50% off Excursions

[Grandad]

I understand that if we book excursions on-line before boarding we will get 50% off, which sounds very good. However, we're not sure if the price quoted on-line already has the 50% deducted or if this is the full price and the deduction is made after we book. Please can anyone help? Thanks very much.

[MrMojoRisin]

Originally Posted by Grandad

I understand that if we book excursions on-line before boarding we will get 50% off, which sounds very good. However, we're not sure if the price quoted on-line already has the 50% deducted or if this is the full price and the deduction is made after we book. Please can anyone help? Thanks very much.

If you download the PDF brochure, this shows the already discounted price.

In the on-line booking form, the full price is shown but as you progress through the process you will see that the discount is applied.

[Phxazzcruisers]

Yes, some of the prices still seem high, but it is indeed the 50% off price.

[vival]

Originally Posted by Phxazzcruisers

Yes, some of the prices still seem high, but it is indeed the 50% off price.

I'm not convinced! I have compared excursions offered for our cruise with exactly the same excursions on an earlier cruise and ours are twice the price in every case. I printed both off and was definitely comparing like for like. I posted a question for Bill many weeks ago and am still waiting for a reply, although I appreciate he has been very busy lately.

[kayn]

I have found that when you book for two on line, as someone else said, when you work through the process the eventual charge for two is the price quoted as the adult price for one person, so you get it at half price.

I have been pleasantly surprised at the cost of tours after the 50% discount. On the Egypt cruise (if we actually get to go) the price seem to average at about $90pp for a whole, long day with lunch, which is less than we have paid before, even in Morocco and China, and a lot less that we were quoted when we tried to organise something for ourselves.

[Over50cruises]

go to *************.com and see what they list excursions for.I have found they are half the full price,and about the same as the 50% off that Azamara offers over the internet

[Bill Leiber]

Hello All -

I'm sorry for the confusion that you've been having trying to figure out the regular and discounted cost for each of our Land Discoveries (shore excursions) options that are available on our website. Thanks to MrMojoRisin's response, the confusion results from the two ways they are offered on our website:

1. If you use the pdf "Land Discoveries Brochure" for your specific voyage, the pricing information shows the 50% price. Recently, to make it more self-evident, the following copy has been added to the cover page: "Land Discoveries prices shown in the brochure reflect the 50% savings available when booking your shore excursions online at least 4 days prior to your sailing."
2. However, when you make your actual booking using your booking number and then enter into "My Azamara" the price shown is the full price. Once the tour is booked, the 50% savings is applied and shown.

I noticed a suggestion to consider booking your shore experiences through independent operators. They are easy to find on the internet and they are usually priced less than our authorized Land Discoveries. It reminded me about the information that Larry Pimentel shared earlier this year on his Q&A thread in which he explained "what you get and what you don’t get with independent operators."

"Independent operators don’t necessarily have the same insurance policy standards and users are not indemnified against loss due to cancellations or other unforeseen circumstances. In many ports independent tour operators are not even allowed pier side and guests must walk long, uncomfortable distances to even locate them. Yes, they often have lower rates, but you pay for what you get. And in most cases they don’t have what we are offering---unique Night Touring."

"With our authorized Land Discoveries there are three overriding things to consider--- I call them Value, Convenience and Peace of Mind.
Value--- Value does not solely equate to price. It equates to quality. I maintain that a cheap vacation can become an expensive mistake when it goes wrong.
Convenience--- With us we’ve done the work of planning your day ashore. We handle all the details and make sure the tour is exactly what is noted in the description. You book online or onboard, and all tours leave from shipboard lounge or pier side with shipboard staff on hand to ensure all guests make it to their tour. You have staff aboard with whom to discuss these programs.
Peace of Mind--- Our Land Discoveries are operated with local, reputable and insured tour operators. When you book with us you know that your tour guide will be on the pier waiting for you. Our onboard staff is there too to answer any questions or concerns. We will connect you with the tour provider. If there are unforeseen changes in itinerary or port arrival time we take care of the details so guests can enjoy their vacation. In the event a tour is cancelled during the cruise for any unforeseen reason, guests receive a refund to their onboard account. There is no waiting or chasing down an independent company for refunds. Your ship will wait for any guests on our sponsored tours. Also an escort for the ship accompanies all tours. Further to this matter of peace of mind, is the fact that our Health Team rigorously inspects all restaurants to be visited on the tour. It checks the quality and safeness of drinking water and even the temperature of the food. We want our guests to be safe. Finally on this point, our Care Team is on hand to deal with incidents when they do come up."

I've shared his thoughts so that might be more informed when you decide to do what's best for your needs.

