booking flight through Carnival

[love2travel41]

I am very interested in hearing of any experience anyone has had with booking flights through Carnival? At what point did you get flight information? Were you satisfied with your flights?

 

Thanks for any info you give.

[Drose716]

I only did it once for my 2nd cruise (first time flying in, long gap... didn't know there was another option!) & haven't done it again since. I'm prettt sure looking back it cost more money. We had no control over the airport we left from, where we flew into or at what times. We were flown out of La Guardia (perfect) day of but into FLL for a sailing from Miami. There's tons of options from NY to Miami daily, but not for us. The shuttle was several $$$ more. We also got a 12:30 flight home again from FLL. The zone number we were given for debark estimated being off the ship at 10am cutting it quite close!

 

I will say this- that whole debarkation situation ended up being a non-issue. Thanks to a hurricane, POM closed. We weren't able to get off the ship until almost 9pm the day of return. We received a note under our door rescheduling us to a 1:45pm flight & then eventually to a a flight the next day. Carnival provided hotel & food vouchers (after a nightmare mob scenario in port to pick them up). So in the end, despite the inconveniences, I was grateful I went through Carnival by chance that time because I wasn't one of the folks on deck trying to get signal to contact the airlines to make flight changes.

 

Due to the cost & lack of control though, I've opted not to go through Carnival again (or during prime hurricane season!)

[SadieN]

Read the sticky at the top of the Cruise Air board.

[lizardhowson]

Over the years, I have read several threads about those who used Carnival airfare. The posters were all overwhelmingly displeased with the flights and times.

 

If you are doing this to save money, I recommend re-thinking it.

If you are doing it because you are inexperienced booking your own flights, use a TA.

[MCFTJCH2V]

I am very interested in hearing of any experience anyone has had with booking flights through Carnival? At what point did you get flight information? Were you satisfied with your flights?

 

Thanks for any info you give.

 

We did it years ago, but saved so much money when we did it ourselves. With better flight times.

[ddbaab53]

We are doing it on our next cruise in April. Very happy with the time and prices. Only $10.00 more than if I had booked it. Prices on the air had drop so I call our PVP and she got the better prices for us.

Edited January 6, 2016 by ddbaab53

[AngMo44]

I recently booked their new air program Fly2Fun. I booked the exact same international flight I was interested in on an airline's direct website for $258 less per person x4. Plus their advantages of changes up to 60 days, guaranteeing we get to our ship, no payment due until 60 days prior to flight, etc...

Within a few hours I had our seats selected by calling the airlines with our reservation number.

 

I did call a few times to track pricing over a couple months. You have the ability to pick the airlines, days, times, etc.

 

It is a little slow reviewing flight options over the phone, but saved us big bucks.

[Mrs CruisinCritter]

We just booked our flights with Carnival for the Vista TA. The cheapest multi-destination flights we could find out of our tiny home airport were $1500 per person. We called Carnival on Saturday to see what they had choice wise out of curiosity and they found flights for just over $500 per person. The flight times are great and we actually got two of the flights we were possibly going to book on our own anyway due to the flight times. We immediately booked through them and it was hastle free!

[cruznjan]

Carnival booked our flights for our last cruise. We got good connections, and the fare was half of what we could have gotten ourselves. That was under the FlyAweigh program.

[WildBlueYonder64]

We are using miles, or would have definitely looked into this option. From what I've read from others that have booked, the advantages were: prices were competitive, not having to pay in full up front, and being able to use Carnival Verizon/AARP gift cards when you do pay, therefore saving an additional 10 percent on the fare!

[QTPieRye]

Our group of 17 is using Carnival Flyaweigh this weekend from LAX to SJU for our cruise on the Carnival Liberty. All on same redeye flight to SJU... but we knew this prior to booking. $459.00 r/t per person with a guarantee to arrive on Carnival :)

[PSRCPA]

Definitely suggest looking at the new Fly2Fun! Go online, find the flights you want and call Carnival for their price.

 

The price for airfare to Europe for our Med cruise was very expensive and decided to check with my PVP. I couldn't believe the price they were able to provide. Also, 24 hours later I was able to go online to the airline pick our seats and upgraded to Delta Comfort.

 

We are going 3 days prior to cruise and staying 3 days in NYC before flying home and Carnival was able to provide flights for those days!

[love2travel41]

Many Thanks to everyone who gave input!

[zdcatc12]

Did I read correctly that you can not do this for only a one-way, it has to be for a round trip?