Free cruises sound like a scam, but it is currently possible to turn elite status earned from a single $95 credit card into months worth of free cruises and free hotel nights if you play your cards right. The best part is that if you follow the steps, you don’t need previous experience with any of this (or any gambling) to make this all happen.
In fact, I wrote this post so that Stacey could cruise for free.
Let me tell you about Stacey: She doesn’t know this, but before we knew her name, my wife and I used to refer to the woman who works at our local post office as “Smiley”. “Smiley” Stacey is one of the nicest people you could meet — I don’t think I’ve ever seen her not smiling or heard her say anything negative. One day recently, when I was in the post office to buy stamps, Stacey asked about whether I knew anything about booking cruises. I had more to say that I could explain over postage, so I gave her my card and asked her to email me.
She did that and so I went to work writing this post determined to tell Stacey how to start at square one and end up floating for free in a tropical sea. I was confident that if I could explain it to a determined newcomer like her, it could also benefit many readers interested in dipping their toes in gaming status matching for free cruises.
A major hat tip to Dave Grossman of MilesTalk.com and his MilesTalk Facebook group because I learned a lot of the relevant Atlantic City and Philadelphia details through his posts and group and a big thank-you to members of our own Frequent Miler Insiders Facebook Group that were able to provide some additional insight on the latest additions.
This post is very long. It is not necessarily meant to be read in one sitting but rather to be a complete guide. If you are reading this in email form, you’re going to want to click through to the website for the full experience and easy table of contents navigation.
Starting Point 1: A Wyndham Rewards account and The Wyndham Earner Business Credit Card
There are two paths to the free nights and cruises in this post. The first path is through Wyndham Rewards. If you take this path, you’ll first sign up for a Wyndham Rewards account at this link (this is their hotel loyalty account; it’s free to join). You want this loyalty account number so that you can enter it on the credit card application for the Wyndham Earner Business card (there is a line for your Wyndham Rewards number).
The next step is applying for the Wyndham Earner Business Credit Card. This is a business credit card, so you’ll need to have a business, but that is a lot easier than it sounds. Almost any type of side hustle can be considered a business — writing a book, writing a blog that you hope to monetize with ads eventually, selling stuff on Facebook Marketplace or eBay, babysitting, etc. Even if you aren’t yet making money from said side hustle, you can potentially qualify for a business credit card.
When it’s something small like a blog that doesn’t yet have ads or selling stuff on eBay or Facebook where you’re making a very small amount of money, you would probably operate that as a sole proprietorship. In that case, you’d use your own personal name as the business name and your social security number as the tax ID. It’s all quite easy. You can find more information and a link to apply for the Wyndham Earner business card on our card page. Note that we do not earn any affiliate commission on this card, it’s just a great deal for a number of reasons (we talked extensively about it on a podcast episode).
The current welcome offer on this card could potentially get you 10 nights at low-end properties, but you could alternatively book a 1-bedroom vacation rental through Vacasa for 5 nights with the 75,000-point welcome bonus like this one I reviewed in the Pigeon Forge area or many great-looking properties in Hawaii. See: Vacasa: Great value is real! for more information about using Wyndham Rewards points for Vacasa vacation rentals. Regardless of the current offer on the card, it could be worth getting just for the cruise opportunities that it makes available through matching.
Once you have the Wyndham Earner Business Card, your Wyndham Rewards account status will update to Wyndham Diamond status (this won’t be instant upon approval, but it should update to Diamond within about a week).
Once you have Wyndham Diamond status, you go to this link and click the button that says “I am a Wyndham Rewards member, match my status” to get matched to Caesars Diamond status.
It should take about a week for your Caesars Diamond status to update. A family member followed this path and logged in to her Caesars account once or twice a day for about a week. When her status didn’t update after 7 days, she emailed Wyndham Rewards by using the email form found on this page explaining that she had submitted for the match and her Caesars status hadn’t yet updated. Two days later, her Caesars status was updated to Diamond. See this post for more detail about emailing Wyndham Rewards.
Once you have Caesars Diamond status, click here to jump to the next relevant section of this post.
I should note that Caesars Diamond members sometimes get offers for free rooms in Las Vegas for close-in stays. I’m currently seeing nights at some properties starting at $8 over the next couple of weeks (the cheapest nights here are at Rio and Harrahs, though I sometimes see others nearly as cheap). One of the benefits of Caesars Diamond status is no resort fees on stays and free valet or self parking — so $8 really means $8 plus tax per night.
Starting point 2: FoundersCard to Caesars Diamond
Another option for those looking to get Caesars Diamond status who do not want or can not get the Wyndham Earner Business Card is FoundersCard. This is the most expensive path in this post and is far more expensive than getting the Wyndham card noted in Starting Point 1, but when you consider all you can get, the high price tag may seem laughably low and it doesn’t require getting a new credit card.
