Celebrity Future Cruise Certificates given as compensation

I wonder if any of you cruise experts can give me some advice? :)

Last year we sailed on Eclipse and had a great time. :cool: We did have a lot of noise in our cabin all night for the first few nights from the Buffet kitchen, which was right above our cabin. We talked to guest services and the noise eventually stopped after a couple of sleepless nights. Guest services gave us future cruise certificates for £700 as compensation. Fast forward a year and we've chosen this year's 14 night cruise with Celebrity. I've negotiated a good price,with some perks thrown in (OBC and drinks), having consulted a few agents. As soon as I mentioned the certificates, the agents I had been talking to said they could no longer honour the deal I had negotiated. I'm now talking to Celebrity directly. I have a good deal with them and they say that they will probably honour the certificates, but that it's a different dept and the discount wouldn't be applied until after we've booked and made a deposit. I'm feeling a bit concerned about booking without knowing for sure that these certificates will be honoured. Call me a cynic, but I'm wondering if these certificates are worth anything at all? :confused: Does anyone else have any similar experience of using these compensation certificates on a Celebrity cruise? Thanks for reading....I'd appreciate your opinions.

We have had two certificates issued in the past by Celebrity. We asked our regular travel agent ( in the States) and he advised us to book it directly with Celebrity. We then booked directly with Celebrity, and they applied the cost of the certificates against the new sailings we picked. We were also allowed to keep any perks that Celebrity was offering with the sailing that were on their website at the time. The probable reason your travel agent could not give you any extras is that any discount for dollars off given on those Celebrity certificates reduces the base fare that the agent would earn a commission on.

If you find a sailing and a price point that you like on Celebrity's website, then call Celebrity and use the certificate against the cost of the cabin, and perhaps there will be a price drop that you can take advantage of before final payment of your sailing.

We just redeemed ours on Sunday. I don't mean to scare you, but we battled with Celebrity for 1.5 hours over them. Our suite cabin flooded on our Eclipse cruise and they had to move us out of the cabin. They gave us 1K each for DH and I.

We found a new sailing and put a deposit down. When we went to apply the certificates, the captains club rep told us only $800something could only be applied to the reservation. What??? She said it was an accounting reason and there were fees built into the cruise fare that the certificate didn't cover. What??? I was just going by the cruise fare only and NOT trying to have it cover taxes, fees etc. I even backed the resident discount off the cruise fare listed on the invoice and it was still over 1K per person.

Completely unacceptable. We battled and battled even trying to find other sailings, but for some reason, they all wouldn't take the full 1K. They finally just manually overrided the reservation we initially wanted and put down the difference between the cruise fare and certificate as the cruise fare.

In the end we got it, but it shouldn't have had to be that difficult. Next time, I'll just push for a refund of some sort but hope to never have a problem where I'd need compensation again.

Good luck and please post your outcome. I'd be curious.

y I have a good deal with them and they say that they will probably honour the certificates, but that it's a different dept and the discount wouldn't be applied until after we've booked and made a deposit..

That is correct. They will apply the certificates to a BOOKED sailing. We just did the same to another sailing on Monday.

I would follow up with a phone call, and have them send you a new invoice showing the discounts were applied. :)

That is correct. They will apply the certificates to a BOOKED sailing. We just did the same to another sailing on Monday.

 

I would follow up with a phone call, and have them send you a new invoice showing the discounts were applied. :)

You didn't have a problem using the full amount? I posted above that on Sunday I had a hard time applying the certificates. They kept saying the full amount of the certificate couldn't be applied. The cruise fare minus the current promo and resident discounts was still over the certificate amount. In the end, they did it but it was a hassle.:rolleyes:

You didn't have a problem using the full amount?

No sir/ma'am, we did not have any problem applying the full amount. :)

We had a minor issue on the Reflection and were given future cruise certificates. They said we had to sail within a year. I called Celebrity to apply them to our 2019 booking (did this in September of 17) and they applied them no problem. They said it wasn't sail by a year later, it was apply by a year later.

Hi cruisenovice

I had the same thing a few years ago with a regular travel agent--the discount given was not the same using a cruise certificate. It affected the commission they got -involved extra work etc. I think when they converted the cert to £ we got £40 for $100 so you will probably get the best deal direct with Celebrity.

Liz

Thanks everyone....this is really helpful! I'll book through Celebrity directly and keep my fingers crossed that we don't have to argue ;) I'll let you know what happens............

We had no problem applying them either. We booked direct. No issue at all.

We had issues (multiple) on our very first cruise. We were treated badly until we reached the head of guest relations who not only made it right, but provided certificates for us to cruise again. I'd say a wise move, since we would not have without them. Our travel agent had no trouble using applying the certificates (along with perk.)

