Does X agent lose commission if I transfer to TA?

[CarolinaMamma]

We booked our cruise with Celebrity less than 60 days ago and I am considering transferring to a TA. The air and cruise are relatively straightforward and we have travel insurance, so I don't need the service of a TA. If I transfer, it would be solely for the OBC or other perks they could offer.

 

I have no idea how Celebrity reps are compensated. I made an initial inquiry and a "Certified Vacatin PlanNer" or whatever they are called, called me back the next day. If she gets paid commission, then she earned it and I would not want her to lose it. She waited patiently and checked specific cabins on specific dates, called me when the $300 per cabin savings came out and rebooked us with the lower rate, helped us get the early seating, and has been very helpful in general. So, she has provided great service, and if transferring to a TA means she would not get commission, then I probably won't do it.

 

I have not even looked into IBC yet. We are a family of 5 and spent a little over $7k for our cruise. Any idea what I could expect?

[Azulann]

I cannot answer your question about the Celebrity commission.

but I transferred my booked cruise to a TA and received $250 OBC for the cabin for a 15 day cruise.

I think the OBC fro TA is based on ength of cruise. They also at times have sales when they also include prepaid gratuities plus OBC.

[gskimmel]

I have a similar situation. The TA I'm considering to transfer my cruise to bases OBC off of the total price of the cruise. However, I'm not sure I'm willing to give up control over my reservation to a TA that did absolutely nothing. Granted, I'm getting $200 for this but I'm still not sure if I want to lose control.

[hulamoon]

My understanding is a pooled commission is lowered when you transfer. Yes,control is a real issue especially if you Fiddle with your booking. I keep reading about exceptional ta's. But not an easy find in my experience.

[stipmom]

I asked my CVP at RCCL if he would lose anything if I transferred my booking and he told me no. I would think it is the same for Celebrity as he used to be able to handle that too

[RMSeadog]

We booked our cruise with Celebrity less than 60 days ago and I am considering transferring to a TA. The air and cruise are relatively straightforward and we have travel insurance, so I don't need the service of a TA. If I transfer, it would be solely for the OBC or other perks they could offer.

 

I have no idea how Celebrity reps are compensated. I made an initial inquiry and a "Certified Vacatin PlanNer" or whatever they are called, called me back the next day. If she gets paid commission, then she earned it and I would not want her to lose it. She waited patiently and checked specific cabins on specific dates, called me when the $300 per cabin savings came out and rebooked us with the lower rate, helped us get the early seating, and has been very helpful in general. So, she has provided great service, and if transferring to a TA means she would not get commission, then I probably won't do it.

I have not even looked into IBC yet. We are a family of 5 and spent a little over $7k for our cruise. Any idea what I could expect?

 

 

Your transfer does not cost Celebrit's sales people any money. They have a quota to meet. If you book they get credit for the booking toward their quota.

 

The OBC given by a TA is based in the cost of the cruise and comes out of their commission. Don't feel bad about taking care of yourself. Celebrity's sales people will be just fine.

 

gskimmel ~ When you transfer to a TA you don't lose control, you just go thru them instead of Celebrit's sale people. You can ask the TA do anything that you would Celebrity. Some TA's do charge you if you cancel, however, if you always book with the same TA they may waive the fee, ours does. ~ Ric

 

[ORV]

I have a similar situation. The TA I'm considering to transfer my cruise to bases OBC off of the total price of the cruise. However, I'm not sure I'm willing to give up control over my reservation to a TA that did absolutely nothing. Granted, I'm getting $200 for this but I'm still not sure if I want to lose control.

 

I truly never understand these "give up control" posts when it comes to this topic.

 

What control?

[hulamoon]

Here are examples of how I have felt a loss of control with a travel agent. I make a voice mail and email request for a cabin change. It is ignored.I ask to have a cruise cancelled and I am sent a contemptuous email that would get people in other industries fired. Price of cruise never drops, so I cannot cancel, pay her fee, and reschedule without shooting myself in the foot.