FoundersCard is meant as a membership card for entrepreneurs, but I believe that in practice anyone can join. The cost depends on where you sign up, but I believe that the regular price is $495 + $95 initiation fee. You can sign up through some referrals for less (I think the current best deal is 3 free months and then $395, but you won’t get Caesars Diamond from the complimentary status and I’m not sure if there’s a way to trigger the $395 charge sooner?).
One of the benefits of a paid FoundersCard membership is complimentary Caesars Diamond status. Once you have Caesars Diamond status, click here to jump to the next relevant section of this post.
Starting point 3: MGM Gold
MGM Rewards is the loyalty program of MGM casinos / hotels & resorts. They have a partnership with Hyatt whereby members with World of Hyatt Explorist or Globalist status can match to MGM Gold. Update: The Hyatt partnership is ending and it is no longer possible to match Hyatt to MGM. Hopefully we will see a matching opportunity with Marriott when their partnership launches in October 2023.
Once you have MGM Gold status, click here to skip ahead to the free nights section of this post.
Use Caesars Diamond or MGM Gold status to get free cruises and hotel nights
Caesars Diamond or MGM Gold for a free 7-night Carnival cruise [Dead]
Caesars Diamond status or MGM Gold status could easily get you 7 nights or more onboard with Carnival cruise lines. Here’s how it works.
Update 9/20/23: It looks like the Carnival fun Match has finally died. The Carnival Fun Match link now goes to a “page not found” on Carnival’s website. Furthermore, a couple of readers have recently reported only receiving an offer for $500 off. When I Google Carnival Fun Match, I am able to find that promo code and it is labeled as Carnival Fun Match, so I think they may have finally killed the free room offer and it is possible that they will only offer this discount in the future (we don’t yet know for sure).
The good news is that for now, the Holland America and Princess matches are still available, but since both as owned by Carnival it might be worth considering them sooner rather than later.
Caesars Diamond to a 12-night Holland America free cruise (sail through 12/31/23)
Holland America has been offering a match program whereby they have been offering many readers with Caesars Diamond status a complimentary interior cabin and $100 in freeplay with drinks for 2 while playing in the casino on eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023 sailings. We wrote about this match here. You can submit your request for this match here. The offer is valid for sailings up to 12 nights (though land & sea cruises are excluded) through 12/31/23 (still confirmed to be the expiration date as of offers received in September 2023).
My wife submitted a screen shot from her Caesars account that showed her name and Caesars Diamond status and number and she received the complimentary cruise offer within a few hours, but processing time has increased to 1-2 weeks.
Note that those who have recently sailed with Carnival or Holland America and not gambled much may not qualify for the free cruise offer.
Caesars Diamond to a free Princess cruise (up to 10 nights, sail through 3/31/24)
Princess cruises is offering a match that looks identical to the Holland America match above. Both cruise lines are owned by Carnival and their match submission systems seem to be the same. You can submit your request for this match here.
Reader Mark in the comments reports receiving an offer for a complimentary interior cabin valid on eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023/2024 sailings (blackout dates may apply). He further reports that it is valid for sailings until March 31, 2024.
My wife and I both tried submitting for this offer (She submitted Caesars Diamond and I submitted Ocean Prime and MGM Gold) and we each only received an offer for up to $200 in free play per person for the 1st and 2nd guest only “Based on status with [their] sister brands”. I interpret that to mean that I didn’t gamble enough on Carnival for Princess to want to give me a free cruise, but it might be worth submitting this if you haven’t cruised with Carnival or Holland America within the past year or two. I assume that Caesars Diamond will be successful based on data points with the very similar Holland America match, but I don’t know for sure if one may be more likely with other casino statuses.
Caesars Diamond to free 4-night stay at Atlantis Bahamas
One of the benefits of Caesars Diamond status is a complimentary stay at Atlantis in the Bahamas. What you get depends on when you go.
First of all, if you go during March, April, or July, you only get a Buy 2 nights, Get 2 nights free deal in The Coral Tower.
If you go during February, June, August, November, or December, you get a complimentary 4-night stay in The Coral Tower and $100 in slot free play. If you go in January, May, September, or October, you get a complimentary 5-night stay in The Coral Tower and $150 in free slot play.
Note that you will still pay the resort fee, which I believe comes to $66 per night. Food on-property is said to be quite expensive, so think of this has a highly discounted stay rather than free, but also much less than the retail price. See this MilesTalk post for more detail.
Caesars Diamond $100 Celebration Dinner
One of the benefits of Caesars Diamond status is a Diamond “celebration dinner”, which is a $100 dining credit that can be used at select restaurants at Caesars properties.
I’ve both written about this benefit and used it in Las Vegas years ago (See: Caesars Diamond Celebration Dinner: Easy to use and worth the match) and I recently checked up on it in Atlantic City and found that there are quite a few options there for the dinner. My wife and I both have Caesars Diamond status and we were able to verify that we have the Diamond Celebration dinners loaded to our accounts, so at some point we’ll enjoy a nice $200 dinner thanks to Caesars Diamond status.
