Celebrity Luggage Valet Service

[multimul]

Our family just returned from a 5 night cruise on the Zenith, and we can tell you that the new luggage valet service was a complete waste of money. Here is our experience exactly as it happened:

(1) We received a letter in our cabin inviting us to sign up for this service at a cost of $10 pp. The letter said that anyone flying AA out of Miami, with a flight that left after 11:30 am, could use the service, and that by signing up, all you had to do was leave your bags outside the cabin door the night before debarkation, and the next time you see them would be at your home airport. The letter also said that instead of the usual color coded luggage tags, we would be issued the airline's own luggage tags. We signed up, since we were flying out of Miami at 11:39 am, to Laguardia in NY.

(2) When the luggage tags were distributed the morning before debarkation day, we received the normal color coded tags, with no explanation. Later that morning I went to the Guest Sevices Desk and asked why we didn't receive the airline tags. The woman at the desk asked me when my flight left. I told her 11:39 and she said that this flight was too early for us to use the service. I said that this was not what the letter said. By chance, another woman behind the desk overheard us, and she said that we were eligible for the service, but that the airline tags for anyone who signed up for this were going to be distributed later that evening, at which point we could ignore the other tags we were given. Very confusing! I'm sure I'm not the only one who had to get on line to ask about this.

(3) We eventually did get the airline tags, and left our bags outside the door. However, as we left the ship and entered the terminal, we were told that we had to claim our luggage, and hand carry it through Customs, just like everyone else. No big deal, but where is the convenience they promised?

(4) Now comes the worst part. The instructions that came with the tags said that as soon as we left the terminal, there would be a sign for the luggage valet service, where someone would be there to load the bags onto a vehicle for transport to the airport. Of course, when we exited the terminal, no such sign was there -- although there were plenty of Celebrity representatives with "Shore Excursion" signs. No one was able to tell us where to go with our luggage, and we waited nearly a half hour before someone from Celebrity came out and said that "the luggage van didn't show yet" and she "didn't know why" or "when it would show up". After a few more minutes with no more information, and a flight to catch, we decided to carry our luggage to a taxi and head to the airport.

(5) When we got to the American Airlines Terminal at Miami Airport, the man at the curbside luggage stand was confused because our bags already had been tagged as if they were checked in. He said we had to carry them inside the terminal to check them in.

(6) When we got inside the terminal, an AA representative looked at our tags and said they were no good because, although they had the correct flight number, they showed our destination as "MIA" rather than "LGA". In other words, she said our luggage had been mistagged aboard the Zenith and would very likely have been lost.

(7) We thaen had to drag our bags to another line to "Check them in" and get properly tagged. We did so. But then were told that we had to hand carry them to yet another line for "security" checking. We did, and here the ordeal finally ended.

CONCLUSION - Don't waste your time and money with this service. Even if everything went as promised, you would not really be saving any effort.

[Lois R]

Sorry the valet service turned out so poorly, other than that

how was your cruise?:)

[tuggers]

I had a totally opposite experience on Century.

 

I got the letter telling me about the service and explaining that if I used it I would also get my boarding pass shortly after midnight. At no time was I promised that I would not have to touch my bags in the terminal. (this wouldn't have been possible as EVERYONE has to go through customs)

 

I signed up. When the regular tags came, I asked my cabin steward who explained the 'special' tags would come later. And they did, in a separate envelope under my door. I put my bags out. Sure enough, right around midnight, my boarding pass appeared under the door.

 

When I disembarked, I was shown to a special area where my bags were easily retrieved and the porter took them through customs. Exiting the terminal there was a big truck with a sign on the side 'Luggage Valet Service'. The porter gave them my bags, I got in a taxi and went to the airport. As I had my boarding pass I was able to go straight to security.:)

 

All in all I thought it was a great service and I would use it again in a heartbeat. I was in FLL. Maybe your problems were partially the Port of Miami? And it is a new service. Maybe Century just had a better handle on it than Z?

[midwestsunshine]

Hi. We too were on the same cruise as multimul and used the "Luggage Valet Service." It sounded like a good idea but I probably won't try it again since it didn't work this time. I wonder if the truck did ever show up.

 

Our flight was 12:50pm and after waiting thru all the lines we only had a few minutes to spare before they called us for boarding.

 

Multimul- did you make your 11:39 flight.

 

The cruise itself was great. We had an extra sea day since it was too rough to dock in Costa Maya. That was fine with me since I wasn't looking forward to our Catamaran excursion after seeing the waves that morning.

By the way- we took the sunset catamaran sail in Cozumel (Celebrity excursion) and only had 16 people on the sail. It was like having a private sailing.