Regards,

Bill Leiber
________________________
Chief Blogging Officer*
Azamara Club Cruises
(*CBO is an authorized and compensated representative of ACC)

[Bill Leiber]

Originally Posted by vival

I'm not convinced! I have compared excursions offered for our cruise with exactly the same excursions on an earlier cruise and ours are twice the price in every case. I printed both off and was definitely comparing like for like. I posted a question for Bill many weeks ago and am still waiting for a reply, although I appreciate he has been very busy lately.

Hello Vival -

Please accept my apologies for my much too late response and dropping the ball.

Your question about the accuracy of the pricing shown for the Land Discoveries on the downloadable PDF brochure for the forthcoming Oct 26 - Nov 4, 2012 Azamara Journey is well-founded.

I've already shared your thorough investigative work of comparing the "50%" per person cost difference shown for Split, Croatia on Nov 1 when compared to August 13 and 20 to our shore excursion team for their review and comments.

As soon as I have a response, I will let you know immediately. It was kind of you to acknowledge that I've "been very busy lately," but that does not justify taking so long.

Thank you for your patience.

Regards,

Bill Leiber
________________________
Chief Blogging Officer*
Azamara Club Cruises
(*CBO is an authorized and compensated representative of ACC)

[vival]

Thank you Bill.
As I'm sure you will have noticed it is not only Split but every port on the cruise that the prices are double.
We have used Azamara excursions in the past and found them to be excellent in all aspects so would be keen to book them again. I wil await your response with interest and we will then be able to move forward with our planning.

[Paul S]

Bill,

We are booked in on the Cairo to Athens leg, and this will be our first time with Azamara. We left it fairly late in the day to make our booking, and the first time we saw details of the excursions was when we viewed them through "My Reservation".

I only looked at the price on offer at the top of the page, and never made it to the figure at the bottom (which was off-screen and needed scrolling down to view), so until this thread I wasn't aware of the 50% reduction. Perhaps you could feed this back and find a way of making your passengers fully aware of the deals on offer.

One other matter - we are booked into Cairo by Azamara for a pre-cruise one night stay. This is our first time in Cairo and we are trying to arrange an independent half day tour before being collected to go off to the ship. It seems a waste to have to stay put n the hotel. However, nobody can tell us what time transportation is organised for. We have called your London office, and they have referred this to Miami but are still waiting for a response. It's not fair on your customers if we can't find out transportation details for travel to the ship until we get to the hotel on the night before.

Regards,

Paul S

[MrMojoRisin]

Originally Posted by Bill Leiber

Hello All -

I'm sorry for the confusion that you've been having trying to figure out the regular and discounted cost for each of our Land Discoveries (shore excursions) options that are available on our website. Thanks to MrMojoRisin's response, the confusion results from the two ways they are offered on our website:

1. If you use the pdf "Land Discoveries Brochure" for your specific voyage, the pricing information shows the 50% price. Recently, to make it more self-evident, the following copy has been added to the cover page: "Land Discoveries prices shown in the brochure reflect the 50% savings available when booking your shore excursions online at least 4 days prior to your sailing."
2. However, when you make your actual booking using your booking number and then enter into "My Azamara" the price shown is the full price. Once the tour is booked, the 50% savings is applied and shown.

I noticed a suggestion to consider booking your shore experiences through independent operators. They are easy to find on the internet and they are usually priced less than our authorized Land Discoveries. It reminded me about the information that Larry Pimentel shared earlier this year on his Q&A thread in which he explained "what you get and what you don’t get with independent operators."

"Independent operators don’t necessarily have the same insurance policy standards and users are not indemnified against loss due to cancellations or other unforeseen circumstances. In many ports independent tour operators are not even allowed pier side and guests must walk long, uncomfortable distances to even locate them. Yes, they often have lower rates, but you pay for what you get. And in most cases they don’t have what we are offering---unique Night Touring."

"With our authorized Land Discoveries there are three overriding things to consider--- I call them Value, Convenience and Peace of Mind.
Value--- Value does not solely equate to price. It equates to quality. I maintain that a cheap vacation can become an expensive mistake when it goes wrong.
Convenience--- With us we’ve done the work of planning your day ashore. We handle all the details and make sure the tour is exactly what is noted in the description. You book online or onboard, and all tours leave from shipboard lounge or pier side with shipboard staff on hand to ensure all guests make it to their tour. You have staff aboard with whom to discuss these programs.
Peace of Mind--- Our Land Discoveries are operated with local, reputable and insured tour operators. When you book with us you know that your tour guide will be on the pier waiting for you. Our onboard staff is there too to answer any questions or concerns. We will connect you with the tour provider. If there are unforeseen changes in itinerary or port arrival time we take care of the details so guests can enjoy their vacation. In the event a tour is cancelled during the cruise for any unforeseen reason, guests receive a refund to their onboard account. There is no waiting or chasing down an independent company for refunds. Your ship will wait for any guests on our sponsored tours. Also an escort for the ship accompanies all tours. Further to this matter of peace of mind, is the fact that our Health Team rigorously inspects all restaurants to be visited on the tour. It checks the quality and safeness of drinking water and even the temperature of the food. We want our guests to be safe. Finally on this point, our Care Team is on hand to deal with incidents when they do come up."

