Celebrity $500 buy in to get $550 to play...

[PTC DAWG]

Was curious if anyone had done this...seems like a good way to get an extra $50 bucks to play with.  I assume you get $500 in real chips, and maybe $50 in "promo" chips or something of the like to play with.  

 

Any experiences with this appreciated.  

[roxievegas]

yes it is a great way to get extra gambling money.  past casino specials have been $75 for $500.  We would get $1500 in gambling money and get an extra $225 - we play the slots.  

The money is loaded on to your individual acct - my acct and my hubby acct are separate.  As we play the slots, you are playing the free money first - if we hit a good hand we would cash out a ticket and save if for later..  You have to play all the money before the end of the cruise.  By saving the cash tickets, you can save them to play after all the buy in money is gone, or turn them in to the cashier and get cash back.  You will have a charge for the orginal $500, or $100, or  $1500 etc on your cabin.

[George C]

We bought 300 so we got 330, what they give you is 5 dollar chips that cannot be cashed in. When you play and win they will give you back regular chips . I thought it was a good deal , let me carry less cash. I will do it again 

[PTC DAWG]

Thanks for the info..basically how I expected it to work.  

[OriginalBoat]

All of it is in promo chips, not just the free money.

[mattie123]

I was told on my last cruise, if you took advantage of this offer your $500 (and the extra $50 obviously) play would not count toward tier level.  Wanting to keep Sapphire I passed.  

[Paulras]

On 6/30/2019 at 5:21 PM, mattie123 said:

I was told on my last cruise, if you took advantage of this offer your $500 (and the extra $50 obviously) play would not count toward tier level.  Wanting to keep Sapphire I passed.  

That's only 550 points out of the 25,000 needed for Sapphire on slots, or only about 70 points on table games. I think the free play is a better "bet". 

 

The good thing with the free play on slots and video poker is that it helps to bring the payout ratio more in line with land casinos. For instance, house advantage on VP at most land casinos is a couple percent but on ships is closer to 20% (achieved through lower payouts for the same hands). A few times, I purchased the $575 for $500 when they offered it, took it to a VP machine, played exactly $575 and hit cash out. Most times, I cashed $600-700. Only once did I lose money, cashed about $400.

[mattie123]

Sapphire level is 100,000 points, not 25,000

 

[Paulras]

26 minutes ago, mattie123 said:

Sapphire level is 100,000 points, not 25,000

 

Yes, you're correct. I should have said 550 out of 100k, which is even smaller. 

 

PS - I'm Sapphire too. Think I ended with roughly 200k points after 2 long (and costly) cruises in 2017/2018. I'm at 99,700 for this period but have a 7 day and a 15 day booked for the rest of 2019. No doubt I'll hit the 300 I need in like 10 minutes!