Note that this works at some Caesars properties outside of Atlantic City and Las Vegas also, so it’s worth looking around if you’ll be visiting another city with a Caesars property.
Caesars Diamond or MGM Gold to Hard Rock Rock Royalty / Unity Icon (2 free nights)
This match must be done in person at a Hard Rock casino. I recommend doing this in Atlantic City.
First, you go to Caesars Atlantic City to print your Caesars Diamond card. There is a self-service kiosk next to the Caesars Rewards desk where you pop in your driver’s license and it pops out your Caesars Rewards card. If you’ve driven to Caesars, you’ll get free parking on the way out by showing your Caesars Diamond card. If you instead have MGM Gold status, you can print out your MGM Gold card at Borgata Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City.
You next bring your Caesars Diamond card to the Hard Rock Atlantic City. Hard Rock charges for parking on the way in, so the smart play here is to valet park (thanks to a member of our Frequent Miler Insiders for this suggestion!) because you’d pay for valet on the way out — and by that time you’ll have Rock Royalty status and thus won’t pay for valet parking (or self-parking in the future).
Go to the players club desk at Hard Rock Atlantic City (it already has “Unity Rewards” signage, though they are still on the old loyalty program as of the time of writing). You explain that you’d like to sign up for a players club card (this is free) and that you have status with Caesars and you understand that they are matching and hand over your driver’s license and Caesars Diamond card.
Hard Rock will match you to Rock Royalty, which is their highest tier apart from the invite-only X tier. Note that they were scheduled to migrate to the “Unity” program, in which case you would receive “Icon” status (effectively the same).
Hard Rock Rock Royalty comes with a complimentary 2-night stay at Hard Rock Atlantic City. You’ll need to book that in advance. According to the website, it is available any night of the week, but Saturdays may be a challenge to find availability. Note that this benefit can be booked starting 72 hours after the match.
Hard Rock is also giving new members who match to Rock Royalty status a $50 slot machine free play credit. The way this works is they load $50 in monopoly money (“free play credit”) to your players club card. You pop the card in a machine and load the funny money to the machine. Then, you must complete $50 worth of spins and then you can cash out whatever is left (so if you play $1 per spin, you’ll need to complete 50 spins; if you play $0.25 per spin, you’ll need to complete 200 spins, etc). If you want the highest chance of walking out with as close to $50 as possible, I think your best bet is playing $0.25 video poker at the maximum of 5-credits (spinning $1.25 per hand, which would require 40 spins).
Believe it or not, it is very tough to keep track of 50 spins. But this past weekend, my wife walked out with $48 and my sister-in-law walked out with $35, so it’s possible to cash out most of the $50.
On the way out of the resort, show your Rock Royalty card at valet to get out for free (you should probably tip the valet person though with a couple bucks from your slot machine winnings).
Hard Rock Rock Royalty to Ocean Prime (2 nights in Atlantic City + 2 nights at Resorts World Las Vegas + 10-night free cruise, sail by 7/1/24)
Next stop is Ocean Casino Resort in Atlantic City. Go to the Ocean Rewards desk there and run the same drill — you’d like to sign up for a players club card and you have Hard Rock Rock Royalty and understand that they match.
Ocean will match you to Ocean Prime status. This is awesome because Ocean Prime gets you:
- Free 2-night stay at Ocean Casino Resort (valid Sunday through Thursday). You can book this after 72 hours have passed since matching.
- Free 2-night stay at Resorts World Las Vegas, which comes with a $100 dining credit and $100 free play credit. This can be booked starting on the 15th of the month following the month in which you match. Note that the partnership with Wynn ended on 7/1/23.
- Free pass to the Avila Lounge at Ocean Casino Resort (a buffet with carved prime rib, full bar, etc). This pass is valid for 2 guests and it is valid for 72 hours after matching.
- Free cruise of up to 10 nights anywhere in the world on MSC in an ocean view room for two people. You pay no port taxes, just a $400 deposit that you get back as a $400 onboard credit. You will pay gratuities of $10-$15 per person per day. This can be booked starting on the 15th of the month following the month in which you match. I wrote about our experience booking this offer here. Current members must book and sail by 7/1/24.
The complimentary nights at Resorts World could be an awesome benefit if you’re able to book on a weekend. I stayed at both the Conrad Las Vegas and Crockfords Las Vegas this year and I really liked the Resorts World complex; I’ll be glad to return. The star of the show though is the free 10-night cruise on MSC. It’s a great deal because you don’t even pay taxes, just the deposit that you get back as onboard credit and gratuities. You can probably upgrade to a balcony room for a reasonable fee (YMMV depending on sailing). As this news broke, I was boarding a free 10-night MSC cruise in Europe (which I got via the now-dead Rivers Philadelphia match). My wife booked an ocean view and I booked a balcony room on the same cruise and her ocean view seems to be larger, though I’m sure this will vary by ship and individual room selection.
