Tami Anderson Cruise
My Refunders Cruise - by Tami Anderson
I was walking into the A&P when I noticed a display sign that read, "Free Cruise for 2 when you buy America's Choice products." Because I've been on a few cruises before and because I love refunding, it caught my eye, so I picked up the flier. The flier said that to do this deal you would need to buy $150 of America's Choice (the A&P store brand) breakfast products, at which point the cruise certificate would print out on a Catalina coupon at the register.
The fine print read that you would still need to pay port charges/taxes of $498 per couple, and that only a certain number of cruises would be given out for this deal. I thought fast as I glanced around at the all of the America's Choice breakfast food items on the list. On the minus side, by buying the store brand, I wouldn't be able to use coupons. However, since we had wanted to go on vacation, $498 for a 4 night cruise for 2 didn't sound too bad, and I knew we would find something to do with $150 worth of breakfast products.
Some of the items were frozen items. I stayed away from these and picked up boxes of cereal, instant oatmeal, honey, pancake mix, peanut butter, jelly, and granola bars. By the time I rang up $150, I had filled 4 shopping carts and my little Saturn was absolutely loaded to the max with groceries.
My stepfather's nephew recently lost his job and is supporting his wife and two kids. We quickly packed up 6 shopping bags of groceries for them filled with America's Choice brand cereal, peanut butter, jelly, oatmeal, etc and added lots of HABA items that we got free/cheap with coupons and rebates. They were thrilled. We kept some and gave the rest to family and friends because there was no way in this lifetime that we could use all of this stuff!
The only down side of my story is that I would never use this travel company again. I really thought they were trying to scam me, but in the end it all worked out fine. I sent my cruise certificate and check for $498 to Travel Company of America in California and waited. What I really didn't like about this company is that the form didn't list their telephone number or a web site address - just a snail mail address, and they wanted a check. I would have liked to pay by credit card for both the points and the added security of credit card protection, but that wasn't an option.
I picked two dates that I thought were pretty obscure. One was in February, and one in the second week of May. A few weeks later they called to say that none of the dates I picked were available, and asked if, for another $150 I'd like to pick another cruise that was leaving on one of the weekends that I wanted to go. It would have the same itinerary and same length of time. I very politely mentioned the words "bait and switch" and told them that I wanted a 4 night cruise for exactly what I paid for. They offered to refund my $498. I politely offered to call my attorney and the evening news. They suddenly "found" another cruise date that wasn't listed as a choice on their form that they would give me for no additional cost to me. I accepted.
Because of his job, my husband wouldn't be able to go, so I asked my sister Loriann if she wanted to go. She was absolutely thrilled, so we made our plans. We chose to leave on the first flight to Miami, Florida at 7 am. This is a really popular destination from NJ, and they had flights leaving just about every hour on the hour, so when we got to the airport and were waiting for our flight, we decided to see if we could get bumped. Sure enough, we arrived at our gate to find hundreds of people waiting to board. We volunteered to be bumped to the next flight in return for an upgrade to first class and a voucher for another flight. They asked us if we'd be willing to fly out at the exact same time we were originally scheduled to leave on a flight bound for Ft. Lauderdale. In return, they would upgrade us to first class and give us each a $150 voucher for a future flight on Continental. They would also put us into a taxi when we got to Ft. Lauderdale and pay for our transportation to Miami airport where our luggage would be waiting (about a 20 minute drive). We very happily took it! We were thrilled to fly first class, and when we got to Ft. Lauderdale, we had no problem getting our ride to the Miami airport.
Because the cruise was leaving from Miami, I wanted to get to Miami the day before the cruise left so that we'd have a day to relax. With a 4 night cruise, I didn't want to waste the first day being exhausted from getting up early and being on the plane. So, I used my Hilton Honors American Express card and booked a free hotel room for the night before. This is a free Amex card that gives you 10,000 points when you sign up and then gives you bonus points during certain times of the year for using your card. For 20,000 points we were able to get a room at the Hampton Inn on Brickell Road in Miami for the night, so off we went. I have to say, we really enjoyed this hotel. While it was not a fancy hotel, it was clean, there was a pool surrounded by palm trees, and the service was excellent. We used our free hotel certificate at check in and we weren't even asked for our credit card! They were wonderful. What I really liked about them was that, even though they didn't have a restaurant in the hotel, they put out a free buffet constantly with cookies, snacks, breakfast foods, coffee/tea, etc. They were probably the nicest hotel I've ever stayed at as far as customer service and cleanliness.
The next day we boarded the Royal Carribbean Majesty of the Seas for our four night cruise. Our room was really tiny, but it was clean and quiet. We didn't notice any noise from the hallway or the rooms next to us. The food was wonderful, and the service was excellent. We quickly made friends with the people seated at our table. One of the guys turned out to be a stunt man who starred in a few action films that we had both seen! Lori won $200 at the casino, and "gave back" $150. I got sunburned (despite SPF 30) but we both had a wonderful time! The price for our trip was definitely right, and if they ever run a promotion like this again, I'd definitely jump at it.
