Why book refundable deposit?

[Shiba_Lover]

Hi all - I was browsing the other day and pricing out the refundable vs non-refundable deposit options for Retreat class.  Deposit is 900 and with the refundable deposit, it ups the price by 1398 for the sailing I was looking at.  From what I can tell given current rules - the ONLY difference is if you cancel prior to final payment, you get your deposit back with the refundable deposit. They have the same fee schedule for cancellation prior to final payment. If you cancel prior to final payment with the non-refundable, you pay a $100 penalty/person then get the rest back in FCC.  So you lose only $200 really unless you just don't plan on taking another cruise.  Am I misunderstanding this????  I must be as there would really be no reason (to me) to pay $1200 more if the only difference is you lose $200 with non-refundable given that I would still most likely plan to take another cruise in the future.  Can someone explain it better if I have misunderstood?  Thanks!!

Edited November 9, 2022 by ehall

[39august]

Ii have been thinking of going to NRD for this reason. Haven't done it yet. but certainly considering. Seems they are really jacking up the price for refundable. 

[patty1955]

13 minutes ago, ehall said:

 If you cancel prior to final payment with the non-refundable, you pay a $100 penalty/person then get the rest back in FCC.  So you lose only $200 really unless you just don't plan on taking another cruise.  Am I misunderstanding this????  I must be as there would really be no reason (to me) to pay $1200 more if the only difference is you lose $200 with non-refundable given that I would still most likely plan to take another cruise in the future.  Can someone explain it better if I have misunderstood?  Thanks!!

We've transferred our deposit on several different cruise and never been charged the $100 penalty. 

[LB_NJ]

For $1400 dollars difference I would book NRD however the difference in price between refundable and NRD can vary.  On one cruise I booked the difference was below $200 so I booked refundable, just in case.

[Cruise Junky]

I find some online TAs have much narrower price difference on the Refundable vs Non Refundable.  

[Shiba_Lover]

2 hours ago, patty1955 said:

We've transferred our deposit on several different cruise and never been charged the $100 penalty. 

So did you have the refundable deposit booked?  Or were you moving to the same ship/itinerary just a different date?  I think that's allowed, but a different ship or different itinerary = the 100 penalty.

[patty1955]

Just now, ehall said:

So did you have the refundable deposit booked?  Or were you moving to the same ship/itinerary just a different date?  I think that's allowed, but a different ship or different itinerary = the 100 penalty.

We had a non-refundable deposit. We changed to completely different cruises. Neither time were we charged the penalty

[Shiba_Lover]

So it sounds like my understanding is correct, and that maybe Celebrity is thinking people who jump in and book really quickly without reading the fine prints are going to just pay a lot more and think "refundable deposit" means "fully refundable"

[Shiba_Lover]

1 minute ago, patty1955 said:

We had a non-refundable deposit. We changed to completely different cruises. Neither time were we charged the penalty

Nice - that's good!  You have a very good TA or got a really nice rep on the phone!!  

[patty1955]

1 minute ago, ehall said:

Nice - that's good!  You have a very good TA or got a really nice rep on the phone!!  

Our TA is a big box, membership store. It might help that we're are Elite Plus.

[Sox Fan Cruiser]

I think it's more a consideration for people who don't cruise a lot.  A huge FCC is no big deal for me as I'll use it.  But when I am traveling with someone that may or may not cruise with Celebrity again it may be a different story.   

[Shiba_Lover]

1 minute ago, patty1955 said:

Our TA is a big box, membership store. It might help that we're are Elite Plus.

Does it start with a C and end with an O?  we are pretty close to Elite plus.  Maybe this is where it actually helps 😁

[patty1955]

23 minutes ago, ehall said:

Does it start with a C and end with an O?  we are pretty close to Elite plus.  Maybe this is where it actually helps 😁

That sounds right.

[dani negreanu]

36 minutes ago, Sox Fan Cruiser said:

I think it's more a consideration for people who don't cruise a lot.  A huge FCC is no big deal for me as I'll use it.  But when I am traveling with someone that may or may not cruise with Celebrity again it may be a different story.   