Note that if you want to bring more than 2 people, additional guests cost $359 each. We’ve had conflicting reports on blackout dates. Some phone agents claim that certain periods are “blacked out” and cost an additional $250 per passenger, but if you simply hang up and call again the next agent may not assess that fee. Generally speaking, if a cabin is available for sale, it seems to be available to be booked with this offer. You can upgrade to a balcony or suite for additional fees.
What makes this offer particularly notable is that it is very nearly net “free”. You do not pay port taxes. You may have to pay a $59 upgrade charge (per cabin) for the “Fantastica” experience, which includes the ability to choose your cabin and dining time (the “free” offer includes the “Bella” experience, where the cruise line assigns your cabin and dining time at a later time, but that isn’t always available). You also pay the $400 deposit that you get back as an onboard credit. That onboard credit could be used to make purchases while on the ship or it could be loaded to a slot machine if you charge the load to your room. How long you play that machine before cashing out is up to you.
If you’re going to sail with MSC and you have Hyatt Globalist, Hilton Diamond, or Marriott Platinum status, you can do a status match with MSC. This can be worth it because if you get matched to MSC Diamond status, you’ll get a complimentary specialty dinner for 2 for one night, a bottle of sparkling wine, a cocktail reception with crew, and some other goodies. I got a bottle of prosecco, a plate of macarons, and some dark chocolate on my MSC cruise. Status match at this link.
It’s worth knowing that Ocean Prime status has a 6/30 expiration date. If you matched after 3/1/23, your status is set to expire on 7/1/24. You must book and sail by that date.
Ocean charges for parking on the way out, but show your Ocean Prime card and you won’t pay for parking.
Other matches?
Surely these can’t be the only matches currently on offer. There are a number of other Philadelphia-area casinos that may offer matches (perhaps these present faster paths to Rivers Black status, but we didn’t have time to drive around to more casinos). Furthermore, Rivers has locations in a number of places. The member of our Facebook group who previously matched to Rivers Black and booked the MSC cruise matched at Rivers Portsmouth by showing both a Caesars Diamond and MGM Gold card. It is possible that other Rivers casinos offer matches, though you’ll want to ask about what you’ll get before completing the match to be sure you’re getting what you want.
I imagine there are more opportunities out there. Atlantic City and Philadelphia offer a number of opportunities in close proximity.
Many free nights in one-player mode
The total number of free nights you could get with these matches varies as offers change. At most recent update, this includes:
- 5 free nights in a 1-bedroom Vacasa vacation rental with the Wyndham Business card offer
- 4 free nights with the Atlantis Bahamas benefit (or maybe 5)
- 12 free nights with Holland America cruise match
- 10 free nights with Princess Cruises match
- 2 free nights at Hard Rock Atlantic City
- 2 free nights at Ocean Casino Resort in Atlantic City
- 2 free nights & $100 dining credit & $100 free play at Resorts World Las Vegas from Ocean Prime
- 10 free nights on MSC from Ocean Prime
As noted in the sections above, some of these offers may be repeatable, which could stretch your free nights even further.
Why do casinos offer matching programs and things like free cruises and stays at other casinos?
Casinos all want to draw in high roller gamblers, so they offer status matches to try to draw high rollers away from competitors in the same way that airlines compete for high-value customers with status matches.
Similarly, cruise lines are after high-rolling gamblers to gamble in their onboard casinos. Offering free cruise benefits to high-tier members of land-based casino loyalty programs increases their odds of drawing in more money in their casinos. Cross-marketing with casinos in other states offers a reason for gamblers to be loyal in their home markets since it will give them a benefit when they inevitably visit Las Vegas.
As is the case with many of the games we play, we can leverage credit cards and loyalty programs to get outsized value. In this case, thanks to the ability to match statuses between casinos, we can appear to be like a high-roller gambler that casinos and cruise lines covet.
Bottom line
This resource is obviously very long, but this illustrates why I love this game: if you learn how to play it, you can vacation like a high-roller for very low-roller stakes. The current matching opportunities make for a boatload (or several boatloads) of free nights in casino hotels and on cruise lines. The average person would be hard-pressed to find the vacation time to accommodate all of the free matching offers that can sprout from a single $95 credit card, though note that in some cases you may be able to book further out (the Carnival offer, for example, was good for cruises about a year out in my experience). If you are retired or work from home and you’re playing the game in 2-player mode, imagine doubling everything in this post. While I don’t know that I’ll love every free stay or cruise, that’s a double-down that I can get behind.
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anyone else getting questions asking for full screenshot shot of your card and status? I’m not sure what they are asking since it’s just the one page that show everything just like the one in Nick’s example.
screenshot from the app works
The fun match is back up and running. Carnival did a website update last week and it caused a number of website links to go down. Back to business as usual for status match.