[dabear]

we used the luggage valet service in San Juan after our 2/4/06 cruise on the Connie and it was great. Of course we did not have a mixup as you did. It sure beat last years embarkation when one of our pieces of luggage was misplaced in the terminal and no one could help or wished to do so.

[Fblack]

I am not sure the service is worth the money at a US airport. I used it in Vancouver after my Radiance cruise to Alaska last August. It was great. It allowed us to bypass several very long lines. In Vancouver, there is an hour wait in the first line for Canadian immigration. Then U.S. customs then security. It usually takes 75 minutes or more in lines. With expedited baggage service, they took us to a special area outside of thew airport and checked passports et on the bus. Then in to a back door for a special security check line. Then to a special door to get to our gates.

 

Maybe 20 minutes tops once we got to the airport. I never touched my bags until I got home.

[tuggers]

It's only $10! I'd pay that just not to have my luggage in lt blue with 500 others!

[CruiseFever]

Help me understand:

 

I don't understand having to go through customs vs "set them outside your door and the next time you see them is at your home airport"

 

I've thought of doing it just for the ease of being able to NOT have to go through the luggage jungle and mosey right on out the door....this is not possible?

[multimul]

Sorry the valet service turned out so poorly, other than that

how was your cruise?:)

Lois - The cruise itself was very nice. Before this we had only sailed on HAL (6 cruises on HAL). Overall, I thought the food and shows were a little better than on HAL. The service was also good, although HAL was just as good. However, the two big downsides were (1) no wrap around deck for walking, other than the jogging track on the top deck which was usually very crowded; and (2) The ship itself was much more crowded than any HAL cruise we had been on. It was very difficult to find lounge chairs

[multimul]

Hi. We too were on the same cruise as multimul and used the "Luggage Valet Service." It sounded like a good idea but I probably won't try it again since it didn't work this time. I wonder if the truck did ever show up.

 

Our flight was 12:50pm and after waiting thru all the lines we only had a few minutes to spare before they called us for boarding.

 

Multimul- did you make your 11:39 flight.

 

The cruise itself was great. We had an extra sea day since it was too rough to dock in Costa Maya. That was fine with me since I wasn't looking forward to our Catamaran excursion after seeing the waves that morning.

By the way- we took the sunset catamaran sail in Cozumel (Celebrity excursion) and only had 16 people on the sail. It was like having a private sailing.

Midwester - Yes, we did make the flight. Sorry to sound so down about this service. We did enjoy the cruise. The way I figure it, even if the service had worked, here is the sum total of what you would gain: With the valet service, after you carry your bags out of the terminal, you would put them on a truck, and see them again at your home airport. Without the service, you would carry them to a taxi instead of the truck, and then check them in with the curbside luggage station at the airport, at which point you see them again at your home airport.

[tuggers]

My experience, which worked quite well, was they gave you different luggage tags which sent your luggage up to a sort of preferential treatment area right beside the customs and where the porters came in so it was VERY easy to snag a porter. then you went through the line and the porter gave your bags to the truck. For the fee you also were preissued your boarding pass the night before so you could by pass everything at the airport and go to security.

 

I really liked it and would do it again.

[sisson_d]

I was on the Feb. 20th Zenith cruise as well, and also used the vallet service. That vallet service tainted the whole voyage for me. From reading info on these boards, I knew that we would have to claim our bags for customs. I still thought it was worth the $10/person because we would get boarding tickets for our flight and wouldn't have to wait at check-in at the airport.

 

What really burned me up wasn't the fact that the luggage van was no where in sight, but that no one from celebrity had any information for us. They all just kept saying, "it's not here". No info on when it may show up. And no one knew what would happen to us if we took our checked bags to the airport ourselves.

 

I eventually figured out that we could no longer wait because we had a 11:44am flight to JFK. So, we boarded a transfer bus at 9:45am with our luggage. Unfortunately, it took over an hour to get to our terminal at the airport. My wife was able to get the other passengers (with much later flights) to let us off the bus first so we could make our way through the airport.

 

We were very lucky becuase the first American Airlines rep. we found happened to be in charge of checking in the bags from the vallet service. Without his help we would have missed our flight. He tried to check in our bags like he would if he got them from the cruise terminal, but there was a problem. Only my bags were checked in. My wife's tags did not register. He snuck us in to the front of the check-in line (which looked to be about 1/2 an hour long) and stayed with us until we were all set.

 

The reason my wife's bags were not checked is because the boarding pass Celebrity had issued her onboard was actually a stand-by ticket and the flight was oversold. According to the ticket agent, our original reservation, booked through Celebrity, hadn't been used to by the on-board staff. Thankfully, she used the original reservation number I gave her to print the real boarding pass and we were set to board the plane.