 

Under these circumstances the TA must voluntarily give up the booking, or so I am told by the cruise line.

 

Yep, loss of control is only one feeling I have had.:eek:

 

I was told by someone at celebrity the pool answer to the question by the op, I would like to think it doesn't harm their bottom line, but they are disappointed when a transfer happens.

[fleckle]

I truly never understand these "give up control" posts when it comes to this topic.

 

What control?

Once you transfer control of your booking to a travel agent, you lose access to much of your own account information.

The payment section of your Celebrity account entirely disappears.

 

If you want to make changes to your reservation, instead of making them immediately yourself, you need to ask the TA to do it for you each time.

 

When I make the final payment myself, I just look at my account and can see right away that it shows the total is paid in full with zero balance due.

 

If I need to rely on a travel agent to make the payment for me, I can only assume that the agent has made the payment correctly because it does not show at all on my Celebrity account.

 

Most of the time there is no problem, but we have heard of cases where the passengers paid the TA but their reservation was canceled because the TA made a mistake and entered the payment to the wrong account, or never made the payment at all.

 

As long as I control my own booking, I call the cruise line directly and have my questions answered. I ask follow-up questions and get them answered too, all done in one call.

 

Once I turn the booking over to a TA, then everything must go through a third party. That can sometimes be a pain, especially if I need to call the TA, leave a voice mail message, wait for the TA to contact the cruise line and get back to me with the answer. Then I need to repeat the whole cycle again if I receive an incomplete answer or have a follow-up question.

 

It was much better back when passengers were able to keep control of our own reservations and wait until final payment before turning our booking over to a TA, but now it must be done within 60 days or not at all.

 

 

[hulamoon]

I agree, 60 days pushes a rushed decision and a lot of people may forget to transfer before final payment. So I wonder if it cost effective.

[CarolinaMamma]

Well, I decided to just ask my Celebrity rep. I received a prompt and gracious email from her explaining that they are paid an incentive, and reminding me (in a non-pushy way) of some of the things to consider when transferring to a TA. The promptness, honesty and tone of her response are further evidence that she deserves the business.

 

My next question to her was about price drops. We are in an FV cabin and rates for those are never published, so it would be hard for me to tell if there is a drop before final payment. If I see that prices on our sailing seem to be coming down in general, I wonder if I can call her and ask if FV rates have dropped. Furthermore, I wonder if FV rates ever do drop, as they are such awesome cabins and there are only 6 corner afts, 12 FVs in all.

 

It seems like Celebrity has 2 types of people who book cruises, the customer service reps who answer the incoming calls and the CVPs. Does anyone know if this is correct? I called and initially spoke to someone who did not know about the FV cabins (told me incorrect square footage) and the next day the much more knowledgeable CVP called me back, we had a long convo and I booked with her.

 

As for giving up control, we used a TA years ago for our Celebrity cruise, and, despite his assurances that our family's reservations were all linked, we discovered the first night that our party of 16 was scattered all over the MDR. There is a certain peace of mind in knowing that you have done it yourself and done it right. I admit I am a control freak though, and can understand that having control may not be as important to everyone.

[ORV]

I guess I'm fortunate, one email or a call to our TA and it's taken care of. Of course we use an independent agency that believes in service and not one of those big online companies where you'll get the agent of the week every time you call.

 

In my opinion there's a lot more to an agent than how much OBC you can get from them.

[AerynSun_JohnCrighton]

I guess I'm fortunate, one email or a call to our TA and it's taken care of. Of course we use an independent agency that believes in service and not one of those big online companies where you'll get the agent of the week every time you call.

 

In my opinion there's a lot more to an agent than how much OBC you can get from them.

 

No, us too.. we've never had a problem, one call and that is all for us... and we get e-mail with invoice and res # for any payments applied...

 

I think we've booked 18 cruises with them over the years? something like that.

 

We have NEVER booked directly through any cruise line and we've always been happy and IF prices drop, all we do is call, e-mail or leave a message and they do what they can. Never had any real complaints.

