Early Savers - Check Your Prices and OBC!

[WorkerBee74]

For those of you who booked "Early Saver", it's worth a check for your cruise fares again today.  I originally booked an Early Saver in April 2018 for a cruise in May 2019 which included a $50 OBC.  On Black Friday I saw that my fare had gone down $136 with no OBC.  So, I applied for the price guarantee knowing they'd retract my $50 OBC but it would still save me $86 overall.  Applied through the form and they repriced my cruise making my final payment in February $136 less than it would have been (so really $86 since they took away my OBC) - yay.

 

Then, today I had another look at Cyber Monday and there was my cheaper fare (the same one I rebooked to on Friday) WITH the $50 OBC.  Applied for a reprice again, still got the same fare which truly saved me $136 since I ALSO got back my $50 OBC.  NICE!

 

I know next some people will wonder how you can tell if you booked an Early Saver (if you don't remember) and are eligible for price protection like this?  If you're on a payment plan like most of us are, you'll get an email from Carnival every month when your payment comes out.  If you look under the Guest Confirmation section, of the email you'll see your guest names, Contact Phone, VIP Club # /Level if you have one and a field called "NOTE".  If it has a "1" in it AND you scroll down to the bottom where it says "Guest Notes", it will give you notes re:

Early Saver terms & conditions (T&C) apply

IF you booked under an Early Saver rate.

 

Go forth and save some cash!  I hope this helps someone out after all the help this forum has given me 

 

EDIT: The form to have your cruise repriced is located at: https://www.carnival.com/core/requestforms/priceprotection.aspx  - however, if there is ANYTHING you don't understand about how this potentially changes your booking (like losing OBC over $50, or changing your cabin type etc) I suggest you call, or add notes for them to call YOU before they make changes in the Additional Comments.   You probably will want to also select "NO" under Include Fares where Carnival picks your room unless you really want that inside cabin next to the galley.  NOTE that both times they repriced they just sent me a new confirmation email with the new terms so I had to know what I was doing when I asked for the reprice 😉

 

Edited November 26, 2018 by WorkerBee74
Clarified rebooking terms

[shof515]

my cruise fare went up..no discount or obc for me 😞

[JaiJae]

My cruise fare went up as well...when I asked about the obc, the rep said my fare would have to be what is listed now. Which is $40 higher. 😕

Edited November 26, 2018 by JaiJae

[dmdiver]

Ours has only gone up - I keep checking, though.

 

[pyropoodle]

just check mine, it is $898.00 more expensive!   wow, probably not likely to drop, but glad I checked.

[Tiger0613]

1)I am not on a payment plan.  I can pay in full for a cruise when booking it, but I wait until a week before the final payment due date.  I save the money each month instead.  That way I continue to earn interest on that money.  I also don't have to wait for a refund if I should need that money in the meantime.

 

2)I price matched for my back to back cruises in January 2021.  The price hadn't changed since I booked the cruises on 11/15/18, but I did gain $50 OBC for each cruise.

 

3)My 2/10/19 and 12/30/19 cruises have gone up.  I already have $50 OBC for them because I used the future cruise promotion a few days after getting home from a cruise in February 2018.  The 2/10/19 cruise fare for two has gone up $130, and the taxes for two have gone up $0.54.  The 12/30/19 cruise fare for one has gone up $20, and the taxes for one have gone up $13.12.

Edited November 26, 2018 by Tiger0613

[WorkerBee74]

Darn!  Looks like all of you have had yours go UP which sucks... I haven't repriced between April and now so maybe there was a lower price at some point but it worked out lower for me these last few days.  If it wasn't for this board I wouldn't have even know how easy it is to do this though so I thank everyone for that! 🙂

 

Hopefully the deal fairy will show up for some of you too, but it's also a good feeling seeing your cruise going up knowing that you locked it into a better rate in the first place.  I am doing two cruises next year, second one on Carnival and first one on Royal - and WOW is the website experience for repricing is definitely better with Carnival.  I barely know how much I owe on Royal (is it Canadian? Is it USD?) let alone think about repricing it - my cabin category is sold out there to boot - haha.

[Mr. Nazzy]

Mine went down over the weekend and I called and knocked $120 off my fare, while losing a $50 OBC.  Today the fare is the same, but they are offering $100 OBC.  Wonder if they'll add that to my booking if I call?  I'll give it a shot after work.

BTW - It pays to watch your fare closely.  I've knocked $200 off through watching the rates.  I've saved an additional $300 taking advantage of a couple AMEX offers. 

[Tiger0613]

1 minute ago, Mr. Nazzy said:

Mine went down over the weekend and I called and knocked $120 off my fare, while losing a $50 OBC.  Today the fare is the same, but they are offering $100 OBC.  Wonder if they'll add that to my booking if I call?  I'll give it a shot after work.

BTW - It pays to watch your fare closely.  I've knocked $200 off through watching the rates.  I've saved an additional $300 taking advantage of a couple AMEX offers. 

They will.  That's what I did when I price matched this morning.

[Mr. Nazzy]

1 hour ago, Tiger0613 said:

They will.  That's what I did when I price matched this morning.

Sure enough they did.  Every little bit helps.  Thanks Tiger and WorkerBee. 

[Mommawo]

How about if I have it paid off now ahead of my deadline 

[Tiger0613]

1 hour ago, Mommawo said:

How about if I have it paid off now ahead of my deadline 

They will still price match.  I just don't know if they will refund the difference or give it back as OBC.  I know they give the difference as OBC when price matching after the final payment due date.

[Mommawo]

2 minutes ago, Tiger0613 said:

They will still price match.  I just don't know if they will refund the difference or give it back as OBC.  I know they give the difference as OBC when price matching after the final payment due date.

That is good too lol thanks!!

[JaniceB]

You hit the jackpot, mine went way up.

[WorkerBee74]

For those of you whose cruises went up, are you sailing soon?  Just curious if you see less sales closer to your cruise date.  I also suspect it has a lot to do with how full your sailing is too.

[Tiger0613]

10 minutes ago, WorkerBee74 said:

For those of you whose cruises went up, are you sailing soon?  Just curious if you see less sales closer to your cruise date.  I also suspect it has a lot to do with how full your sailing is too.

My next cruise is 2/10/19.  The cruise after that is 12/30/19.  Both have gone up.  The closer you get to your cruise date, the less sales there are.  Occasionally a sale will pop up that is lower, but it will switch you over to a guarantee rate.

 

 

 

Only once have I gotten a price drop closer to a cruise.  The cruise was a 5 day on 12/26/16 out of Mobile.  I booked it 3/8/16 under my VIFP number.  On 3/10/16, I switched it to my mom's VIFP number to use the actual offer that she got.  That dropped the fare for two $60 and gave $50 OBC.  I checked at least once a week for drops, but the only ones that showed would have taken away the OBC.  I gave up on getting a price drop.

 

On 10/7/16, my mom and I were on our way to visit family in another state when I decided on a whim to check again.  The early saver fare for two had dropped an additional $60, the taxes for two had dropped $12, and the rate still offered $50 OBC.  This was 20 day before the final payment due date.

[MistyRo76]

Checked my April, 2019 Cuba cruise and it's only got 1 cabin left showing available....so no prices drops or upsells for us!