Tag Archives: Carnival Cruise Lines

Carnival: Agents didn’t get paid due to ‘glitch’

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Carnival Cruise Line has fixed a “glitch” in its system that prevented the payment of commissions and refunds, according to an email that Joni Rein, the line’s vice president of worldwide sales, sent to travel agents on Wednesday.

Commissions and refunds due Jan. 22 will be paid Friday, Feb. 6, along with commissions and refunds processed between Jan. 29 and Feb. 4, Carnival said. Commissions and payments due for the following week, Jan. 23 through Jan. 29, will be paid Friday, Feb. 13, along with the current week’s payments.

One agent said that Carnival was three weeks behind on paying commissions to her agency, and another said that Carnival had missed one week of payments to his agency.

An agent told Travel Weekly that Carnival didn’t know about the lapse until agencies began calling the cruise line. She said that she had to call the cruise line and her sales rep to get a response.

She said Carnival responded with two emails: one on Friday, Jan. 30, saying it was working “’round the clock” to fix the problem, the second on Monday, Feb. 2, saying that it was having trouble fixing the problem because of Wave season.

On Wednesday, the agency received the email from Rein. It was a mass email to travel professionals and included information on the updated payment schedule.

“We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and thank you for your understanding,” Rein wrote in the email. “Most importantly, we thank you for your continued support.”

Get away from it all? Cruise passengers want MORE…….

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Get away from it all? Cruise passengers want MORE intrusion from the outside world with free wifi the innovation they’d most like to see on ships (…it can cost £20 an hour)

  • Poll of 1,000 passengers found demand for internet access was top
  • But logging on can prove costly…and the signal can struggle at sea
  • Experts say younger travellers like to share holidays on social media 

By TOM KELLY FOR THE DAILY MAIL

With their on-board entertainment and air of relaxed seclusion, cruise liners seem the ideal place to get away from it all.

But it appears that what holidaymakers really want is more intrusion from the outside world.

Almost nine in ten passengers said free wifi and email access is the innovation they would most like to see on cruise ships, a poll found.

Get connected: nine in ten passengers said free wifi and email access is the innovation they would most like to see on cruise ships

Get connected: nine in ten passengers said free wifi and email access is the innovation they would most like to see on cruise ships

With many now including smartphones and tablets in their luggage, travellers increasingly expect to be able to browse the internet even when far from land. And while many liners try to accommodate their demands with wifi hotspots, logging on can prove costly at up to £20 an hour.

There are also problems with repeated signal interruptions and slow service. ‘This is a particularly prevalent issue for younger families,’ said Sukie Rapal of Cruise.co.uk, which carried out the poll of 1,000 passengers.

‘Teenagers use their devices to stay in touch with friends on social media, access mobile applications and play games – meaning cruisers are susceptible to receiving a very unexpected cost at the end of their trip.’

The demand for better internet access is partly down to the falling average age of passengers, which the survey found has dropped from 60 to 55 years in the last decade.

‘With a 195 per cent rise in the number of searches for cruises on mobile devices this Christmas, it’s apparent that cruisers have become more tech savvy,’ she added.

‘Cruisers need to do their research to find the most reasonable rates for wifi use, because if they fail to do so, it could end up costing them more than the holiday itself.’

Get away from it all? No thanks: Many travellers increasingly expect to be able to browse the internet even when far from land

Get away from it all? No thanks: Many travellers increasingly expect to be able to browse the internet even when far from land

The poll also showed that world class entertainment came high up on cruisers’ wishlists, while around a fifth said their biggest demand was flat screen televisions in their cabins.

The least desired innovation was robot barmen, which have already been installed on a Royal Caribbean ship. Just one per cent said they were interested in seeing these on board.

The most popular ocean destination for this year is the Far East, while Europe’s Danube is the preferred river trip.

Carnival Vista the product of healthy competition

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Business competition isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be. It led to ruinous price wars in the late 19th century in many industries.

But it’s also a great goad to improvement. That seems to be what’s happening in the cruise industry, especially in the contemporary market, where a remarkable series of interesting ships have been coming out of Europe’s shipyards.

Judging by the renderings released last week, the latest to join the fray is the Carnival Vista, coming in 2016.

While still bearing the imprint of Funship 2.0, the Vista will have a number of novel elements not shared by other Carnival Cruise Line ships.

Guests on the SkyRide cycle 150 feet above the sea.

SkyRider, a recumbent cycle that runs a circuit around and above the sports deck, may be the most noticeable of the bunch. But there’s also an IMAX theater, part of a Multiplex area; a new kaleidoscopic water slide; a casual seafood restaurant; an area of suites with hammocks; and a new approach to family staterooms. With the Vista, Carnival will become the first cruise line to brew its own beer at sea.

The cluster of new features is reminiscent of two other ships introduced in 2014: Norwegian Cruise Line’s Norwegian Getaway and Royal Caribbean International’s Quantum of the Seas. The new deck of indoor/outdoor restaurant space on the Vista’s Deck 5 looks remarkably like the Waterfront on Norwegian’s Breakaway/Getaway ships.

The Vista's resort-style pool deck.

Norwegian, Royal and Carnival have been rivals for more than 40 years, but their competition in ship design is as vital as it has ever been. Each is pushing the other to develop better and more exciting new features, and the benefits are accruing to cruise passengers who have a fantastic array of fun things to do on a ship.

And of course, there’s a lot for travel agents to talk about and sell on these new ships. So here’s a salute to healthy competition. Long may it reign.