June 2024 AARP Celebrity Cruise Gift Card Update

[TGfromTX]

2 minutes ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

There was a thread here on the Celebrity forum a few months back going into great detail/concern over the fact that there is NO chance of refund if the cruise is cancelled. 

I think the partial answer is in the terms I posted:  Once the reservation has been made, Celebrity Cruises normal policies regarding cancellation, changes, and deadlines for the payment of deposits and all other payments, shall apply.

I would expect funds to go back to a gift card where policy allows a refund. I'd call the number I posted to get first hand info if important to someone.  

[Rick&Jeannie]

31 minutes ago, TGfromTX said:

I think the partial answer is in the terms I posted:  Once the reservation has been made, Celebrity Cruises normal policies regarding cancellation, changes, and deadlines for the payment of deposits and all other payments, shall apply.

I would expect funds to go back to a gift card where policy allows a refund. I'd call the number I posted to get first hand info if important to someone.  

That is certainly the "logical" assumption that most anyone would come to...but that is why the thread was so concerning; one contributor swore that he had called Celebrity multiple times and had it confirmed that funds were forfeited.  I'm just steering clear of the X cards...

[Rick&Jeannie]

Here is the thread I was speaking of.  Lots of contradicting info...but read the entire thread before passing judgement!

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2946333-gift-card-limit/

[bbstx]

Below is a transcript of a chat I had with an agent at aardy.com where I purchased my trip insurance.  FWIW, my insurer for this cruise is Trawick.  

 

TL:DR: The agent told me that using gift cards to pay for the trip did not affect cruise insurance.  However, I would only be reimbursed for the actual amount I paid.  Example: if my cruise cost $1000 and I used two $500 gift cards that had cost me $900, I’d only get $900 back.

[ngrund]

2 hours ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

Just to clarify...

You do NOT need to be an AARP member...just join the "AARP Rewards" program which is free. 

 

 

Some of the gift cards do require an AARP membership to purchase.

[TGfromTX]

1 hour ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

Here is the thread I was speaking of.  Lots of contradicting info.

Interesting read. The policy seems to differ on each site even a year later.  The main point of contention sounds like whether you get refunded if you cancel before final payment. If I every buy any, I might wait to buy until it's near the due date for final payment - just in case.  In either case I'd call the 'help number' and reconfirm the policies before I purchased any.  

[wallyj]

@Rick&Jeannie, you DO need to be a member of AARP to purchase Celebrity or Royal Caribbean gift cards. They are considered a Premium product and you can now buy up to 25 per month.

 

Currently Princess gift cards do NOT require AARP membership, just a AARP rewards account and have 5 per month limit.

 

@TGfromTX, you should be aware of the processing time required by Celebrity if you want to use gift cards, as you or your travel agent will need to forward the gift card images to them at least 10 business days before final payment. With Celebrity and Royal Caribbean gift cards, you cannot use partial amount of gift card. Say you have a balance due of $578. You can use one $500 gift card, but if you use a $100 gift card for the $78 balance, you will lose $22 value as no remaining balances will apply. Also unlike Princess gift cards, you cannot use on board to apply to your on board folio.

[JJK2008]

On 6/18/2024 at 6:23 PM, Knights on the Beach said:

In September of last year, I booked Equinox for January 2025 and was able to use a $500 AARP gift card for the deposit. I guess I was lucky they let me use it. I put a hold on the cruise online and then bought the gift card without reading the terms - I wrongly assumed it was just like Carnival and I could apply the cards online. When I realized it wasn't going to work like that, I called Celebrity to apply the GC. I was advised I had to pay $100 of the deposit with a credit card and then the rep applied $400 from the GC as the remaining $500 deposit and then he reduced our total cruise price by $100. I remember thinking that was a crazy way to do it and honestly it felt really shady. 😂But it clearly says on my gift card that certificates may not be redeemed online and it also says certificates may not be used towards the deposit. So yeah, I was lucky. 

 

Looking online now, it does show an option to apply a GC. However it also asks for an expiration date and CVV which GCs don't have. Has anyone successfully applied gift cards online to pay off the cruise or do you have to call or email every time?

 

I think you're confusing the AARP E Gift Cards with actual Celebrity Cruise Line Gift Cards from the Cruise Line. They are NOT the same. The AARP cards are a unique item with their own T & C. This may have changed recently. Check the latest T & C to be sure. 

Edited July 8 by JJK2008
Update

[Cruzinram]

45 minutes ago, JJK2008 said:

I think you're confusing the AARP E Gift Cards with actual Celebrity Cruise Line Gift Cards from the Cruise Line. They are NOT the same. The AARP cards are a unique item with their own T & C. This may have changed recently. Check the latest T & C to be sure. 