[fleckle]

..........As for giving up control, we used a TA years ago for our Celebrity cruise, and, despite his assurances that our family's reservations were all linked, we discovered the first night that our party of 16 was scattered all over the MDR. There is a certain peace of mind in knowing that you have done it yourself and done it right. ......

Oh, you just reminded me of one more little thing I had forgotten about. We traveled with a group of people who were booked with a number of different TA's and they described what an ordeal it was for them to get their reservations linked.

 

Since they were not able to link the reservations themselves, they needed to contact all the different travel agents involved to get it done. After going through all that, it was still messed up. They were also scattered all over the dining room, just as happened to your group.

 

The members of our group still had control of our own reservations, so we simply linked them all ourselves and had no problem.

 

When we turn control of our reservation over to a TA, it is nice at least to get a company where a live person answers the phone each time so we don't need to keep leaving messages or wait for an email reply.

 

One of the most annoying things is calling with a simple request and being transferred to a TA's voice mail, having to leave a message asking them to do something that you know good and well you would already have completed if you had simply been able to handle it yourself instead of needing to go through a third party.

[bgrieve]

I stopped using TA's years ago. First one acted as though I was bothering her by booking cruises with her. She has since gone out of business. Big surprise. I then used another, who forgot to pay our balance. What a mess. I now book with Celebrity, and can maintain control over my bookings.

[bighairtexan]

If I don't get one automatically, I ask the TA for the CELEBRITY invoice. And although the TA I use is Celebrity's largest online booking agent, after final payment I always wait a couple of days and then go online to my credit card account to make sure the money has been paid (and to whom). When I booked through Celebrity, I'd still make sure the money was charged to my card as per the invoice. So it's no more work for me and I like the sometimes substantial OBC's from the TA.

 

That being said, if a bunch of us were cruising together I'd strongly try to get them all to use the same TA because as others mentioned, linking reservations is hit or miss at best otherwise. Though we have had excellent luck getting our tables changed once we are on board, if we're scattered about due to a "missing link."

[Chunky2219]

I stopped using TA's years ago. First one acted as though I was bothering her by booking cruises with her. She has since gone out of business. Big surprise. I then used another, who forgot to pay our balance. What a mess. I now book with Celebrity, and can maintain control over my bookings.

I feel some sympathy for your experience, but there's always a few rotten apples at the bottom of the barrel.

 

I use a big, on-line, telephone and local (to me) cruise only TA. They are always comfortably cheaper than cruise line prices, even with discounts and special promotions. They are always on the ball, always helpful and nothing is too much trouble. Yesterday, prices for our October cruise dropped so I gave them a ring. Ten minutes later they rang back and I had >30% off a 2A and almost £1200 off our RS booking.

 

In contrast, I've had the whole range of experiences dealing directly with the lines, from okay to dreadful. It's worth putting in the effort to find a really good TA. You'll save £££ or $$$$.

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[CarolinaMamma]

I'm happy for the folks who have had good TAs, but I'm unwilling to find a good one by trial and error. I understand why CC does not allow people to recommend TAs, but do wish there were some sort of rating and review system, as there is for ships. I know it could be rigged, but still...

 

The time we had 16 in our party, they were all booked through the same TA, so no excuse for not having us linked. Oh, and I got nothing for bringing him 8 cabins. He sent me a Royal Caribbean coupon book, which was no good to me on a celebrity cruise. Pretty sad that he couldn't even remember what line he had booked us on. We had a fabulous cruise, so it's not as if anything catastrophic happened, and we got the dinner seating fixed by the second night, but the experience definitely left me wanting to have more control over my booking.

 

I heard back from my Celebrity rep today that she would be happy to check for price drops if I call her. Good to know. I will have to keep an eye on whether the prices of the sailing are going down in general, and she can then check the FV cabin prices, as they are not published online. So far, I am happier with my Celebrity rep than I have been with the 2 local TAs I used for previous cruises. Good service is so hard to come by these days, I am very appreciative of my Celebrity rep for providing it!