 

ANOTHER PROBLEM, by this time there was only 35 minutes left before flight departure. The deadline for checking bags is 45 minutes before a flight. The nice man that had stayed with us told me he would try to get them on the plane. If not, they would be on the next flight 1 hour later. Not the end of the world, but ARRRRGH.

 

We then ran to security and got through in about 20 minutes. We ran to the gate right as they announced final boarding and we made our flight. If we had skipped the vallet service we would have been on the first transfer bus that morning because we had priority disembarkation even w/o the vallet service. We would have had plenty of time. Instead we waited around for a van that may have never showed up and watched everyone else make their way to the airport.

 

As I sat in the plane, out of breath and covered in sweat, I vowed to NEVER go on Celebrity again. Later, when I calmed down, I decided to wait and see how easy Celebrity makes it for me to get the $20 refund, and let that be the deciding factor in whether I sail with them again. Hopefully, they make it easy, the wife loves Celebrity.

 

Sorry for the long sob story, but I wanted everyone to see just how inconvenient the vallet service could be when things go wrong.

 

ADVICE: DO NOT use the vallet service if you have an early flight.

Doug

 

BTW, the luggage made it to JFK with us. Thank you anonymous American Airlines baggage handler.

[MRSKitty]

Sisson D,

 

I'm sorry you had such a bad experience with the valet service. However, you should always keep a few things in mind. If I am correct, Celebrity employees do not have control of when an outside service shows up. If the truck was delayed, there is nothing that they can do about it at that time. From what I have heard, Celebrity's employee's try very hard to please their customers. I'm sure it was just as frustrating to them that there was a problem, and that they could not fix it immediatly or give answers that were needed.

 

Also, I have learned that no matter where I go, vacation, business trip, what ever...things arn't always going to be perfect. I just take them as they come and give a smile. I never let any misshap ruin anything for me. If I did,t hen I would never have a good time. If someone were to be severly injured or die...THAT would ruin it for me. If you don't freak out about things you will feel better, be more relaxed, and never let the small stuff ruin any experiance for you.

[debby21]

We used the service yesterday in FLL. It was wonderful. Maybe the problems are with Miami?

 

Debby

[sisson_d]

First, I was under the impression that this was a celebrity service. Second, none of the celebrity peir personel that worked there seemed to care about our concerns. None of them even offered to look into it. If we had been dealing with the Zenith ship personel, I'm sure they would done a LOT more for us. Third, I am about as cool and collected as they come in the moment. During the whole thing I smiled and was polite. I'm not one of those people that you see on that "Airline" show that blow up and yell at people for something they have no control over. I just expected Celebrity to run a tighter ship, even if we were on land.

 

Doug

 

Sisson D,

 

I'm sorry you had such a bad experience with the valet service. However, you should always keep a few things in mind. If I am correct, Celebrity employees do not have control of when an outside service shows up. If the truck was delayed, there is nothing that they can do about it at that time. From what I have heard, Celebrity's employee's try very hard to please their customers. I'm sure it was just as frustrating to them that there was a problem, and that they could not fix it immediatly or give answers that were needed.

 

Also, I have learned that no matter where I go, vacation, business trip, what ever...things arn't always going to be perfect. I just take them as they come and give a smile. I never let any misshap ruin anything for me. If I did,t hen I would never have a good time. If someone were to be severly injured or die...THAT would ruin it for me. If you don't freak out about things you will feel better, be more relaxed, and never let the small stuff ruin any experiance for you.

[EMS8]

We used the luggage valet service in FLL yesteday as well. Like Debby21 said, it was great. We were sitting at our gate in FLL at 9:00 am! I will definately use this service again. $10 pp is a bargin.

[redheadskier]

Guess I am confused -Zenith is coming into Miami, I am flying out of FLL (not American b-t-w.flying on Continental) around 12:30 Sat the 6th

 

Those of you who used the service, did your ship come into Miami and you flew out of FLL, and those who say they used it for FLL same question - did you come into FLL on your shipand fly out there?

 

I would tend to use such a service - esp as I have heard FLL is sort of a zoo on Weekends - and this being college spring break any advantage is appreciated (my husband is terrible in airports!!):rolleyes:

 

AndIhave never been to FLL or Miami to boot - yikes!

[FinelyCruising]

I think the intent of this new valet service is for cruisers with later flights. Not to tick anyone off...I don't think a flight around noon time is a late flight...4 or 5 in the afternoon is, and the cruiseline may be their own wost ememy in this regard.

 

I think the cruise line has to fine tune their own gig a bit...