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There’s a new targeted offer out this morning for Carnival Cruise Lines: Spend $350+, get either 7,500 Membership Rewards points or $75 back depending on which card is targeted for the offer. You’ll have to log in to your Amex account to see if you were targeted for this Amex Offer.
The Deal
- Spend $350+ with Carnival Cruise Lines, get either 7,500 Membership Rewards points or $75 back with a new targeted Amex Offer (see your offer for terms)
Key Terms
- Expires 7/31/18
- Excludes purchases made onboard ships, single and group shore excursions, meetings, weddings, in-room gifts, gift cards, and a lot more (see the screen shots above and your offer for full terms)
Quick Thoughts
This is a nice offer if you are planning to pay for a Carnival Cruise. Assuming you value Membership Rewards at more than 1c each (and you should — our Reasonable Redemption Values has them pegged at 1.82c each), the Membership Rewards version of this offer is much stronger (worth approximately $136.50 based on a reasonable redemption – potentially much more if you maximize your redemption).
The terms of this offer state that your cruise must be booked direct via Carnival’s website or phone number. That might make this offer less valuable for some folks who would ordinarily book through a travel agent that can offer extra benefits like an onboard credit, etc. Cruises are outside of my wheelhouse, but I thought that when booking through an agent you still paid the cruise line directly, which makes me wonder if it might be possible to stack (though I am far from confident that it would be possible).
On the other hand, I do believe it is possible to put down a deposit on a cruise and pay the balance separately. I think it would be relatively easy to trigger a couple of offers if you had this one synced to multiple cards and made multiple payments of $350.
If you’re interested in a Carnival Cruise, either offer looks pretty good to me.
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I went through my travel agent. Did two $375 payments (because I mixed up the amount needed for this offer) and both triggered the $75 credit. Payments through a travel agent are still processed by Carnival, so Carnival is the merchant that shows on your statement.
Get AmexOffer and best on-board credits as follows:
Step 1: Decide which cruise you want
Step 2: Cruisecompete.com will help you find the travel agent with the best onboard credits for your selected cruise
Step 3: Book your cruise directly thru Carnival using split payment Amex cards; prepay in full to maximize AmexOffers before 7/31/18 expiration
Step 4: Wait a few days and call travel agent from Step 1 to transfer your Carnival reservation them
Not as restrictive as it seems. I was able to use it for a previous booking thru my travel agent. The payment is made straight to Carnival by the travel agent. Just received the $75 rebate yesterday. So you get over 20% off with this offer plus what ever your agent gives you. I had this on 6 cards & will be using it on all. The previous offers saved me over $1,000 on an Alaskan cruise that we will be taking in September.
Awesome. I thought that might be the case. Glad to have a data point. Thanks!
WOW is this restrictive. It seems that the only way to get the credit is on a new booking through Carnival. Usually you can do better with an agent or OTA although on the 7500 points it’s a close call by the time you figure the agency OBC and other perks. The only other exclusions I could think of that they didn’t address was 1 per household, 1 per lifetime or only 1 card purchase per person across all cards. So unless you can game this with multiple AMEX cards on a direct booking I’m thinking it’s not a super great deal but you might save a few bucks depending on the cruise.