 

^This.

[jelayne]

1 hour ago, patty1955 said:

Our TA is a big box, membership store. It might help that we're are Elite Plus.

Elite Plus does come not into play.  We are Elite + and  changed to a different ship and date and were charged the $100.  

[Jeremiah1212]

A few reasons. Some people are just adamant on having the flexibility. The majority of people don’t know about the $100/pp fee to change. 
 

If you book NRD there is also a chance the TA pulled your booking into group space without you knowing and you ultimately did have a refundable fare. 

[LuAnn]

I booked refundable because I always book a long ways out and my DH was not in the best of health. Otherwise i would book the non refundable. 

[LB_NJ]

I don't always travel Celebrity so FCC is not very useful.

[Algebralovr]

We booked one cruise where the fully refundable deposit was only $120 extra…. We were booking in Feb 2020…. While on board, shortly after the Princess ship had been quarantined in Japan.  It was shortly before the all stop.  
 

It was worth $120 not to have to worry.  It was two weeks later the world fell apart. 

[NMTraveller]

We got charged the $100 change fee for each passenger.  We ended up cancelling a cruise that Celebrity was going to cancel anyways. 

 

I think that I would still do the NRD, however when Covid was happening and the cruise lines were cancelling and changing itineraries it was a bit of a hassle and a monetary loss.

 

I would definitely do the refundable when travelling in a large group or older family.

Edited November 10, 2022 by NMTraveller

[Reel Love]

Silly question but can you change a booking with refundable deposit to a non-refundable and lower the final cost?  Or if you try to do that will they change your booking to current rates? (current cost is almost $1800 Canadian/cabin higher right now than what we paid).  Cruising June 2023 and booked back when cruising was just re-starting and we felt more comfortable at that time with refundable. 

[Algebralovr]

@Reel Loveany time before final payment, you can change to the prevailing rate and offer and a NRD at that time.  
 

We had one booked at refundable and when we saw a really good price, we  updated it to a NRD and saved $1100.  

[jagoffee]

Several years ago, Celebrity modified their process annd  increased the delta between NRD and fully refundable.  There can be some exceptions, but with my cruises the difference has always been significant.  I always book NRD.  I believe that a lot of people do not fully understand the difference, thinking incorrectly that they are losing the total deposit.  IMO this was done to reduce the “just in case” multiple bookings.

 

OP, you are understanding correctly.

 

I have only moved a cruise once and $100 a person was added to the fare of my new cruise.  Perhaps if I would have pushed hard enough, I could have had it waved.  I seldom cancel or change cruises.

[Denny01]

15 hours ago, jelayne said:

Elite Plus does come not into play.  We are Elite + and  changed to a different ship and date and were charged the $100.  

I agree it isnt automatic or assured, but when I transferred to another X cruise, my TA asked X to look at how much Ive cruised X and did they really want to charge me because I was just moving to another X cruise?? They didnt charge me. 

 

Now that is probably more to do with a good TA, but the status did help. Any excuse to save a few bucks! 

 

Den

[Jeremiah1212]

30 minutes ago, jagoffee said:

Several years ago, Celebrity modified their process annd  increased the delta between NRD and fully refundable.  There can be some exceptions, but with my cruises the difference has always been significant.  I always book NRD.  I believe that a lot of people do not fully understand the difference, thinking incorrectly that they are losing the total deposit.  IMO this was done to reduce the “just in case” multiple bookings.

 

OP, you are understanding correctly.

 

I have only moved a cruise once and $100 a person was added to the fare of my new cruise.  Perhaps if I would have pushed hard enough, I could have had it waved.  I seldom cancel or change cruises.

 

At one point pre-COVID there was some concern about the number of duplicate bookings. People with several cruises booked for consecutive weeks, multiple suite categories booked on the same cruise, etc. just waiting to see which ended up at a price they were happy with. This resulted in the current NRD structure and prices that really don’t fluctuate like they did in the past. The current system is fair IMO.