A malfunction in Carnival Cruise Line’s systems on August 25 and 26 led to incorrect pricing for the Cheers! drink program. Now, the company is offering a discount as a form of compensation.
This offer can’t be transferred and is only available for a limited period. Although it provides some savings, it does not reproduce the massive discount that resulted from the glitch.
Carnival Cruise Line is currently offering a discount on drinks. The company contacted guests who had booked the Cheers! drink package during the weekend when the pricing malfunction occurred. The glitch calculated the entire package price as a single day’s cost, irrespective of the cruise length.
The Cheers! package can only be booked for the duration of the cruise and isn’t available for individual days. As a result of this error, the checkout prices for Cheers! were displaying significantly reduced rates, with discounts up to 86% for a 7-night sailing.
A number of hopeful travelers took advantage of these erroneous prices, hoping the cruise line would honor the pricing, as was the case with a similar pricing error by Royal Caribbean International in July 2019.
However, Carnival Cruise Line has chosen not to honor these mistaken prices, instead offering a discount to the affected guests. All guests who booked the mispriced packages will receive refunds to their original payment method, and can rebook the Cheers! package with a one-time, non-transferable 10% discount.
This discount is only valid for a limited time and applicable only for adults in the affected cabins, excluding other drink packages or onboard purchases.
Customers should be aware that all transactions with the incorrect Cheers! pricing have been cancelled and refunded, including purchases of other items like Wi-Fi packages, spa treatments, or shore excursions.
The discount only applies to the Cheers! package and isn’t applicable to other items that were cancelled in the same transaction.
With a 10% discount, customers will not benefit from the up to 86% discount that the glitch offered. But it is a modest saving on the Cheers! beverage package.
The current rate for the package is $59.95 per day when bought before the cruise, or $64.95 per day when bought onboard a Carnival ship. An 18% service charge is added to the package cost.
Assuming the discount is valid only for pre-cruise purchases, guests using the discount code would save $41.96 over a 7-night cruise if the discount is applied before the service charge, or $49.52 if the discount also includes the service charge.
