent the request a couple of weeks ago for a September cruise... is a casino rate and the answer was - NO. Oh well

[hockeyluver]

On 5/21/2022 at 5:35 PM, bobsfamily said:

Sent the request a couple of weeks ago for a September cruise... is a casino rate and the answer was - NO. Oh well

try sending them in again,  2 of my 3 were casino rates.

[ninjacat123]

On 5/21/2022 at 12:05 PM, joeygold said:

We have 2 rooms booked on Carnival Horizon 8 day Southern Caribbean cruise sailing 5/28/22.  One inside cabin in my name and one balcony cabin in my wife's name (so we can ultimately have our 2 kids use the inside cabin and my wife and I use the balcony).  My wife and I each own over 100 shares, in separate brokerage accounts, each account in our own name.

My brokerage account has both my name and my husband's on it.  With 200 shares in the account, can I send the same statement in when we book a room with his name on it and a room with my name on it and get the shareholder's credit for both rooms?  Thanks for your insight!

[Tom-n-Cheryl]

40 minutes ago, ninjacat123 said:

My brokerage account has both my name and my husband's on it.  With 200 shares in the account, can I send the same statement in when we book a room with his name on it and a room with my name on it and get the shareholder's credit for both rooms?  Thanks for your insight!

 

I don't see why not. I would, however, submit them a few days apart, just to avoid one person getting both in front of them at the same time and making an on the spot executive decision!

 

Tom

[ontheweb]

1 hour ago, ninjacat123 said:

My brokerage account has both my name and my husband's on it.  With 200 shares in the account, can I send the same statement in when we book a room with his name on it and a room with my name on it and get the shareholder's credit for both rooms?  Thanks for your insight!

Even if it was only 100 shares in the account with separate cabins, both should be approved. I would, however, go with the advice of not sending them together.

[Tom-n-Cheryl]

2 minutes ago, MalteseFred said:

 

If I may opine, if both cabins are under the same booking #, then one will only get the shareholder benefit once.

 

Thanks,

Fred..

 

PS: Tom, the other day I promised you I would tell you my TIVO shareholding.

Purchased 1000 shares at an all-time high of $58, this was in the heyday of the dot.com

bubble.....the following darn day they started sliding down and never went back up ...eventually

ended up having to liquidate them at around $7 when TIVO was bought out ...... every single time I think about them, I nearly get congestive heart failure, again! 

A very different outcome from my $1.05/share Carnival purchase of the early 1990s.

 

 

Ouch --- yep, investing reality check! I had a small number of Sirius shares and watched them head down to $.05 (it was assumed that they were going under), then were "rescued". I wish I would have had the nerve to buy under $.10, but if I had, it probably would have gone under - LOL

 

Regarding the booking #/OBC thing - doesn't each cabin have it's own booking number, just by default?

 

Tom

[crespo]

I applied by email on May 16 and received an answer approving my shareholder OBC today (so it took 9 days).  I'm travelling on a 7 day Alaska cruise with a VIFP fare (a rock bottom one, I'm paying $319 for a solo porthole cabin before taxes/fees). 

 

As somebody else pointed out, the timestamp was weird, 3:22am (Pacific Time). Somebody was burning  the midnight oil or they have a serious email backlog at Carnival. 

 

Good luck to all that have applied.

 

[RoOkla]

On 4/9/2022 at 4:49 PM, 13cheermom said:

Just submitted mine for a November cruise this fall.  Got a response back stating" they had received my email and are happy to look into my inquiry and get back as soon as they can".  So okay that sounds normal, then it says "due to increase in inquiries their response time will take longer than normal. We will process your requests as rapidly as possible but keep in mind this may happen as late as the week prior to sailing". 😱  "Please do not submit any duplicate requests."  Is this the normal message going out now for stockholder requests.  It has been 2 years since sailing with Carnival, but don't remember that kind of message before. Anyone else see this before??

I always use the email request, but if I don't hear anything I ask my Carnival booking agent (Carlos @ 85523) to assist and he always get's me my OBC.

[RoOkla]

2 hours ago, ninjacat123 said:

My brokerage account has both my name and my husband's on it.  With 200 shares in the account, can I send the same statement in when we book a room with his name on it and a room with my name on it and get the shareholder's credit for both rooms?  Thanks for your insight!

I think we've been on other cruises together.  Your sign-on looks familiar.  Did you guys do the Long Beach to Singapore right before the Covid fiasco?  