Just some data for folks since everyone has been so nice to provide data points. This is for princess
Offer Type PCLMatch 1: Complimentary Interior Cabin
Offer Description: Valid on eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023/2024 sailings (blackout dates may apply and subject to availability)
It says 60 days on the email but the phone rep said i have until 3/20/24 to use it AND sail. SOme other users have said the same. Cost $1191 for 2 adults + 1 baby. That includes $400 of on board credit so I guess this “free” cruise is $791 for 7 days. It may be less for others depending on tax/fees. We may still book it since the going rate for this on expedia is $2750 without the $400 onboard credit.
Princess Plus is $60 PP/day and Premier is $80 PP/day.
I got this offer 1 day after I submitted my caesar diamond to princess. Good luck everyone!
Question: Does anyone know if the princess airport transfer is on a bus to/from the ship? If it isn’t then we would need to bring a car seat.
I got the same offer. It seems an actual person is sending this to me. Do people usually get automated offers in the future?
A person sent it to me also. Sorry if I said it was sent by a bot. It was emailed and then I called the phone rep.
No problem, I thought I read that people were offered different offers over time, so I was curious if that was automated or if a person reached back out.
The only one consistently offering balcony has been carnival based on my reading. Holland is interior on all except 1 post. Unsure about Princess or RC. Have you been able to match RC? I can’t find a link to submit it. I got the other 3 successful.
Filled out the form with my Caesar’s Diamond Card for the Princess offer and this is what I got.
“Based on status with our sister brands, we can offer you the below offer. If you wish to accept, please confirm and we will provide you with a certificate to book the offer directly with a Princess Cruise Line agent. Thank you!
$200 Free Play per person (1st/2nd Guest Only) *valid on new bookings only
I didn’t gamble much on Carnival so not sure if that’s why I didn’t get a free cabin offer. “
same for me
Someone else I know too…
Also have submitted matching requests regardless for the last 2 months….no match. I’m Wyndham Diamond (earned from parlaying programs back and forth
Holding the Wyndham Business card gives you Diamond status which has continued to count as “earned” for matching. The merry-go-round of status matching back and forth between Ceasars and Wyndham died I believe last year. The verbiage would also prevent you matching another hotel program to Wyndham and then Wyndham to Ceasars.
I don’t know whether the verbiage kat sites is new, but in terms of the merry go round dying, that wasn’t quite universal. I did get the Wyndham business card this summer, but I did *not* have it before that and I have still been able to match back and forth each year up to and including this year in February. Others reported that it didn’t work, but it did work for me.
I first got my Wyndham Diamond status years ago via a match to Hilton and then successfully matched back from Caesars Diamond to Wyndham Diamond and then from Wyndham Diamond to Caesars Diamond on February 1st each year. Like I said, that definitely didn’t continue to work for a lot of people, but it did for me.
Can you get the free cruise if you will be one person only in the cabin? Normally they charge a single supplement.
I believe so. Search the comments here — I’m almost positive that someone else has commented about doing it solo.
Their website is undergoing maintenance and ever since then the status match page has not been working. It doesn’t necessarily mean the status match is dead, the website could just be broken for now.
I think so too. I have an existing offer for up to Free Balcony room that is good until Sept 26 (they have been extending is for almost a year now). When I click on the link, it does take me to the same page as before that shows upto Balcony Room free, but has a banner on the top that says they have had issues due to multiple system updates over the weekend and that people may have received error messages.
Also seeing this as well. Fingers crossed…….
Haven’t found anything good or anything that works for our schedule with Holland America. Wondering if they’ll offer it again in 2024 if we don’t redeem this one or if we should push it and go somewhere this year
Interesting, are they limiting dates to this year? When I did the Holland America match in February the e-mail mentioned “eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023 sailings (blackout dates may apply)”. But speaking with a rep on the phone to ask about dates pretty much everything was free and clear with no restrictions.
We booked an Alaska cruise round trip out of Seattle for right after July 4 – prime sailing season for the Alaska itineraries. HAL ends up charging a flat rate for each additional guest and also flat rates for any room upgrades regardless of the market price (we upgraded to a balcony since there were no interior cabins remaining that could fit 3 people). This makes their offer mediocre on what would be cheap cruises anyway but great for cruising during peak travel times.
You booked a summer 2024 Alaska sailing? That is the 1st data point I’ve seen on this or in the FB Insiders group. Very interesting. I’ve been holding off on the HA match hoping they would open up next years dates. I really want to do a July 2024 Alaska out of Seattle as well. Guess I need to do the match ASAP.
Sorry no, I booked (and we already completed!) an Alaska cruise on HAL this summer of 2023. I matched back in February and the phone rep told me I could book basically any date the rest of 2023, so about 10 months out. I never received a list of limited dates or itineraries to pick from.
