Celebrity Cruise Line Beware of Poor Customer Service on Celebrity Cruises Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

My wife  and I took a cruise vacation for 10 days on Celebrity Cruises. The cost for us was $7,000 plus $1200 for round trip airfare to Rome and back to Houston. The Celebrity ship left from Rome and sailed for 10 days around the Mediterranean area. Celebrity's travel agent booked us to have a connected flight through Paris DeGaulle airport. The connection time was only 1 hour and 10 minutes which was way to short for such a long trip (about 12 hours from Houston to Paris to Rome). We missed the connection from Paris to Rome and this caused us to miss the boat which was leaving that same day from Rome. The result was a nightmare.

We could not get hold of anyone at Celebrity to help us. They did not have anyone working in Europe in a Customer Service capacity (or a local phone number to call) to assist their travelers who might have difficulties such as we did. Their Customer Service office is in Florida but since we were in Paris it was not open for several hours due to the time difference between Paris and Florida. We had to spend the first nite of the trip in an airport hotel not on the cruiseship.  We finally got to the ship 2 days late in the Sicily port of Messina. At no point in the trip did we get much help from Celebrity. When we finally got to the ship in Messina they did not even offer to help us to get our luggage on the ship. We have cruised with other cruise lines and those were far and away much better than the Celebrity. We came away with the idea that once Celebrity gets you payment they do not have a good system to assist their travelers on the way to the ship. 

1. Try not to get a connecting flight -- get the travel agent to get you a direct flight to the city where you catch the boat. Europe airports take over 1 hour to get from gate to gate.  If you have to connect do not allow a connect shorter than about 3 hours.

2.  Take a spare cell phone. I have and I-Phone and it drains battery fast. No way to recharge it at the airport. Take a phone which you can take a spare battery for backup.

3.  Take an electrical converter/adapter. Make sure when you get one of these that it reduces the voltage from 220Volts to the USA 110 Volt level. You cannot use any US cellphone on to charge without this device.

4. Get the NAME of a contact at the Customer Service center if  you need help. Make the travel agent get you a direct phone line to the Customer Services.

5. Buy the travel insurance. Right now with Europe in a financial mess, it is possible you can get your tour cancelled. With trip insurance you are protected under USA laws.