Check with Celebrity gift card department for T/C.  I found that these third party gift certificate T/C are not current. See previous post with phone number to call. The third party resales are not keeping current on Celebrity's current T/C.

[Vagabond Knight]

 

On 6/18/2024 at 6:45 AM, KKB said:

When I read the above sentence from the AARP site, I thought that I could ONLY use them as a deposit. ("payment toward new reservation" as opposed to "payment on current reservation")

We thought the same and, though we'd used GC for other cruise lines, there was so much fine print and so many restrictions on the Celebrity GC that we were kind of afraid we'd buy something we'd somehow not be able to use.  We didn't check with our travel insurance but it sounded like the purchase could be a loss of we canceled.   Maybe that's not the case... we'll have to look into that aspect of it. 

 

So, if they're not for the down payment, what DOESN'T  qualify as a new reservation? Maybe one that's been rescheduled somehow? That wording is unclear to me. 

 

When you pre-book future cruises onboard (the deal where you can make $100 down payment, must book the cruise within four months, and you get $150 OBC), is that considered a promotion for which GC cannot be applied to the balance, or has anyone successfully used GC in this situation? 

Edited July 9 by Vagabond Knight

[deb18]

Hi.   Can you use the AARP gift cards to pay for gratuities that were added when you booked ? 

[TGfromTX]

4 minutes ago, deb18 said:

Hi.   Can you use the AARP gift cards to pay for gratuities that were added when you booked ? 

No - they directly state toward fare only.

[RobertoF]

A data point: we were able to use the AARP gift card for everything after we paid the deposits.  We did not have prepaid gratuities.  We were able to use the gift card for taxes and port charges, not just the fare.  My guess is that if the fare included gratuities you could use the gift card for that, although I would also think if you added the gratuities separately as an add on maybe it would not work.  Although we were able to use the gift card for taxes and port charges, there is a risk in doing that.  If we cancel we lose everything, whereas if we only used the gift card for the fare we would lose that but would still get our taxes and fees refunded in the event of cancellation (we did not buy trip insurance).  I hope that helps a little.

[aandjw]

Ok - today I purchased $1000 (x2) of cards from Cardcash (AARP variety lol) 12% off - through the Capital One shopping APP - supposedly 3% cash back up to $1000 per purchase. Sent cards to my agent who sent on to Celebrity ($3300 balance with gratuities prepaid). I'll report on any issues (balance due 10AUG).....

[ken987]

Hi all,

My friends and I all paid our cruises off successfully using the AARP gift cards. I bought $3700 worth and it was absolutely no problem. You basically screenshot the E gift cards and then list the voucher numbers in the email. Was so easy and absolutely no pushback from Celebrity. I plan to pay off all my cruises this way going forward.

 

 

[ken987]

On 7/3/2024 at 11:25 AM, celebrity cruiser said:

I did a lot of research on this because I thought it was a good thing and for some it may be. For me and because one of the regulations of the Aarp card is that you cannot be in a group booking, it will not work for me. Since my TA always puts me in a group and I get that group discount, I will be happy with that perk.

smooth sailing 

That is weird because I am pretty sure I am in a group booking...and I just paid off my cruise using AARP Gift cards. There is a Gift card Number for Celebrity and I think it is worth the  call to that number to double check. 

[mac_tlc]

I just paid off my Beyond cruise using 13 gift cards purchased from AARP. Emailed a list of the gift cards, and provided a picture of each of them. It took them about 4 days to process them. 
 

Definitely going to use them again. Can’t turn down 10% savings. 

 

mac_tlc

[Vagabond Knight]

Did any of you who reported success with the cards book using a "CRUISE LATER" reservation?

[N.Ice]

The last time I used gift cards for Celebrity (in Dec 2023), Celebrity told me that I couldn't use gift cards to pay off the Port Fees and Taxes portion of my balance, but recently, someone from Celebrity customer service said I can use it to pay off the full balance.  

 

@ken987 or @mac_tlc... since you both have very recent experience, can either of you confirm whether or not the gift cards can now be applied to the Port Fees and Taxes portion of the balance?  TIA!

[wallyj]

2 hours ago, Vagabond Knight said:

Did any of you who reported success with the cards book using a "CRUISE LATER" reservation?

I was on the Eclipse last November and purchase 2 Cruise later deposits. I booked 2 sailings for November of this year in April using the certificates as the deposit. When I bought the cruise later deposits, I did not want them to automatically be assigned to the TA I used for the current sailing, so the bookings would be with Celebrity. 
 

