discount websites

[sailon]

I have booked two cruises through an online website and am trying to price the next one. But there seems to be so many more offerings through the internet than even 2 years ago. Is it ethical to ask on here for your suggestions of best pricing/best service?

[sailon]

I have booked two cruises through an online website and am trying to price the next one. But there seems to be so many more offerings through the internet than even 2 years ago. Is it ethical to ask on here for your suggestions of best pricing/best service?

[Raoul Fiebig]

Hi sailon,

with more and more cruise lines no longer allowing discounting of officially announced fares (I'm not talking about "brochure rates"), the position of specialized cruise agents has been improved.

If you know exactly what you want, you might want to go with one of the "big players", but if something goes wrong, you might be on your own. However, personally I would always prefer booking with a specialized local travel agent.

You indicate yourself that the number of offers is huge and almost confusing. Allow a professional TA to help you find the right cruise for you. I'm sure you will be happy to have gone that way.

BTW This comes from somebody who is not a travel agent and who has no advantage whatsoever from expressing this opinion.

[Tony DeWitt]

With respect, I must disagree with my colleague Raoul.

We booked our first two cruises, paying nearly full price, through our local travel agent. On our second cruise we heard about a company called vacationstogo.com. This Houston travel agent books cruises with Carnival, Princess, Norwegian, and all the other big players. They have a 90 day ticker where you can pick up last minute cruise bargains, and that is normally where my wife and I go to get our cruises.

At V2G we got a partial oceanview on the Golden Princess for $848.15 per person for 3/20/05. With insurance our total fare came to about 1800.00 and that seemed pretty good to me.

We booked our Air on Travelocity. We paid $1462 RT (for both of us) to San Juan. We had to make a stop over in Birmingham or it would have been less.

We've taken three cruises with V2G and had good luck with all of them. We recommend them because they do such a terrific job of getting your cruise right from the very beginning.

Just one couple's opinion, FWIW.