Hello All,
We joined this program while on a Carnival Cruise a few yrs ago and we have had problems since we joined. We couldn't get anyone to help/assist us, managers/supervisors have yet to return a single phone call to this day, and whenever we tried to speak to someone "higher up" (i.e. a supervisor or manager) they were either "on vacation" or "out sick".
Basically, you buy some points...the amount depends on how many you want to purchase for the amount of cruises you want/plan to take within so many years. We were planning quite a few cruises in the near future so it made sense. Then you are supposed to use the points toward the purchase of a cruise. They supposedly offer a better deal, thus you would spend less by using them. In our experience they did not offer a better deal and the lack of customer service made this completely useless.
The only way we could get out of this deal was to spend all of our points...so we did just that. We were in the process of planning a cruise with a large group of our family and friends, so we used our points to book cabins for some of our family members. We even ended up loosing like 40 points and the only way we could use them was to purchase more points. There was no way that was even an option for us.
Luckily, we did not let this experience discourage us from cruising with Carnival as we love their ships...however, if we ever saw them on one of the ships I'm sure a few words would be exchanged.
This program also included 3 vouchers for land vacations, however, it takes an act of congress to schedule them....so we have never used them either.
Like I said before this has not discouraged us from cruising with Carnival...as a matter of fact we leave next Sunday 5/11/08 on the Carnival Pride!
Enjoy the rest of your weekend!