I've shared his thoughts so that might be more informed when you decide to do what's best for your needs.

Regards,

Bill Leiber
________________________
Chief Blogging Officer*
Azamara Club Cruises
(*CBO is an authorized and compensated representative of ACC)

Bill, I am sorry if I caused any confusion but I thought my response was quite clear.

[Bill Leiber]

Originally Posted by MrMojoRisin

Bill, I am sorry if I caused any confusion but I thought my response was quite clear.

Hello MrMojoRisin -

I assure you that you did NOT cause any confusion whatsoever and that you're quite correct when you state your response about the 50% tour costs was "was quite clear." In fact, it was perfect!

It appears that my sentence was poorly worded when I attempted to give you the "credit" for having provided the correct explanation.

I'm sorry for creating that confusion and extend my thanks for your frequent and very accurate responses that you always add to the Azamara Cruise Critic forum and for your loyalty to our company.

Best regards,

Bill Leiber
________________________
Chief Blogging Officer*
Azamara Club Cruises
(*CBO is an authorized and compensated representative of ACC)

[uktog]

Bill
There are certainly glitches with the 15 October Journey shore excursions. All the excursions that were added after the itinerary change do not include any 50% off allowance even at the final screen
I know this has already been highlighted to Miami by the ever helpful Voyager staff in the UK but the fix has not been forthcoming.

[santrah]

I booked my cruise through my travel agent with the usual excellent service, price. I then confirmed my 50% discount shore excursions through Azamara direct and paid by credit card over the telephone as the online system wouldnt confirm one if the trips. The service on the phone was excellent. I received an email confirmation and receipt of payment a few minutes later. Then today my travel agents called me to say there was an invoice to pay for my shore excursions. I emailed over my Azamara confirmation to them. Hope it gets sorted...I aren't paying twice !! There is some communication and accounting error on Azamara. .

[deise17311]

Originally Posted by santrah

I booked my cruise through my travel agent with the usual excellent service, price. I then confirmed my 50% discount shore excursions through Azamara direct and paid by credit card over the telephone as the online system wouldnt confirm one if the trips. The service on the phone was excellent. I received an email confirmation and receipt of payment a few minutes later. Then today my travel agents called me to say there was an invoice to pay for my shore excursions. I emailed over my Azamara confirmation to them. Hope it gets sorted...I aren't paying twice !! There is some communication and accounting error on Azamara. .

Are the 50% off excursions a sales "tactic?" I.E. Up the price 150% then drop it 50%? The excursions all seem very expensive to me compared to other cruises we have been on including port intensive Med...just curious...

[uktog]

I see you are going to South America, the cost of both ships and independent excursions are quite a bit higher than in the Med. I would say looking at year on year comparisons, there has been about a 25% loading of prices, sometimes you can square that with inflation/exchange rates, sometime, though not often you can say it is the quality of the excursion - but as many have the same operators and programme as mass market lines that is not always the case, however to be fair Azamara will tend to put less passengers in a bus/van than other lines. The rest of the difference - yes it may be a marketing tactic

[deise17311]

Originally Posted by uktog

I see you are going to South America, the cost of both ships and independent excursions are quite a bit higher than in the Med. I would say looking at year on year comparisons, there has been about a 25% loading of prices, sometimes you can square that with inflation/exchange rates, sometime, though not often you can say it is the quality of the excursion - but as many have the same operators and programme as mass market lines that is not always the case, however to be fair Azamara will tend to put less passengers in a bus/van than other lines. The rest of the difference - yes it may be a marketing tactic

Thanks! We tend to book with the cruise line to save hassles, except in the Med we did not, and found the experience to be quite nice...I think for the cruises we are headed on we will book with AZ. Thanks for your reply...I'm always cautious with "50% off sales"

[uktog]

We certainly found in South America the day time excursions were very good indeed. There were issues with the evening excursions in Rio and I would not rush to do excursions that involve eating off ship

[deise17311]

Originally Posted by uktog

We certainly found in South America the day time excursions were very good indeed. There were issues with the evening excursions in Rio and I would not rush to do excursions that involve eating off ship

I agree...we tend to stay away from the eating off excursions...with all the wonderful food onboard...

[vival]

On our first two cruises with Azamara we didn't book any of their excursions as we felt they were overpriced. However on our next two cruises where they were offering 50% reductions we found them much more affordable and booked
a number. We found them without exception to be well organised and of a high standard.