Cruise Discounts?

[momberry]

So a coworker has been talking about a Disney Cruise....so my wheels are turning....when can I get my family on one??

We are DVC members. Where can I find the best prices? Through Disney direct? Or a travel agent?

Thanks!!

 

[tjkraz]

DVC members are not typically eligible for any form of discounts on cruise rates. DCL did make an offer available to members for sailings in June '12 but it was done on pretty short notice (April '12) and it's the first time I ever remember such an offer being made.

Many travel agents offer stateroom credits (money credited to your shipboard account that you can use for incidentals) when booking through them. The DCL website allows you to price a trip quickly and easily. But I would also contact a Travel Agent or two and see how their rates / credits compare to Disney's own prices.

If you bought your DVC points direct you can often use them toward the cost of a cruise. But the economics of cruising on points aren't nearly as good as using points for DVC villa stays. And there are also some other drawbacks I won't go into.

 

[CruznLexi]

I am both a Fl resident and and a TA and generally the price that Disney has and our rates are the same. I can sometimes get a great rate on the cruise being a fl resident but very few since the new ships came out . We did have some great rates back in Jan for the Dream. It was very last minute too.

 

[ssawka]

DVC members are not typically eligible for any form of discounts on cruise rates.

Sure they do, but you have to pay cash. You can do what we did for our MR cruise in Jan 2011. We took advantage of the Kids Sail Free deal by renting out our point. For our next cruise we have rented our points again. I just can't see using twice as many points to cruise on points.

 

[MrShiny]

In general, it is better to pay cash for a cruise than use points. The pricing is pretty much uniform no matter how you book, but depends on how far in advance and how empty the ship is - prices can literally change daily.

A lot of TA's offer onboard credit (which is so easily used!). Costco offers Costco cash cards I believe.

The best price on a cruise is booking on a previous cruise! So if you are thinking of one of the big expensive ones, might be worth it to do a short one as far in advance of that as you can!

We've found that at the end of the day, a cruise can be just as affordable for us a WDW vacation. Since everything except mainly alcohol and excursions is included, it's actually a pretty good value, but YMMV of course!