Any experience with Travelocity and Crystal Cruises?

Travelocity is offering a $200 per cabin shipboard credit and prepaid
gratuities on a Crystal cruise I am considering. Does anybody have any
experience with getting these perks from Travelocity? Is there any way
that another TA can match them or is that a special deal negotiated
between Travelocity and Crystal?

What is it like to use Travelocity as a cruise agent? I would appreciate
any comments. I booked a hotel/car package from Travelocity once. They
neglected to tell me that the tax on the car was not included. Getting
the bill when I returned the car was a shock.

Your posts lately are rather curious to say the least. If you are in fact a
'real' travel agent you should know the answers anyway and you should be
able to get the lowest price possible as you will be getting all of the
commission anyway. Just not sure what you are looking for here.
Jim


"Odysseus" wrote in message
news:lU1jb.769137$YN5.751496@sccrnsc01...
Travelocity is offering a $200 per cabin shipboard credit and prepaid
gratuities on a Crystal cruise I am considering. Does anybody have any
experience with getting these perks from Travelocity? Is there any way
that another TA can match them or is that a special deal negotiated
between Travelocity and Crystal?

What is it like to use Travelocity as a cruise agent? I would appreciate
any comments. I booked a hotel/car package from Travelocity once. They
neglected to tell me that the tax on the car was not included. Getting
the bill when I returned the car was a shock.

I am not a travel agent and have never claimed to be. As you said, if I were
a TA, I would know the answers to the questions I pose. Some of the
questions I have posed are ones that I don't want to ask the TA I have been
using since I am considering finding a different way to book cruises.




Your posts lately are rather curious to say the least. If you are in fact a
'real' travel agent you should know the answers anyway and you should be
able to get the lowest price possible as you will be getting all of the
commission anyway. Just not sure what you are looking for here.
Jim


"Odysseus" wrote in message
news:lU1jb.769137$YN5.751496@sccrnsc01...
Travelocity is offering a $200 per cabin shipboard credit and prepaid
gratuities on a Crystal cruise I am considering. Does anybody have any
experience with getting these perks from Travelocity? Is there any way
that another TA can match them or is that a special deal negotiated
between Travelocity and Crystal?

What is it like to use Travelocity as a cruise agent? I would appreciate
any comments. I booked a hotel/car package from Travelocity once. They
neglected to tell me that the tax on the car was not included. Getting
the bill when I returned the car was a shock.

On Wed, 15 Oct 2003 22:49:51 GMT, Odysseus wrote:

I am not a travel agent and have never claimed to be. As you said, if I were
a TA, I would know the answers to the questions I pose. Some of the
questions I have posed are ones that I don't want to ask the TA I have been
using since I am considering finding a different way to book cruises.

Send me an email -- -- about getting good service
and low prices. I think Travelocity is okay, really, but you can do
better for cruises.


Mason Barge

"If this is coffee, please bring me some tea. If this is tea, please bring me some coffee."
-- Abraham Lincoln

Unless you can get a LOT better price via Travelocity.com I would not
use them. Based on what I have seen from them on some simple air
tickets they don't give me much hope that, should there be a problem,
they would be able to address it.

This is just IMO and others may have a different take on them.

Just be sure to get two or three prices from some of the well
respected agents on this forum for the SAME cabin including taxes and
service fees before booking.

-D

Odysseus wrote in message news:lU1jb.769137$YN5.751496@sccrnsc01...
Travelocity is offering a $200 per cabin shipboard credit and prepaid
gratuities on a Crystal cruise I am considering. Does anybody have any
experience with getting these perks from Travelocity? Is there any way
that another TA can match them or is that a special deal negotiated
between Travelocity and Crystal?

What is it like to use Travelocity as a cruise agent? I would appreciate
any comments. I booked a hotel/car package from Travelocity once. They
neglected to tell me that the tax on the car was not included. Getting
the bill when I returned the car was a shock.

From: (dep_blueman)

This is just IMO and others may have a different take on them.

I do ... when continental bumped me ... Travelocity was extremely helpful in
telling me my rights ... and exactly how to proceed ... The rep spent 30 -45
minutes with me ... unrushed and patient ...


Be seeing you
In the Village
Number 6

Travelocity is not competitive when it comes to luxury cruises. They
give you the cruise lines rates and maybe throw in some goodies like
shipboard credit or pre-paid gratuities.

Shipboard credit and pre-paid gratuities is a pretty common offer
among agencies belonging to consortiums like Giants, Virtuoso or
Vacation.com. We belong to Vacation.com, and offer those on about half
of all Crystal sailings.

Travelocity is really not competitive for cruises. We have to compete
in this market, and we provide our clients with an additional 10% off
and, at this time, one or two category upgrades. Other agencies do the
same.

You do the math, how much money you waste using Travelocity for
cruises, considering upgrades and additional discounts, you can get
from other agencies, along with the shipboard credit and the pre-paid
gratuities.

Have you seen and heard the TV and radio campaigns these companies
(Travelocity, Expedia, Orbitz, ...) run. Guess who pays for those?

Wolfgang Petrusch
www.deluxevoyages.com

Maybe I need to change agents. I have booked six cruises, four of them
with two cabins, and one three week land tour with this agent. I must
have given them at least $20K worth of business. The only thing I have
gotten from the company is cheap gifts like photo albums. They are not
offering me any kind of a price break on a Crystal Cruise.


Travelocity is not competitive when it comes to luxury cruises. They
give you the cruise lines rates and maybe throw in some goodies like
shipboard credit or pre-paid gratuities.

Shipboard credit and pre-paid gratuities is a pretty common offer
among agencies belonging to consortiums like Giants, Virtuoso or
Vacation.com. We belong to Vacation.com, and offer those on about half
of all Crystal sailings.

Travelocity is really not competitive for cruises. We have to compete
in this market, and we provide our clients with an additional 10% off
and, at this time, one or two category upgrades. Other agencies do the
same.

You do the math, how much money you waste using Travelocity for
cruises, considering upgrades and additional discounts, you can get
from other agencies, along with the shipboard credit and the pre-paid
gratuities.

Have you seen and heard the TV and radio campaigns these companies
(Travelocity, Expedia, Orbitz, ...) run. Guess who pays for those?

Wolfgang Petrusch
www.deluxevoyages.com