Am X Celebrity credit card

[naples queen]

Are there any of you who use the American Express Celebrity Credit Card? If so, can you explain the benefits as far as using it for your cruise. I see on some boards where people accumulate many points which they use toward their cruises. Is it worth it? There is no annual fee. Thanks for any input.

[Pisces11]

I don't know anything about the AmEx Celebrity card. I am surprised that there is no fee after a year. This would be the first AmEx card without one. I have a Citibank American Airlines Am Ex card and a gold Am Ex card. When you read the fine print and compare, there is no comparison between the two and I am getting rid of AA Am Ex card after the free year is up. As an example, if I had used my gold card instead of my AA card for my upcoming trip to Hawaii, I wouldn't have had to spend over 300 dollars on trip insurance, it would have automatically been covered and we have great health insurance. I cannot stress enough to do what I didn't do-read the fine print between a regular American Express card and the specialty bank Am Ex cards. The regular one has great customer service and the buyer's protection plan. They fight for you in any dispute with a merchant. The specialty card might not do this. Good luck. Sometimes things seem better than they are which is why you need to read all the annoying fine print.

[joanna627]

I opened one up last year to use for my upcoming cruise. So far, I've been very pleased with it. I have 0% APR until 2008 and no hidden fees. I haven't tried transferring my points credits yet, but if that goes smoothly I'll definitely keep the card. I have a Delta Amex also and I agree with the previous poster that this card has not been worth it. There are high annual fees and I am cancelling it.

[jer_l]

We don't have the Am X card, but we do have the Celebrity Visa card. It was through MBNA, but Bank of America bought them out. No annual fee. All Celebrity purchases (cruises and shipboard account) are double points. The big pay off is at 125,000 points. Up to that it's shipboard credits or credits toward a cruise ($1 for each 100 points), but 125,000 points can be redeemed for a cruise for two worth up to $2500 which doubles their value. It will take us several more years to get there, but what a great way to celebrate when we do.

[naples queen]

Thanks for the input. I too have a Delta Am X and am planning to cancel it. We have tried to redeem many, many frequent flier miles and have not been able to do so. It's not worth it....along with the annual fee. Anyone else have any experience with redeeming points toward cruises?

[gracecarmo]

is there a fee for the gold American Express card? I have the Celebrity Amex card and have already cashed in points for $500 worth of shipboard credit, and used these credits on our past two cruises. However, I never looked at the fine print!

[kelmac]

I have the Celebrity American Express card. Cashed in my first 25,000pts for a free airline RT ticket to FLL. I'm up to 24,050 points again, and think the airfare deal is better than anything I got with my airline card. You can use it for shipboard credit, gifts...,

 

Enjoy!

Kel

[naples queen]

From what most of you have said, it sounds like an ok deal so I just applied. Anything would be better than Delta AmX.....and there's no fee!

[LJAM]

I don't know anything about the AmEx Celebrity card. I am surprised that there is no fee after a year. This would be the first AmEx card without one. I have a Citibank American Airlines Am Ex card and a gold Am Ex card. When you read the fine print and compare, there is no comparison between the two and I am getting rid of AA Am Ex card after the free year is up. As an example, if I had used my gold card instead of my AA card for my upcoming trip to Hawaii, I wouldn't have had to spend over 300 dollars on trip insurance, it would have automatically been covered and we have great health insurance. I cannot stress enough to do what I didn't do-read the fine print between a regular American Express card and the specialty bank Am Ex cards. The regular one has great customer service and the buyer's protection plan. They fight for you in any dispute with a merchant. The specialty card might not do this. Good luck. Sometimes things seem better than they are which is why you need to read all the annoying fine print.

 

I have three American Express Cards including the Celebrity card. One card I have had for over 8 years and there has never been an annual fee on any of them. I always read the fine print and I will not accept a cad that charges me a fee.

 

The only draw back to the Celebrity card is the same as any American Express card there are still businesses that only take MasterCard or Visa. If I was going to do it again I would get a Celebrity Visa instead so I could accumulate points faster.

[gracecarmo]

I just checked with DH and he says that there is no yearly charge for the X Amex card. We also have the X Visa card, but will use the Amex card to get the points.

All this information, I learned here on CC, and has earned me over $1800 in the past year. (2 cruises). Included is the Stockholder's OBC, the X Amex card, as well as onboard bookings. We had a good time spending all the OBC's!

[alohavictoria]

It sounds like a lot of us have both the X AMEX and the Delta Amex. I'm also getting rid of the Delta Amex because I don't like the annual fee. It was great for a while and I earned enought miles to fly to Peru for free, but now it's time to move on.

 

What nobody else mentioned is that you can also get cash with the X Amex card after you accumulate so many points. So, rahter than using your points for a shipboard credit, it might pay better to eithe rtake the cash or cah them in for an airline ticket. If you take the shipboard credit, then you miss out on those double points for your Celebrity charges. I figured that out after I used the points once for a sb credit. Now, I use my card to pay for the cruise and the charges on board as well as those future cruise deposits that I always seem to have! I get double points (actually they have been triple but I think that stopped 12/31/06).

 

You really have to see which of the benefits will work for you the best. But as everyone else says there is no annual fee for the card. I'm thinking about getting one of the Visa X cards. MBNA allows you to transfer points from one card to another - but they do charge you $15. In some instances where so many places don't take Amex, it might be worth the $15 after you have accumulated a lot of points.

[SusieV]

I wish us Canadians could have a Celebrity credit card :rolleyes: They don't offer them outside the USA.

[vicgiz]

I, too, have the Celebrity Rewards AMEX card. I chose AMEX over VISA because, at the time I enrolled, the bonus point offers were better with AMEX.

 

I just redeemed points for a $250 onboard credit, and hope to have another before we cruise in the summer. Everything has been smooth so far, and I'll bring my receipt along when we cruise, just in case the credit doesn't automatically show up.

 

You can get cash or other benefits besides cruise rewards, but I think that the "cost" in points is higher when you choose something that isn't a Celebrity program. (I imagine that any card associated with a particular business is going to give you the best deal when you redeem your points with their own business.)

 

For me the cruise credits make me feel like I have a little "play money" on the ship. I know that it isn't exactly "free" because I could use it for other items, but it is still nice to have! :)