Flights by Celebrity Issues

[Cruise a holic]

10 hours ago, Marie51 said:

 Can you go to the airlines website and change your flight there? 

 I priced the flights by celebrity and they were the same as if I bought the flights on my own so I really don’t see any sense in using celebrity to book your flights 

 What is the advantage? Anyway I hope you get your flight changed 

Advantage is that if you book flights early when you reserve your cruise, the airfare isn't due until you pay for the cruise- if the airfare goes down, call celebrity and they typically make adjustments without a hassel.

[juksing]

8 hours ago, RTShaker said:

FYI, the codeshare is still active with Westjet/Delta.

Yes, I believe the codeshare between Delta/Westjet is still there but unfortunately (and strangely) for the direct flight I was originally booked on (YYZ-MIA) the direct flight seems gone; It is no longer on Delta site but on Westjet they still show up.  In fact all the direct YYZ to MIA flights (at Delta site ) which were run by Westjet are gone. 

[happy cruzer]

10 hours ago, NutsAboutGolf said:

They charge $200 to change flights after final payment, correct?  Pre-pandemic, the airlines used to charge a change fee, now they don't although you receive a credit vs a refund.

 

 

Anyone know exactly how this work?

 

On 4/3 the Edge departs FLL/Port Everglades has a 3pm all aboard for a 330pm port departure, flight by X allows me to book a flight landing at FLL at 12:21pm, this one way flight is $150ish.  If that flight is delayed and you miss the aboard, what happens?  Also of note, the next day is a sea day; so flights by X will put someone who misses their flight in a hotel for two nights, give them a food allowance, cover airport transfers book them flights foreign port?

 

I've always been an arrive the night before kind of guy but if X is guaranteeing they'll get you on the ship at the first port and cover all expenses if a flight delay causes you to miss embarkation, I may start booking at least the flight from home to the embarkation port which avoids the pre-cruise hotel stay, avoids a couple airport transfers and possibly some vacation time.

Regarding cover all expenses, typically expenses are covered by an air carrier that is obligated to depending on the reason for the delay such as mechanical issues.  Very few instances of a cruise line paying out anything.  Additionally that is what travel insurance is for particularly weather issues and after a claim is filed.  If you read the cruise contract, you will see the devil in details that the cruise line only acts as a travel agent regarding airfare. 

[NutsAboutGolf]

2 minutes ago, happy cruzer said:

Regarding cover all expenses, typically expenses are covered by an air carrier that is obligated to depending on the reason for the delay such as mechanical issues.  Very few instances of a cruise line paying out anything.  Additionally that is what travel insurance is for particularly weather issues and after a claim is filed.  If you read the cruise contract, you will see the devil in details that the cruise line only acts as a travel agent regarding airfare. 

 

Yup!  I quoting the person who said it was "guaranteed" to get you on the ship but later it was revealed that is incorrect info.  The problem is, the airlines only are obligated to get you to the airport near the port.  If you miss the ship due to a delay, your only recourse is travel insurance.

[publicpersona]

10 hours ago, NutsAboutGolf said:

12 hours ago, PinkSandGirl said:

3.  They guarantee to get you to the ship if there are airline delays. 

 

Anyone know exactly how this work?

 

It doesn't. The claim that they "guarantee to get you to the ship" is a misunderstanding. Like any travel agency or the airlines, they will attempt to rebook you. But if it becomes impossible to get to the ship before it departs, you're just going to miss the cruise. Joining a cruise downstream is no longer possible due to COVID protocols, from my understanding.

 

At best, you might have leverage to request a cruise refund. But you are probably better off just getting travel insurance if you want to cover the risk of missing the cruise during flight delays.

[publicpersona]

7 hours ago, happy cruzer said:

My TA told me the some of the wording on the website is leftover from the past, i.e. the 200 change fee is leftover. 

 

I can attest that early January, 2022, they still charge $200 per pax penalty for change when within final payment.