Based on Grant’s experience below and that Princess and HAL are both Carnival owned (and maybe share booking processes? The offer wording and fee structure are similar) you might have luck pushing for July of next year if you get an offer.
I think what we all want to know is…. did Stacey ever book a free cruise?!?!
For the Princess Cruise free cruise offer, here is the offer I received:
Offer Type PCLMatch 1: Complimentary Interior Cabin
Offer Description: Valid on eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023/2024 sailings (blackout dates may apply and subject to availability)
I called the booking number and the rep said that you must book by and sail by 3/31/2024. I told that was disappointing since I was looking forward to a summer cruise. The rep asked which cruise I was interested in and then asked if this was my first time sailing on Princess. I said yes, but had sailed with other Carnival family of cruise lines and she was able to use the certificate for a cruise in June 2024.
Price per person for port taxes and fees was about $205 and there was a $200 deposit per person, which would become onboard credit. Total for 2 passengers was $205 + $205 + $200 + $200 = $810, but I would have $400 onboard credit. You can pay an upgrade fee to move from a inside cabin to an ocean view, balcony, or suite, along with purchase drink packages and any other add-on.
So you had until Mar to book it, that’s nice. And what did you use for the match?
I used old screenshots from my original Carnival Cruise Line offer for a free interior room.
You mean you just sent your carnival balcony offer? No MGM gold or Cearsar’s?
I did provide my Caesar’s Diamond elite status photo in a subsequent email, I just responded to their email thread.
Okay, thanks.
I just responded to Andrei’s comment above, this sounds almost verbatim like the Holland America offer.
Based on that and the upgrade fee structure I would assume the same thing holds true for Princess as Holland America – the fees don’t have any link to market price and so are a much better deal on popular sailing dates.
Glad to hear they were willing to extend the use of the certificate to next summer.
Yes, the status match and booking process were very similar for Holland America and Princess.
For my Royal Carribean free cruise offer, I was originally provided a list of eligible cruises good through October 2023. I emailed them back stating that I had all my travel plans booked through 2023. They changed my offer and sent me a list of eligible cruises through April 2024. Don’t be afraid to push back and ask for a cruise outside their standard booking dates. They want people to go on a cruise, so they are pretty accommodating if you call or email them.
I just called and the agent wouldn’t budge about the March 2024 date which is a bummer because I have too many cruises booked and probably can’t squeeze in another one. I think the letter is misleading because it says it’s for 2024 sailings and it says Alaska is included which only sails in the summer. She also said it was limited to 10 days and I was looking at an 11 day Alaska.
I would try to find another cruise that is 10 days or less and try calling again. Did you mention that you cannot travel before March 31 since your travel plans are already in place? You can also say that you are really excited to try Princess Cruise Line since you’ve heard such wonderful things from your friends and family members 🙂
It seems like the carnival link is now broken, do we think that the promotion is over or has it just moved?
same- looks like the link may be down:(
Will the Carnival fun match work for free cruise offers if you’ve sailed with them before?
Probably not if you didn’t gamble on that cruise.
Bummer! It was like 15 years ago when are kids were young and we didn’t prioritize gambling.
I got a match and booked Carnival and I haven’t cruised Carnival since 2008 and I went with young kids and didn’t gamble back then either.
I sailed a couple times with them in 2017 and 2018. I did not gamble and I did get the balcony offer this month after matching in Aug.
Still waiting on Carnival to offer free cruise – only promotions thus far. In the meantime, thought I would share that I did Virgin Voyages Cruise last year. Based on Nick and others food comments on MSC, I can tell you Virgin food was amazing. Definitely a different vibe with no kids, but really enjoyed it over others (have done 3 Royal C and 1 Carnival in past). Hoping to see one of those Virgin 80k point offers soon!
So Atlantic City is a very strange destination, but if you go during warm weather, the beach is certainly pleasant enough for a couple days even if you have zero interest in gambling. We stayed for $30 midweek at Cesears with our Diamond status, and walked over to Hard Rock and Ocean to get our status matches.
We didn’t get anything except the status from Hard Rock because we had previously matched about 5 years ago, but Ocean gave us each a voucher for 2 at their Avila lounge and 2 night future stays.
The Avila deal required us to use the voucher WITHIN 3 days, so we ate there twice. The food isn’t gourmet, but it’s certainly enjoyable, especially if you enjoy prime rib and the free booze. One day they had fried oysters on the buffet, and that was fun, too. We’re thinking of going back next spring to use our free hotel days (the hotel looks nice, much nicer than the Cesears’ properties), and would like to get into the lounge again.. But, normally, you need $10.00 in comps. Realistically, is there any way to earn these comps if you don’t gamble?
Hi, is the Royal Caribbean match still available? I have a free balcony cruise from Carnival as an offer. But I’m confused on where to go to get a Royal Caribbean match. Where on Clubroyaleoffers.com do you go?
