Fix the Freaking Computers

[jc foster]

          Yesterday I logged onto the Celebrity website to view an upcoming Alaska voyage.  A message appeared on my screen stating that X amount of dollars would be deposited onto my credit card in 3 to 5 business days.  I knew this amount was the same as I had paid for the Celebrity Vacation Protection Plan and I knew I had not cancelled anything. I checked and sure enough my insurance had mysteriously just disappeared. I called Celebrity and after a 50 minute wait I talked to a very nice lady who basically told me sometimes it (the computer) just does this.  She was very nice placed the insurance back on my account and sent a receipt. Also while we had the lady on the line my wife talked to her about a problem with the check in app.on her Iphone . The app would show her checked in and then suddenly the Travel Info. section would just go blank.   My wife had spent  over an hour on the phone two days prior and was told to call back because they were having an IT problem.  Our final answer from Celebrity is dont worry about what it says on your phone App your good on our end and ready to board.  My question is whats the purpose of the phone app if it doesnt work ?

[jc foster]

8 minutes ago, jc foster said:

          Yesterday I logged onto the Celebrity website to view an upcoming Alaska voyage.  A message appeared on my screen stating that X amount of dollars would be deposited onto my credit card in 3 to 5 business days.  I knew this amount was the same as I had paid for the Celebrity Vacation Protection Plan and I knew I had not cancelled anything. I checked and sure enough my insurance had mysteriously just disappeared. I called Celebrity and after a 50 minute wait I talked to a very nice lady who basically told me sometimes it (the computer) just does this.  She was very nice placed the insurance back on my account and sent a receipt. Also while we had the lady on the line my wife talked to her about a problem with the check in app.on her Iphone . The app would show her checked in and then suddenly the Travel Info. section would just go blank.   My wife had spent  over an hour on the phone two days prior and was told to call back because they were having an IT problem.  Our final answer from Celebrity is dont worry about what it says on your phone App your good on our end and ready to board.  My question is whats the purpose of the phone app if it doesnt work ?

 

[heatescapee]

Oh my! This happened to me, too. I received an email that I’d cancelled Cruise insurance and was told I did that on the date that I started the checkin for our Aug. 25 cruise. I didn’t see how I could have possibly made that error…fixing that got a bit cumbersome, I’ll skip those details, something about it was after final payment so they had to make special arrangements. Particularly upsetting because my husband was unexpectedly in the hospital at the time! Thank you for posting. 

[doccide]

Last year NCL somehow cancelled my whole cruise!  I got it re-instated and the NCL agent said he had never seen this happen.  Yesterday my transfers from FCO to rome and rome to port were somehow cancelled.  They said I cx them when I wasnt even on the computer

[SoloAlaska]

Haven’t had an issue yet but I also don’t book the cruise line insurance. I travel quite a bit so I just have an annual multi trip policy which covers me.

[Pennstatedj]

The same thing happened to me after final payment for my last cruise on Equinox July 8. I almost did not see it. We called and it was straightened out. But what worried us is my wife fell and broke her wrist just two weeks prior to this so we were worried when her operation was two weeks from cruise. The dr gave her ok two days before departure. So we were worried if we had not found the cancellation and reinstated it. 

 Those of us that have been around since 1995, know X has the worst computer systems. It always amazes me how they make changes and it seems they never ask for input from their customers. I do not think they ever beta test anything. I have had several encounters with their IT department on board and once with the Head of X IT. He told me that they have a department of one. That was 5 years ago. My thought was he was a fix it man not a real department manager. It makes me think that they on plug in programs and hope for the best. 

[Happy Cruiser 6143]

Seems to me that the moral of this story is not to buy insurance from Celebrity.  Their IT has been a mess forever and they show no signs of wanting to fix it.

[heatescapee]

This was our first time buying Celebrity’s insurance…..sadly, I was feeling lazy so I just clicked on the insurance rather than using our usual company. The stress of Celebrity’s having deleted the insurance wasn’t worth the ease of my click! I ended up ultimately being charged 3x for the insurance and refunded twice. Never again! 

[Fly and Sail]

It's outrageous how they neglect one of their most important distribution channels and general IT. It's a total shambles and I just don't get their unwillingness to get this fixed.

[Dar & Bob]

We had the same thing happen last year just before our final payment.  The amount due dropped by the exact amount of the insurance.  Had to call our rep to get it reinstated.  I wish that Celebrity had the details of the booking on the website.  We have cruised Princess a lot and you can see every line item on their site so if something does change you don't have to guess at what it is.  

I do agree that Celebrity's website is one of the worst. 

[zitsky]

Celebrity IT is pretty bad.  They fixed the thing where you would logon on one computer and forget to log off then you’d be at work the next day trying to check something and it wouldn’t let you log in.

 

It could be better, but I don’t work there.

[Traveling Fools]

Didn't have anything to do with a purchase, but when trying to sign in over the weekend X told me my email address wasn't on file with them.  Strange since I've been sailing with them since 2003.  Anyway I had to reenroll to access my account.  Nothing had changed on my current booking.

[NutsAboutGolf]

On 8/3/2023 at 1:32 PM, Fly and Sail said:

It's outrageous how they neglect one of their most important distribution channels and general IT. It's a total shambles and I just don't get their unwillingness to get this fixed.

 

I know someone who works in Viking and another who worked at both Viking and Crystal until the pandemic hit and they moved to another industry.  Some cruise lines don't want to spend the huge up front costs for the software and training so they rely upon IT to take a disaster and turn it into a lesser disaster.  The Viking person said this is also the reason on X, we don't get CC loyalty status discount off things like the internet and have to call in; their software doesn't allow it.  I will say Carnival's is great, never had an issue yet others in the travel industry, like SouthWest suffered when they didn't want to spend the $$$ on the software and it came back to bite them

 

[mnocket]

Many executives see IT as a cost center, and cost centers are things to be minimized.