[publicpersona]

10 hours ago, PinkSandGirl said:

I think some of it is kind of vague though.   https://www.celebritycruises.com/flights-by-celebrity

 

What is vague is their marketing term "Assured Arrival" that was probably created by the same one who came up with "Always Included" to mean something that has exceptions.

 

Despite fuzzy marketing phrases such as "peace of mind" and "someone looking out for you", the actual commitment defined in the terms and conditions is to assist you with day of travel rebooking, just like any other TA or the airlines would do. Nothing else.

[39august]

I also cancelled a cruise for late Jan. on Jan. 4 under CDC program regulations. I will be refunded 100% of the airfare. There is no penalty under CWC. My TA has assured me this is correct. And he forwarded to me an answer  direct from Celebrity about the refund. If you read all the info about CWC  on X's  web site, you will see that air with X is "protected" .  BTW, when I call early morning, I usually get thru in 10-15 minutes. 

[happy cruzer]

10 minutes ago, publicpersona said:

 

I can attest that early January, 2022, they still charge $200 per pax penalty for change when within final payment.

So I was talking about airfare that was cancelled or changed that was covered by Cruise with Confidence.  Sorry if I muddied the water.  Did you have a Cruise with Confidence change that incurred the $200 penalty?

[awhfy]

12 hours ago, p18750 said:

No, at least not for AA. They appear to know the flights were booked by a third party and will not let you change them, they say call the travel agent. 

We were able to change our flights directly with AA this week, they started to say contact your TA then realized our issue & just fixed it. Our issue was an airline schedule change & the rebooking was for 10 days later. Sometimes common sense prevails 

[publicpersona]

6 minutes ago, happy cruzer said:

So I was talking about airfare that was cancelled or changed that was covered by Cruise with Confidence.  Sorry if I muddied the water.  Did you have a Cruise with Confidence change that incurred the $200 penalty?

 

Sorry that I misunderstood. My change was not CWC, but rather to adjust the itinerary after AA juggled its schedule significantly.

[p18750]

I am happy to report back that after the third time on hold for over 2 hrs I was able to talk to a very nice person who was happy to adjust my airfare. Saved my wife and I over $1,000 on our airfare so the hourly rate was not too bad. 

[jagoffee]

On 2/24/2022 at 5:22 PM, PinkSandGirl said:

I book First Class as well.  I can see my seats but can't make changes on aa.com.

 

Interesting that you are able to change seats.  

 

I just logged in to see if I was now able to but no, I can't change seats.  Not that I need to. 😉 The only time I did was one time they changed the plane type and they didn't reassign the same seats so I had to call to change them.  

 

🍹

I am not sure why you are not able to add you AA CA flight to your account and then change seats.  I do it all the time.  I have a current AA reservations from Celebrity for November, , I just check and I can change seats on AA.com ( I am assuming you have a FF account with AA)

[terrydtx]

We have used CA and never waited more than 10 minutes.  Last year we used them for our flights to FLL to book with Delta. Delta changed flights and times 3 times in the month before our cruise and CA was able to change flights that worked better for us at no extra charge. First time change I tried calling Delta and got the dreaded hold time is currently 5 hours, I then called CA and got the changes done in less than 10 minutes. Last year we also used CA for business class air to Italy for Celebrity Cruises that eventually got canceled by X after final payment and we got 100% reimbursement for the $6300 in air, if we had booked directly with American Airlines, we would not have gotten our money-back. 

 

We have not had problems changing seats on CA tickets with American Airlines, we go into our AA account and change seats if needed. The only airline we have issues with over seat assignments is British Air which charges a fee to pre book seats even in business class, so we avoid any routes that involves BA.

 

 

Edited February 26, 2022 by terrydtx

[dazey]

I do use Flights by Celebrity and recently changed sail date and had to change flights.  I did get charged the $200 as final payment had been made.  One time the flights were changed by airline which I did not like and they changed them without a $200 fee, of course.

 

I have also noticed that if you call the customer service number and get transferred to Flights they always seem to pick up quickly.  But then I have waited for customer service for over 2 hrs also.