I removed the Royal Caribbean section because that hasn’t been available since early this year.
Is it better to open a Caesars Rewards account before trying to match to Wyndham or does it work fine doing it at the same time?
I was also looking for any posts that outline other benefits of having Caesars Rewards. If you have one, will you please include a link.
You DON’T want to have the account before matching, having an account will disqualify you from matching.
That’s not true at all. You need to have a Caesars account in order to tell Wyndham what to match to. And an existing account is fine – my wife and I have had Caesars accounts for many years and have matched from Wyndham to Caesars each year for the past several years.
You are right, Nick- my wife did a match from MGM to Caesars and that didn’t work out since she already had an account, it would have worked with the Wyndham route. Apologies for the confusion.
Ah, that makes sense! That’s correct that that matching from MGM to Caesars would require your Caesars account to be brand new.
Quick DP on HAL match – I submitted my Ceasers Diamond screenshot yesterday around 3pm and received a standard free cruise offer (interior cabin + $200 casino free play) that almost everyone else has reported at 10am today (so less than 24 hrs turnaround).
do you mind if I ask if your HAL offer was limited to cruises in 2023? I am hoping to do this but can’t get off work until Jan 2024.
Yes, unfortunately it does say 2023 cruises
Kudos to Nick and the FM team for going above and beyond! I may have missed it, but does anyone know If you have to keep re-matching every year with Ocean Prime (to get a cruise every year)? Many thanks fellow FM’ers!
At Resorts World now for the two free nights. Having a difficult time getting anyone to add $100 dining credit and $100 free play.
Rewards counter had no idea what I was talking about. Hotel check in had me waiting 30 minutes in the lobby while they tried to add it. Finally told it was all set, but still not seeing any freeplay in the account.
I was told on the phone it would be added when I picked up my rewards card.
I called the Getting rewards number and they added the credits. I wouldn’t bother with the rewards desk or hotel desk, they weren’t helpful.
Correct me if I’m wrong but it looks like Starting Point 3 no longer exists. Hyatt landing page states that Hyatt-MGM partnership ends 9/30/23 and there is no link to apply to the MGM program. Hyatt Explorist here.
I still have Caesar’s Diamond and MGM Gold, but I don’t have the physical cards and I currently live in Japan. Is it possible to do any matches for any Asian cruises? Or even Mediterranean? If not, then how could I get Florida cruises from the matches? Thanks in advance.
Nick, and issues re-matching to Ocean Prime if you already matched to them last year? Thanks for the great content!
Realized I wasn’t totally clear…I was able to easily re-match to Hard Rock Rock Royalty (even after doing the same match from Caesars last year), and I was hoping to use this Hard Rock status to re-match to Ocean Prime. Thanks again.
does this re-match give MSC cruise again?
I saw something online that says “Tier match valid for new signups or customers who are inactive for the past 12 months.” Not sure how this is enforced in practice.
Nick, I don’t think you addressed this before. Can you please clarify if the VFIP Blue First Sailing with Carnival gets upgraded to a higher status with Carnival, after some time? They give me VFIP Blue via my Caesars diamond match, and it seems to me they offered promos that are given to all VFIP blue members, with no free cruise promo so far.
The color has nothing to do with anything here – the Carnival Fun Match is sort of a misnomer. You aren’t getting any sort of status, you’re getting cruise offers. Your color is solely related to how many lifetime nights you’ve cruised with Carnival. If you’ve never cruised with them before, you’re one color. If you’ve cruised before, you’re another (can’t remember which one is red and which is blue), after X number of lifetime nights you’re Gold, etc. We’ve had both Red and Blue members get the same free balcony offer.
Have you read the post about updating your profile information? If not, pop “trouble with the Carnival Fun Match” in the search box and you’ll find it.
Thank you so much, Nick. I just read it and followed the advice.
I’m still not getting the free carnival offers (profile updated, mgm gold via Hyatt just before it expired), I’m just getting promotional emails. Any other suggestions that have worked for others? I live in Detroit so was considering going to local mgm and Caesar’s Windsor to match Diamond but I don’t think I can resubmit on carnival fun site?
Followed Nick on same cruise about a week later. My impressions largely align with his, except:
1. Did not find the food quite as bad as he did. Confined my dining to the buffet. Salad bar and pizza always fine. Breakfast fried eggs, toast fine. Meat cuts always super cheap, e.g., pork, leg of Lamb, overcooked ‘Roasted beef’, hamburgers not edible.
2. Crowds and seating in buffet not too bad. Even when cruise completely booked.
3. Room service coffee not too bad.
4. Found entertainment and entertainers not as good as Nick. Crappy sound systems. Hard time telling some lounge performers from karaoke singers!