 

Can you guys explain if it tells you your cruise category on the booking page?  I looked but couldn't find which code we are sailing under.  It was the deal where an inside cabin was free, but you had to pay a small fee for each cabin upgrade.  I truly appreciate your assistance.  I'm looking forward to start our long sailing again.

[ninjacat123]

10 minutes ago, RoOkla said:

I think we've been on other cruises together.  Your sign-on looks familiar.  Did you guys do the Long Beach to Singapore right before the Covid fiasco?  

I wish we would have been on that cruise!  We have never cruised out of Long Beach but someday we will😄 All of our cruises have been East Coast, almost all on Carnival.

[rj59]

I finally got mine approved, a week or so before the cruise. I was slightly irritated that I chose a 6-day leaving today, instead of 7 on the Splendor, which would have given me an extra $50. Having had to deal with customer service on Royal, Princess, and Carnival throughout the pandemic, I have to say I've had the best experiences with Carnival, for ease of getting a rep, for ease of canceling and getting a quick refund over disagreement with covid protocols, and most importantly, getting a friendly, easily-understood, US-based rep. My shareholder OBC denials were all in late-fall and early-winter, when demand and capacity dropped again from omicron, so I think it was just a way for them to try to limit costs. Depending on when you bought, too, being a shareholder might have lost you more money than the OBCs are worth, if you'd invested something with better growth and dividends instead. 

[silverturtle]

I received the OBC for 100.00 for this june sailing, seems like it only took 3 weeks. I sent mine in using snail mail and everything went fine. I also have the casino rate and it was approved without a problem.

[kctwinmommy]

On 5/19/2022 at 2:46 PM, Tom-n-Cheryl said:

 

I'll bet you wish you had bought 10,000 !!!

 

Darn crystal ball (of mine). Yours did VERY well !

 

Tom

I wish my husband had that when he bought Amazon stock in like 2000! We could have certainly bought more at the time (both fully employed, no kids). But for some reason, he bought it on a whim and only bought like 20 shares!

 

Now we did get lucky with our Ferrari stock. We bought 100 shares of that as a gift for our son, as he loved the high end cars (who doesn't! LOL!). Bought them at almost they're lowest price in 2016, and they have done well. We don't do much in the stock market personally, but we got lucky with that one.

[kctwinmommy]

I'll have to try the suggested way to do this. We just bought stock 2 weeks ago. I didn't even realize there was a benefit for it on the ships. Good to know!

[farjar]

I tried submitting my original request by email on March 8.  On March 27 they emailed they weren't able to open my information in the form submitted.  I am not tech oriented so I snail mailed the information on March 27 and received an email on May 22 we were accepted for both our upcoming cruises in Sept. and Dec.

[Travel Bear]

I faxed mine in weeks ago, got a canned response saying long wait time but should hear back 1 week prior to sailing. Depart June 10 so am hopeful. 

[pc_load_letter]

Woohoo, was granted my $50 obc for my July cruise on Radiance out of LBC.

 

I sent my first request about three weeks ago and was worried I did not hear anything back. I sent another email yesterday and today I have the reply granting the obc.

 

Thanks to @ninjacat123 as I used your template for my email.

 

Guess the wife can get a purse or I can get some booze. Maybe steakhouse.

[byrdbrain55]

I sent mine in through email on May 23 and got an email back granting my OBC on May 29.

 

[Fatcat604]

I bought the share, and I will submit it next week. Can I just screen shot the share document by iPhone and submit it through email? 
the share is under my name, if my husband get another 100 share, we will open an join account by then. Can we submit it for another room? I’m worry about minimum requirement in future to receive benefit. Thank you 

[ontheweb]

13 minutes ago, Fatcat604 said:

I bought the share, and I will submit it next week. Can I just screen shot the share document by iPhone and submit it through email? 
the share is under my name, if my husband get another 100 share, we will open an join account by then. Can we submit it for another room? I’m worry about minimum requirement in future to receive benefit. Thank you 

Yes, each can apply in separte cabins. If in the same cabin, the rule is one per cabin.

[AnitaVacation]

I got my first denial...the first two cruises I submitted for, I faxed it in, no problems.  This time I decided to email it in and it was denied with the excuse: you purchased a special rate cruise, not eligible.  Well, that last two cruises were also special rate cruises (casino deals) and there was no problem.  So I resubmitted via fax....so, hopefully it will go through.