book 8 cabins - get one free?

lifeisschool · #1 (**permalink**) February 6th, 2007, 01:26 AM

Now that we're back, my hubby has all the nurses he works with at the hospital wanting to go on our next cruise with us!

I've heard that if you book a certain amount of cabins, you can get one free. Has anyone ever done this? Do they all have to be in the same category? Do you go through the cruise line directly? What else should I be asking?

Thanks,
Margaret

mehawk · #2 (**permalink**) February 6th, 2007, 05:57 AM

I have never heard of that. :o

Eaky77 · #3 (**permalink**) February 6th, 2007, 08:22 AM

Yes, it is true you can get a free room, we've looked into it ourselves. DH is the one that did all the reasearch, so I am not sure on all the 'rules.' I would give a call over to a Carnival Personal Vacation Planner. They would have all the info needed for this.

Good Luck,
Erin

mteague · #4 (**permalink**) February 6th, 2007, 08:30 AM

Yes, you can do it...you have to book through the group travel department or contact a travel agent. When you get 8 cabins booked, you get one double occupancy fare free. To get an entire cabin free, you would need to book 16 cabins. No you don't have to have the same kind of rooms. I'm just not sure how different cabins would affect the free fares. Probably would relate to the fare of the cheapest room. We have 22 cabins booked with our group. Two more and we get a third fare free!

On our group cruise, we rolled all of these incentives into a plan that will divide it among the cabins and wll be placed on the Sail & Sign card. You can also get an alcohol card for group cruises for adults only. Check with TA or Carnival on that. You can also do a board search because someone just posted info on that. Since we have a large number of 18 and under students in our group, we decided to forego the cocktail party offered for groups. I think we are getting something else in it's place, but we don't know what it might be.

Make sure your TA is watching the price of the cruise and adjusts your fares accordingly. If you book through Carnival, I think you have to do your own checking and call Carnival for the reduction.

Also, be careful when you begin rooming lists, make sure there is someone over 25 in each room or you will have a BIG headache. Read the Please Help thread.

Melody

lifeisschool · #5 (**permalink**) February 7th, 2007, 01:47 AM

Thanks Melody and Erin. I'll look into it!

momphoto · #6 (**permalink**) February 10th, 2007, 10:40 AM

Yes for every 8 cabins you get a free bunk. The free is based on which category you have the most of. So if you have 5 inside and 3 balcony the free one would be to the inside. You also get ammenity points that you can use for many different things onboard. We had a group of 6 so missed out on the free bunk but still got all the points. We ended up having a $100 credit per cabin, bottle of wine per cabin and a free photo coupon which is worth $15. It is best to go with a travel agent if booking a group as they can handle all this for you.

Kuki · #7 (**permalink**) February 10th, 2007, 11:06 AM

Quote:

Yes for every 8 cabins you get a free bunk

That's close, but not quite accurate. You receieve the equivelant of the cost of one berth, but you do have to pay the portion that's designated to port fees and gov't taxes.

Here's a link to an article I wrote about this recently
http://www.cruisemates.com/articles/...roupcruise.cfm

I FOR SURE would work with a travel agent, rather than the cruise line directly. There's alot of details to cover, like dinner assignments, etc. when doing a group... and there's always something that goes wrong on someone's booking within the group. Let an experienced travel agent deal with it. It doesn't cost you 1 penny extra, and can often save you money and aggravation!!!