 

I think the wait is definitely too long sometimes but I put it on speaker and go about doing something else.  The bottom line is that Celebrity, once I get to speak to them, seems to resolve any issue I might have.

 

I have tried emailing them as they suggest but that takes a few days for a response - way to long for me to wait for a resolution.

 

 

 

 

[MaVtMdFl]

Flights by Celebrity has  the worst customer I've ever encountered. It is impossible to get through over the phone, they don't respond to e-mails. We paid for our tickets and our ship is leaving in less than 3 months, but we don't have assigned seats on airlines. Since we paid for business class flights, and are flying transAtlantically, my spouse and I would like to sit together, if we even have seats. This is totally unacceptable but there seems to be no recourse. Ideas?

 

[sippican]

37 minutes ago, MaVtMdFl said:

Flights by Celebrity has  the worst customer I've ever encountered. It is impossible to get through over the phone, they don't respond to e-mails. We paid for our tickets and our ship is leaving in less than 3 months, but we don't have assigned seats on airlines. Since we paid for business class flights, and are flying transAtlantically, my spouse and I would like to sit together, if we even have seats. This is totally unacceptable but there seems to be no recourse. Ideas?

 

 

You may have paid for your flights, but usually Celebrity does not actually ticket them until closer to the date of departure. If they are not ticketed, you can't choose seats yet.

I have been successful calling them and asking when the flights will be ticketed.

[terrydtx]

53 minutes ago, MaVtMdFl said:

Flights by Celebrity has  the worst customer I've ever encountered. It is impossible to get through over the phone, they don't respond to e-mails. We paid for our tickets and our ship is leaving in less than 3 months, but we don't have assigned seats on airlines. Since we paid for business class flights, and are flying transAtlantically, my spouse and I would like to sit together, if we even have seats. This is totally unacceptable but there seems to be no recourse. Ideas?

 

Have you tried booking seats directly with the airlines?  This is what we do and have no problems. You should even be able to do this online at the airline's websites. All you need is your record locater number which should be on your receipts. 

[jagoffee]

2 hours ago, sippican said:

 

You may have paid for your flights, but usually Celebrity does not actually ticket them until closer to the date of departure. If they are not ticketed, you can't choose seats yet.

I have been successful calling them and asking when the flights will be ticketed.

I am sure it depends on the airline, but I pick and move seats all the time on AA way before ticketing.

 

What airline do you usually book?

[p18750]

1 hour ago, jagoffee said:

I am sure it depends on the airline, but I pick and move seats all the time on AA way before ticketing.

 

What airline do you usually book?

I have always been able to immediately reserve seats on flights purchased through Celebrity. But for some reason this time I am able to assign seats for UA but not for AA. I called and Celebrity was able to assign seats. My final payment is not due for about 60 days. 

[CyberTag]

2 hours ago, p18750 said:

I have always been able to immediately reserve seats on flights purchased through Celebrity. But for some reason this time I am able to assign seats for UA but not for AA. I called and Celebrity was able to assign seats. My final payment is not due for about 60 days. 

We are able to change our seats on our outgoing flight to BCN on United, but not our returning flight on AA.  

[jagoffee]

6 hours ago, p18750 said:

I have always been able to immediately reserve seats on flights purchased through Celebrity. But for some reason this time I am able to assign seats for UA but not for AA. I called and Celebrity was able to assign seats. My final payment is not due for about 60 days. 

 

4 hours ago, CyberTag said:

We are able to change our seats on our outgoing flight to BCN on United, but not our returning flight on AA.  

Are these actually AA flights flown on AA planes?  (Not a codeshare operated by a non AA partner an AA codeshare number?)

 

 

[CruiseOrRust]

I just had a new experience that raises the question of whether it's worth booking fights through FBC.  I called them yesterday to rebook Delta flights to/from South America next Dec/Jan to take advantage of a $70 fare drop each for two of us.  After a 2 hour wait time, the agent courteously rebooked the flights and dropped the fare (for flights) by $140 total.  Unfortunately, I didn't notice until later that he had mistakenly changed the return flight to a day later than originally booked. 

