Does Celebrity cancel cruises often?

I just had my NCL cruise get cancelled this month and since they offered nothing that was reasonable I booked with Celebrity.

Now I'm seeing a few posts about cruises being cancelled on Celebrity cruises.

I know things happen but it seems like a lot of cancelled cruises. Is there a way to figure out if the new cruise I have booked might get cancelled? It has been quite stressful trying to re-plan my vacation. I'm still doing a Pacific Coast but it ends in a different city and has more ports so more researching for me. I also plan to spend 6 nights after the cruise before flying home.

I have cruised with Disney 5 times and maybe remember reading once about a cancelled cruise. I know they only have 4 ships so that might be the reason for less cancelled cruises.

The question is....how far away is your X cruise?

Cancelled cruises happen on every cruise line usually for a charter but sometimes for maintenance or refurbishment.

Celebrity is usually fairly reasonable about providing alternate itineraries and sometimes financial considerations and/or perks.

We have been cruising with Celebrity for almost 12 years and have completed 11 cruises with them. In that time we have had 2 cruises cancelled. One was a Pacific repositioning cruise (i.e. a once a year cruise) because Celebrity had decided to charter the ship. The other was a bog standard Caribbean because Celebrity had decided to remain in Europe longer.

So, from our experience, you could say that Celebrity cancel a lot of cruises but, strangely perhaps, I feel that we have just been unlucky. I do not feel that it is a common occurrence. It is not something I worry about much.

More notable, of the 11 cruises, only one or two have actually sailed the itinerary we booked. Our first cruise itinerary changed more than a year in advance, another changed the day we boarded. In this respect, others have said we have just been unlucky. I feel that it is common place for itineraries to change and almost expect it.

We have cruised once with NCL and twice with Azamara. All three of these cruises sailed as originally planned. However, I am sure that both these companies cancel cruises and change itineraries. Some people have cruised longer than us and more frequently and never been affected by changed or cancelled cruises.

I believe that answers you will received here will depend on the personal experience of the responders and those who have been affected are more likely to respond to your question than those who have never had their cruise changed or cancelled,

We book about one year in advance and never have had a cruise cancelled. I would guess that if you booked a couple of years out there would be a very slight chance of a cancellation. Don't worry about it.

You will hear from those whose cruise was cancelled but it will be a very small minority in actuality in my opinion.

We have had 2 cruises canceled out of 17, one due to a charter on RCI and one with Celebrity due to redeployment of the ship. We were notified about both 1 year out.

For the RCI cruise, there were rumors on CC that the Allure (brand new at the time) had been chartered by Atlantis that week, but it took several days to get a straight answer from RCI. I finally put a hold on the previous cruise for a similar suite and the next day was told that our cruise was chartered and they switched the reservation to my held suite and gave us $400 OBC. It paid for our specialty reservations, including a Chef's Table experience. The only thing I lost was time on the phone - it was a great cruise.

The Celebrity cruise was canceled last September due to Equinox redeployment. They notified us at 8 PM by email and luckily I saw it immediately and went to work on finding a similar cruise and decent adjacent cabins. We ended up on the Reflection for 2 days less and lost Barcelona, but gained Malta. I was looking forward to going back to Barcelona and do some Gaudi-intensive touring, but loved Malta. We upgraded to AQ and the cruise was cheaper (2 days less) and we received $200 OBC, which we used toward the premium package upgrade. The cruise was amazing so it all worked out well.

We have been on a Celebrity charter and will go on another in a few weeks, so have been on both sides of the charter business. I think it is a little hard to predict about which cruises will be chartered, but here is some info on M class cruises:

We were on a charter on the Infinity in Feb, 2016 and will be on the same charter on the Summit Feb, 2018. Many charters on the M class ships seem to be in Feb-March for the music cruises. We have received word that this same charter (Flower Power Cruise) will be on the Infinity March 30-April 8 in 2019. The same company usually has another cruise on the same ship adjacent to that cruise, but those dates have not been released. It looks like Smooth Jazz is on the Infinity for 2 cruises Feb, 2019.

I have been a little nervous about my January Edge cruise being chartered by a big group like Atlantis, since it is a new class of ship, with lots of bells and whistles. It is now 1 year out so hopefully will be in the clear now :).