When I submitted the transfer request to the TA I wanted to have the booking, I immediately received a ‘denial’ response saying the transfer request needed to be done within 30 or 60 days of acquiring the cruise later deposit. I called Celebrity and explained, how can I transfer if I have not even booked the cruise yet, so would not know which TA I want to use. The agent checked and came back saying they found info saying the timer starts once I selected the cruise, so they will refer my request to department that can get this done. My bookings were eventually transferred to my requested TA.

 

I purchased about $2000 in Celebrity gift cards in $500 and $100 values(thru AARP) and you have to use the ENTIRE face value of the card, so no partial balances are left when u apply a card. Example, your final balance due is $878. If you used 1 $500 card and 4 $100 cards, you will lose $22 value of $100 card since the entire $100 card will be considered ‘used’ even though only $78 will be charged to it. No remaining/partial balances are left. So in this case, use only 1 $500 card and 3 $100 cards and pay remaining  $78 via credit card. FYI, Princess and Carnival allow you to have a partial/remaining balance on your gift cards.

 

Final payment is this month and the beginning of next month. I forwarded my TA copies of the gift cards and they forwarded to Celebrity for processing. I believe Celebrity says to allow up to 10 business days for them to do so.

 

Celebrity has processed the cards for my first booking and are in the process of applying the others for the booking where final payment is the beginning of next month.

 

I only had the cruise later as the initial deposit on these bookings, and Celebrity allowed me to use gift cards to pay the entire final payment which includes taxes and fees. @N.Ice, please see above.

 

 

 

Edited July 31 by wallyj

[mac_tlc]

6 hours ago, N.Ice said:

The last time I used gift cards for Celebrity (in Dec 2023), Celebrity told me that I couldn't use gift cards to pay off the Port Fees and Taxes portion of my balance, but recently, someone from Celebrity customer service said I can use it to pay off the full balance.  

 

@ken987 or @mac_tlc... since you both have very recent experience, can either of you confirm whether or not the gift cards can now be applied to the Port Fees and Taxes portion of the balance?  TIA!

I guess it depends on how you think of the dollars and what is paid first. I had already paid the deposit for our cruise ($522). The balance was $4930, so I used $4900 in gift cards. 
 

Since the port fees and taxes, which were around $225 I think,  are less than the deposit amount, you could view it that the gift cards didn’t cover the port fees and taxes and that they were “paid for” with the deposit. 
 

This cruise was reserved with an on-board “Book Later” certificate, so $200 had been paid when I got the certificate. When I actually chose a sailing, it was in the Retreat so an additional $322 deposit was due, which was paid with a credit card. 
 

mac_tlc
 

 

Edited July 31 by mac_tlc

[Vagabond Knight]

Thanks for the detailed reply, @wallyj.  That's exactly what I needed to know!

[N.Ice]

3 hours ago, mac_tlc said:

I guess it depends on how you think of the dollars and what is paid first. I had already paid the deposit for our cruise ($522). The balance was $4930, so I used $4900 in gift cards. 
 

Since the port fees and taxes, which were around $225 I think,  are less than the deposit amount, you could view it that the gift cards didn’t cover the port fees and taxes and that they were “paid for” with the deposit. 
 

This cruise was reserved with an on-board “Book Later” certificate, so $200 had been paid when I got the certificate. When I actually chose a sailing, it was in the Retreat so an additional $322 deposit was due, which was paid with a credit card. 
 

mac_tlc
 

 

This is still different than my previous experience because I had also paid a deposit and Celebrity at the time didn't offer to apply the deposit amount to the Port Fees and Taxes.  I'll have a final payment coming up this Jan, so I'll see then.

[Rick&Jeannie]

There was a thread on this board a while back stating that if you use these gift cards and you must cancel the cruise...you FORFEIT all funds paid by GC!  I was completely in shock over this; it just sounds illegal to operate in this manner.  @KenTheCruiser says he called Celebrity's GC department on more than one occasion and this was supposedly confirmed.  As such, I have steered clear of the AARP cards for Celebrity.  I have purchased 64 cards to date for (mostly) Princess, a few for Carnival and have had no issues in using them there, although I have NOT tested the situation by having to cancel.

 

Has anyone had to cancel your booking after having used the AARP gift cards?  I sure would like to save on Celebrity cruises just like I do with other lines!

[Ellaleah]

I’m pretty sure that Celebrity has changed their GF so that you can pay for your entire cruise with them( not sure about port fees).  I bought 1 and they canceled my cruise.  Luckily I sold it to a friend that was able to use it.  I don’t trust Celebrity and I believe that they could change their policy at anytime.  After they changed it the last time to allow you to pay for the entire cruise, they still had the wrong rules on their website.