This morning I called to rectify the incorrect flight return date.  The agent courteously rebooked the flight itinerary back to the correct dates.  She then emailed a new cruise confirmation upon which I noticed that the cruise fares had increased by $1800 and the taxes/fees/port expenses had increased by $900.  After several back-and-forths these two issues were resolved.  Then I noticed a new $200 change fee had been added to the latest confirmation (wiping out my $140 flight savings plus some).  The agent told me there was nothing she could do about this one.  She then transferred me to a cruise desk supervisor who also told me it couldn't be fixed.  I told her it would be fixed or we would just cancel the cruise altogether.  After more hold time she got back on the line and told me she had reduced the cruise fare by $200 to counter the "unfixable" new change fee.

So, the numbers are now right but over two days I spent over six hours on the phone to effect $140 in flight savings.  Had I booked directly with Delta in the first place, I could have recouped the $140 as a future flight credit online in just a few minutes time.  

I've never had this issue of rebooking flights with FBC resulting in changes to the cruise charges before.  Yes, it can be fixed with enough time, patience and insistence.  But I was told by the cruise desk supervisor that this could happen any time one makes changes to flights booked through FBC.  If the flight costs drop again I'm not sure I'll even try to capture the difference.  The FBC agents and cruise desk agents are unfailingly polite and responsive to issues.  But the inability to make changes online and the seemingly arbitrary computer system have (for me) rendered any benefits to booking flights directly with the cruise line much less compelling.

[mchell810]

13 hours ago, CyberTag said:

We are able to change our seats on our outgoing flight to BCN on United, but not our returning flight on AA.  

 

9 hours ago, jagoffee said:

 

Are these actually AA flights flown on AA planes?  (Not a codeshare operated by a non AA partner an AA codeshare number?)

 

 

 

I have pretty much the same issue: able to select seats on the outbound Delta but not the AA return.  And yes, it's an AA flight, not operated by any other entity.  When I log into AA it shows that the tickets have not been paid.  I have decided to just keep trying periodically since I am flying BC and the seat location just isn't that important.

[terrydtx]

5 minutes ago, CruiseOrRust said:

I just had a new experience that raises the question of whether it's worth booking fights through FBC.  I called them yesterday to rebook Delta flights to/from South America next Dec/Jan to take advantage of a $70 fare drop each for two of us.  After a 2 hour wait time, the agent courteously rebooked the flights and dropped the fare (for flights) by $140 total.  Unfortunately, I didn't notice until later that he had mistakenly changed the return flight to a day later than originally booked. 

This morning I called to rectify the incorrect flight return date.  The agent courteously rebooked the flight itinerary back to the correct dates.  She then emailed a new cruise confirmation upon which I noticed that the cruise fares had increased by $1800 and the taxes/fees/port expenses had increased by $900.  After several back-and-forths these two issues were resolved.  Then I noticed a new $200 change fee had been added to the latest confirmation (wiping out my $140 flight savings plus some).  The agent told me there was nothing she could do about this one.  She then transferred me to a cruise desk supervisor who also told me it couldn't be fixed.  I told her it would be fixed or we would just cancel the cruise altogether.  After more hold time she got back on the line and told me she had reduced the cruise fare by $200 to counter the "unfixable" new change fee.

So, the numbers are now right but over two days I spent over six hours on the phone to effect $140 in flight savings.  Had I booked directly with Delta in the first place, I could have recouped the $140 as a future flight credit online in just a few minutes time.  

I've never had this issue of rebooking flights with FBC resulting in changes to the cruise charges before.  Yes, it can be fixed with enough time, patience and insistence.  But I was told by the cruise desk supervisor that this could happen any time one makes changes to flights booked through FBC.  If the flight costs drop again I'm not sure I'll even try to capture the difference.  The FBC agents and cruise desk agents are unfailingly polite and responsive to issues.  But the inability to make changes online and the seemingly arbitrary computer system have (for me) rendered any benefits to booking flights directly with the cruise line much less compelling.

That is a lot of work to just save $70pp. I would have just waited as the flights and pricing will probably change again.