I think it is hard to predict when a cruise will be canceled, but I think I would personally think twice about M class in the Caribbean in Feb-March. Luckily, as others have said, it seems to be a pretty rare occurrence otherwise.

In all my 50 plus cruises, I've only had one cancelled and it was a Celebrity cruise.

If you buy travel insurance (even if you buy it from Celebrity), read the fine print. Does it cover expenses incurred due to the cruise line cancelling the cruise?. It's kind of an important question since many make non-refundable air reservations when they book the cruise. Yes, many airlines allow you to get a credit (not a refund) with a penalty,...but let's say your flight was on egypt airlines...what would you do with a credit on egypt airlines (just an example, obviously). Celebrity does not seem to offer much in the way of compensation when they cancel a cruise.... other than maybe a credit of some sort with Celebrity which doesn't help much if you don't cruise on a Celebrity ship within a certain number of months.

With only 5 cruises under my belt and keeping my fingers crossed,I never experienced a cancelled cruise. I understand they can occur for two main reasons: Charter or ship needing dry dock or repairs.

Regarding the chartering of a ship, since it is a manageable issue by the cruise line, is there a point in time, from which a cruise line will stop accepting renting the ship to a business and cancel a cruise: Eg. 3 months, 6 months, a year before sailing? ( or if the price is right, they will accept to do it up to the last minute?)

Regarding ship repairs, I understand that an unexpected turn of events, may lead a cruise line to make difficult choices. But safety has to be the priority. This said, in this case, guess will likely have flights booked, which may vary in cost and type of fare. Is the compensation package offered to passengers in this type of circumstances sufficient to compensate for additional cost involved? ( For example, the cancelled Infinity cruise in April, I believe that a standard «*$250*» dollars was offered. This may cover a flight time change but not the full fare, if the fare was not refundable or exchangeable or if the customer cannot reschedule leave at work.) In this case is the cruise line assuming that passengers insurances will cover the difference?

I am just curious. Thank-you in advance for sharing your experiences and knowledge.

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I've been on over 50 sailings, with several different cruise lines and have only had 2 cruises canceled: one with Celebrity for a charter and one with NCL as they had scheduled a completely different itinerary (Alaska to one that included Cuba).

I hear of Celebrity canceling their cruises for a charter about once every year or so and usually booked passengers are notified well in advance. But, I also just read they are cancelling a Panama Canal cruise on the Infinity in a few months for dry dock to work on the pod propulsion system. Their compensation package is pretty good.

You are right about NCL ... that offer of $25 obc to reschedule was pretty pathetic so I declined and booked on Princess instead.

In all my 50 plus cruises, I've only had one cancelled and it was a Celebrity cruise.

In my about 30 cruises, only one and it was Celebrity.

I know all lines do this from time to time, but this was the one that cost me $$$ as it was a one of a kind itinerary and hooked to a private land tour.

Our very first cruise was cancelled a number of years ago. It was the first leg of a b2b, and we were fortunate enough to be able to add it after what was originally the second leg. Kept the same cabin, and as no flights or hotels had been booked, it had no impact on us.

We have sailed with Celebrity 36 times now and only one cruise cancelled, about six months out (and this was more than 20 years ago). It was charted by an organization doing a nudist cruise (I kid you not). Generally, cruises are only cancelled a long way out unless there is an unforeseen technical problem based on what I see on these boards.

With Celebrity, we had two cruises Around Japan that were cancelled in 2015. The first was cancelled because the ship was being sold and moved. The second was chartered, and our best option turned out to be a Japan and China cruise with most of the ports in Japan, which was close to what we originally booked.

With NCL, we had a cruise cancelled in the Med, because the ports included Alexandria, Egypt. Political events in Egypt largely led to that cancellation.

Both times we rebooked, Celebrity let us keep the lower fare for the Japan and China cruise, which saves us a few hundred dollars. The NCL cruise we found another cruise that was ok, but not as nice as the original cruise. Sill, we cam out on all the cruises with good replacements. All cancellations were in advance of our purchasing our airfare, etc.

We have sailed with Celebrity several times and have been bumped by charters twice....and I am concerned it is about to happen again for our Feb 2019 cruise. Each of these have been when we are booked on the Summit in Jan or Feb. The Summit tends to get chartered but often is the only Celebrity ship going out of San Juan when we are able to sail.