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I've received these certificates several times and my travel agent had no trouble applying them in full with no argument from Celebrity.

We had no problem applying them to an existing booking. Could this be a UK Celebrity issue? There are always differences it seems.

We received them at the end of our NYE 15-16 cruise. They said good on a cruise completed within a year. We had a cruise that we had already made final payment on only 6 weeks later, so we couldn't use it on that. Our next cruise was in Feb 17, which would have been more than a year later. I told her that we weren't able to book an additional cruise to take place within 12 - 13 months, between vacation time and finances.

Our TA had us scan them in and email them to her. We didn't know if we'd need to actually mail them in to Celebrity (which is what the wording said), but the scanned copies in the TAs hands worked.

She spent some time on the phone with Celebrity's agent, but was able to get the certificates extended to our already booked Feb 17 cruise on Eclipse. They reduced her commission, so we got a little bit less OBC from her, but we saved the money up front, so a win-win.

Maybe it was easy because ours were only for $200 each? We had booked the cruise when it was first released and already had a good price, and the discount made it even better.

We applied a future cruise cert to a sailing already booked, we had to scan and email it to them. A week later w got a new invoice with the cruise repriced, it went up £800 and we lost our drinks. When we challenged it we were told it’s no combinable and we should have been told. Took a few calls to sort out but we got the price put back, the drinks reinstated and the discount.

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We have had such certificates three times and had no problems redeeming them, even in the UK, but we do always book direct with Celebrity. With all accounting adjustments (from perks to discounts) they do take a long time to apply because it seem that each item needs to be added manually in separate cycles.

We have always found Celebrity to be especially fair with such compensation. When I have said that I have not been looking for compensation and we would not use it because we always book a couple of years in advance (and they are for new bookings within one or two years) the time period has been extended.

Incidentally, we have certificates awarded by both UK and US staff and redeemed them in the UK.

We had no problem applying them to an existing booking. Could this be a UK Celebrity issue? There are always differences it seems.

The certificates are for new bookings only (says so in the small print) regardless of whether issued in the UK or US. We have had both.

We applied a future cruise cert to a sailing already booked, we had to scan and email it to them. A week later w got a new invoice with the cruise repriced, it went up £800 and we lost our drinks. When we challenged it we were told it’s no combinable and we should have been told. Took a few calls to sort out but we got the price put back, the drinks reinstated and the discount.

We have always been able to combine the certificates with all perks and offers but only on new bookings.

We have had certificates a few times and used them to pay for already booked cruises with no issues although Celebrity UK do not seem to understand that the certificates are in $ rather than £s.

We had no problem applying them to an existing booking. Could this be a UK Celebrity issue? There are always differences it seems.

I was given certificates to the value of £350 p.p, due to a sewage smell outside our room on Eclipse in the inaugural season (Oct 2010)

I booked a cruise via a TA to Hawaii for March 2012. The certificates were applied without any problem, but there were no other perks attached to the booking ( I struggle to find a TA that gives perks)

UK or US Travel Agents do not like these certificates as it reduces their commission. We had $400 worth, but the T/A increased the cruise fare to compensate, which meant we only realised 80% off their value. It was still a better deal than using them directly with Celebrity.

When I received them onboard (cabin flood) I tried and failed to get Celebrity Guest Relations to exchange them for obc. That’s the way the cookies crumble..........

UPDATE:

Thanks to everyone who advised us on this topic. I'm pleased to report that Celebrity have honoured our £700 Cruise Certificates in full! They've adjusted our "final amount to pay" accordingly. I'm surprised and delighted, as the cynic in me was getting ready for an argument. ;) Best wishes to all you helpful Cruise Critics :) x

Happy to hear it all worked out with no hassles.

We will be getting a FCC at the end of the month as they have cancelled the Jan. 31st 2020 14 day cruise. I did read that  booking a cruise  before the year is up but actually going on it after that year is ok? Is this correct?  We plan on using it 15 months from now(better bang for the savings). My brother in law had one and I do believe the cruise date was over a year since he received it but he had  booked it within the year period. He went through a travel agent with no issues  getting the perks etc as advertised. I have heard the English have issues with bookings.  Here I believe a travel agent gets a percentage of the commission after the parent company takes its chunk and the local company takes its chunk.  If you book directly,  you don't save the commission.  I have been lucky to get in on some group pricing which larger companies can get too which helped in moving this upcoming cruise to one a month later. We had a really good price on the Jan. cruise but they have gone up alot. 

I'm also in the situation that khalubear is.  My question is if the FCC is applied as a reduction of the cruise fare or if it is applied as a payment?