Thomson Celebration

Hi, This is my first cruise. It's my husbands birthday and I asked to order a bottle of Moet to our room on his birthday. I was told it was £42 to order before we leave BUT the champagne will be in the room on arrival. When I informed my husbands birthday is 3 days into our cruise I was told it would then be £50 as they would also include a note. I don't need a note as I have a birthday card. £8 for a note!!! Would it be possible to buy the champagne on board and get this delivered to our room and avoid the extra £8 charge?

Welcome to Cruise Critic. Best to post this on the Thompson Cruise Line Board.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?s=&daysprune=-1&f=497

Keith

You might like to consider the option of saving yourself not £8, but more like £28 !! ;)

Until a year or two ago, Thomson had a liberal policy of allowing passengers to bring aboard their own alcohol at embarkation, or at ports-of-call, or consuming purchases from their duty-free shop.

Sadly Thomson have now followed the policy of US lines in denying passengers that right - and have even gone one step further by banning the taking-aboard of all alcohol, whereas most US lines (RCI, Celebrity, Princess etc) permit you to take aboard at embarkation one bottle of wine (incl champagne) per person, a policy which would have solved your problem - the only "smuggling" you'd have to do would be to keep it hidden from hubby ;)

But whereas their policy is now much more stringent, putting it into practice is sloppy - plenty of reports of folk taking alcohol aboard at both embarkation and ports-of-call without their bags being scanned. Any that is seen is retained by security & returned to you during the last day or two.

When returning from a port-of-call visit whether it's scanned is a bit hit-and-miss, but checked bags generally aren't scanned on embarkation - far too many bags, far too little time.

So you might want to consider buying a bottle of bubbly before you leave home & putting it in a checked bag. (Beware the small risk of the bottle breaking and soaking stuff in your case).

Prospects are that there will be no problem, and you can get one of your shipmates to pop it in their fridge for a few hours before opening - Celebration is a super-friendly little ship.

In the unlikely event that it's discovered & held until the end of the cruise, you can arrange to buy a bottle at ship's prices for the big day and enjoy your own on the last night. Because she's such a friendly ship, your new friends can even help you to empty that final-night bottle :D

(Beating the system is part of the fun :cool:, and I don't give a damn for the opinions of those goody-goodys who consider it dis-honest. :rolleyes:)

But if the idea doesn't appeal, you can buy from a bar or restaurant on the ship and take it to your cabin. The on-board price for Moet a couple of years back was £39.95, which ties in with the £42 you've been quoted and would avoid that iniquitous £8 charge for a card. And no chance of you forgetting to present it at the right time, not always true of ships' arrangements.

There's no drinks service charges on Thomson or other UK cruise lines.

Alternatively - or additionally if you're feeling flush - you can book to dine that evening in the Mistral a la carte restaurant for a premium of about £19 per person, ie about the same cost as the bubbly.

Super little ship, super-friendly passengers and crew & ideal for a Brit's first cruise - Thomson ships' crews put the customer-friendliness and efficiency of their head office staff to shame.

All first cruise are great.

JB :)

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

I would just pre-purchase the bottle of Moet and let them deliver it to the cabin on the first day. That way on his actual birthday you will have time to get the bottle properly chilled.