Feeling slightly better but a tad worried as I picked another Pacific Coast with Celebrity. It's for September of this year.

With 20+Celebrity only once! The cruise was changed from Suez Canal from Dubai to Rome to Dubai to Singapore! We had bought air tickets which were non refundable so accepted the change and though it cost us more it was still a great trip.Dianne

Feeling slightly better but a tad worried as I picked another Pacific Coast with Celebrity. It's for September of this year.

If it is going to be canceled due to a charter, it would have most likely been done by now. They usually notify booked passengers about a year ahead of time so that flight cancellation fees won't be involved. So, you should be good to go on that sailing.

If it is going to be canceled due to a charter, it would have most likely been done by now. They usually notify booked passengers about a year ahead of time so that flight cancellation fees won't be involved. So, you should be good to go on that sailing.

Thanks! It would really be awful to have a second cruise cancelled.

We’ve done over 50 cruises. We had one cancel by another line but Ncl stepped in and offered to take every passenger. We lost an Ncl one due to a hurricane and we’ve had itinerary changes 6 times and lots of missed ports. Out of our 19 celebrity cruises we’ve never had a cancellation with them, we’ve had itinerary changes but never a cancellation.

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Thanks! It would really be awful to have a second cruise cancelled.

I would feel a bit snake bit if it did. That cruise that I booked on NCL that was canceled was replaced by a cruise on Princess ... by me, of course. Not really the same itinerary but I mostly cruise just to be on a ship with convenient embarkation / debarkation ports and much less for the itinerary in between. Now, it looks like they may have oversold the replacement sailing, which is fine with me, too. I would definitely accept a move over offer if one comes my way. Luckily, no airfare is involved and we are super flexible with our schedules.

Celebrity cancelling cruises due to "charter" is becoming more frequent these days. I booked the Infinity for 11 Feb 2019 cruise and was informed a couple of months ago that the ship was chartered. They moved me to an alternate date (13 Apr 2019) in the same cabin category and with all of my previous "perks", and gave me $200 obc for my inconvenience. However, I just found out on Friday that the 13 April cruise has been chartered as well! I am trying to get booked onto one of the alternate dates they provided (one is 9 Feb 2019 which is weird seeing that our 11 Feb cruise was previously cancelled) but there are very few cabins left....hopefully my TA can work her magic. There is always a risk booking a cruise (lesson learned) and thankfully I have not booked any airfare (although Celebrity offered some compensation for those who did). However, I will not be happy if Celebrity cannot accommodate me on the 9 Feb sailing after cancelling the previous two Celebrity sailings that I was on!!!

We are in a similar situation. We had a March 2019 cruise booked on the Infinity that was chartered and rebooked on the April 13 Infinity 5 night. We were informed Thursday that this cruise was chartered. My husband and I are in the Summit October 27 this year and have also booked a January 19 on the Equinox with my sister so none of the 4 dates offered work. Twice bitten doesn’t go down well.

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We sail Celebrity when we cruise....we have three cruises cancelled, all on the Summit for charters. She is a smaller ship (Millennium Class) and more likely to be chartered than the Solstice class (Reflection, Equinox etc) ships. We were offered a new cruise on an S class at the M class rate each time but you had to choose specific sailings...we also received on board credit. All were cancelled before air was able to be booked so we never lost airfare. I think that is pretty standard when a ship is chartered. The line doesn't want to risk having to reimburse airfare for 3000 passengers.

We sail Celebrity when we cruise....we have three cruises cancelled, all on the Summit for charters. She is a smaller ship (Millennium Class) and more likely to be chartered than the Solstice class (Reflection, Equinox etc) ships. We were offered a new cruise on an S class at the M class rate each time but you had to choose specific sailings...we also received on board credit. All were cancelled before air was able to be booked so we never lost airfare. I think that is pretty standard when a ship is chartered. The line doesn't want to risk having to reimburse airfare for 3000 passengers.

Equinox used to be chartered every year in the summer when she was in Europe. It’s only since she was deployed to the Caribbean year-round that it appears to have ceased. Silhouette has also been chartered a few times, especially for the ‘clothing optional’ cruises ;).