Celebrity Cruises
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Bad cruise, Bad crusie line
This is our letter to the CEO and we received a call because we have two future cruises planned, one on a millennium ship in Hong King for December and one on Edge in Nov. we plan on canceling if there is no restitution for the January sailing. Ms Lisa Perlo Lutoff C/o Celebrity Cruises Dear Ms. Perlo-Lutoff, I am one of the many disappointed passengers on the recent January 21, 2018 Antarctica cruise that was unhappy with their Celebrity cruise experience. I’m not going to rehash all the issues that occurred on the trip. It wasn’t the weather, I was on the ship, the weather was fine. I am a full-time physician who has sailed 8 cruises in 6 years with Celebrity, and has two more planned for this year alone. I work hard and play hard. My husband and I made a decision to stick with one cruise line, CC, 6 years ago and we have not regretted that decision at all. However, I find it startling the lack of response by your office about this terrible cruise experience. It’s not consistent with the CC we know. As an aside, I am very active in fundraising efforts in South Florida for several local charities. I was at a recent meeting for one of our upcoming events and your name came up for generously donating a trip for our cause. Thank you for the generosity. Afterwards, I was asked one-on-one by a committee chair, who knew about my recent Antarctica cruise, about he cruise. When I explained to her that Antarctica is beautiful and there is no place like it on Earth, but that we went on one engine, to only 1.5 of 4 ports, into a storm, at an isolated part of the world, and was on the ship for 12 days straight. She was shocked and said she would have been apoplectic to know that there was no proper response by CC for such a poor experience. As we both agreed that this was so inconsistent with your generosity, we then discussed the possibilty that maybe you were not being informed by those who report to you about the outrage of many loyal Celebrity Captains Club Elite and above members. We are individuals who have spent years amassing loyalty with your company. No one wants to start over with another cruise line. I like CC, I enjoy the Aqua Class, the itineraries, the food, etc. So the lack of response is not consistent with your generosity towards charity, therefore it almost appears that you really may not have been made fully aware of the almost 2,000 people unhappy about their decision to take that cruise. I, for one, would have canceled and rescheduled that trip, but I was not given that option. We were told about the one engine just 5 days prior to the cruise sailing. That seems very unfair, as I would’ve rescheduled and not risked being in an isolated part of the world, on one engine, at risk of missing many planned ports. But, I don’t like to complain without coming up with solutions. I feel the negativity by thousands of people towards Celebrity, especially when the ship was packed with so many captains club members, should be diffused. Celebrity cruises took a gamble of sending the Infinity out on one engine. I know from your own captains on board that trip that departments were on overtime, running at losses, when the trip was barely half over. Please reconsider writing off this cruise as a lesson learned and consider giving passengers proper credit towards a future cruise. On board at the time, I had thought $3000 towards a future cruise or $2000 back (per cabin) for the cruise would have been fair compensation for what we missed and experienced. Yes, some people won’t be happy no matter what CC does, but most are reasonable and would feel compensated for what was not the cruise of a lifetime. I feel that the social media war Celebrity is trying to wait out isn’t worth it. The passengers aren’t wrong about this one and this really should have been nipped in the bud a long time ago. I just can’t help but think you may not have been fully updated as to just how loyal CC passengers really felt. Again, thank you for your time reading my letter. But most importantly thank you for your generosity toward charity. That says a lot. If there is any way I could help put this issue to rest, I would be happy to help mediate a resolution. Thank you for your consideration. Melanie Hecker, MD, MBA