5. Tiny pool areas so crowded as to be unpleasant.
6. Cabins furnished like an old MarriottCourtyard.
7. Smoking on balconies ‘officially’ prohibited and cited on safety video. But really allowed. . You’d expect at least signs on balconies. Nope.
8. Ports-of-call made the trip fun!
Like Nick. Fine ‘free’ holiday that I would do again on newer ship.
Thank you Nick & Frequent Miler!
I have matched recentl. how do you book MSC cruise?
DP: 8/11/23 ~ matched Caesars Diamond to Rock Royalty and Rock Royalty to Prime. I don’t believe I got any freeplay from HR, or maybe it was $10? But at Ocean i did get a nice bright t-shirt. Have until 6/30/24 for cruise. Avila lounge was so-so IMO.
I went to AC to do all of these matches today. Success across the board, except at Borgata. Desk said they no longer match to Oceans Prime, just Oceans Reserve.
I did the same a few days ago. I also couldn’t do the “Bonus match” (Ocean Prime to MGM Gold at Borgata Atlantic City). I was told that match was discontinued on July 27th. Thankfully the valet hadn’t parked my car yet.
Lucky you! I was out $5 for the garage parking. 🙂
One other point worth noting for anyone still following this thread — when I went to the desk at Ocean, the agent said over her shoulder to the neighboring agent “oh it’s another Wyndham.” I said nothing about Wyndham — I just asked her to match my Hard Rock status — so I suspect they have been getting a steady stream of people following this post’s instructions and they know the source. Not sure if that’s a harbinger of cruise benefit cuts to come, but thought it was worth mentioning in case people are on the fence about doing this sooner rather than later.
One more point — the buffet at the Ocean is thoroughly mediocre (especially if you’re a vegetarian), but on the upside the drinks are stiff. Not a surprise given the venue, but I wouldn’t plan my day around the free lunch.
I submitted my match request to Carnival but still didn’t see the changes in my status – still a blue tier. How long does it take to process the request and before I get the first offer?
I have a question about the Ocean’s MSC cruises. It is my understanding that the free MSC cruise is per calendar year, so as a first time Oceans prime member this year I should get one cruise in 2023 and one cruise in 2024 before my status expires in June 2024. I just booked my cruise for 2023, so if I understand this right I should be able to book a cruise for 2024 as well correct? If so, do I have to wait until January 2024 to book the 2024 cruise or is there a way to book it sooner? I am torn on whether to start preemtively start booking award flights for the cruise I want, or waiting until I can actually book the cruise in January. Thanks in advance!
I’m not sure about that. The brochure shows a free cruise to be taken by 6/20/2024.
All – I did the Atlantic City status match adventure a few years back (2018 or 2019) and let many of them lapse. Does anyone know if I would be able to do this again (essentially double dip)? Thank you in advance and great article Nick!
You can do hard rock and ocean again. Ocean requires that your account has been inactive for 18 months, which means you cannot have put your card in a machine to play or whatever for 18 months. I believe you can rematch at Hard Rock after 12 months of inactivity.
Just to clarify – is there no longer a path to a free MSC cruise other than Oceans Prime in person visit to Atlantic City? Just wanted to make sure I’m understanding all the ‘update’ sections correctly in the post. Thank you!
You can still status match Caesars -> Hard Rock -> Oceans after getting Caesars status via either Wyndham or Founders Card in order to get the free MSC Cruises.
Thanks Andrew! And does it still work to status match from say Hyatt Globalist to Wyndham to get the ball rolling?
Does anyone know if Carnival will send another offer if you don’t take the bait on the first one? I have a balcony offer that I can’t book yet due to scheduling. It is due to expire tomorrow.
95% of the balcony are taken and 70% of oceans are taken. Most are interior now. They offer balcony and “none” of the cruises have balcony available.
That’s covered in the post — we continued to get new offers every month for 12 months.
That’s a relief since I will let this balcony room expire today then. Hopefully more routes with balcony rooms opens up. Thanks for responding!
Nick, did you continue to receive the offers then even after your Caesars diamond status as listed on the card you had submitted had expired? And legitimately had expired for a couple of months I imagine until you were able to re-match from Wyndham?
Me and P2 just did a quick cross country turnaround to do the matches in Atlantic City and everything went without a hitch. I had a few question about using the things we get with the match:
1) Does the stay at Resorts World include parking?
2) How far off can I book the MSC Cruise? This year I already have plenty of travel booking?
3) Any other restrictions with the MSC Cruises? I’m thinking back to the Holland America cruise and all of the restrictions that are not spelled out in their email (e.g. no holidays). I know about the 10 day limit, of course.
1) No idea about the parking, but have you checked whether there is a fee to park at Resorts World? If there is, I would bet that Circus Circus probably doesn’t charge and it’s next door. Treasure Island definitely has free parking, but it would be less convenient.
2) You’ll be able to book MSC through the expiration date of your Ocean Prime status (which will be June 30, 2024)
3) I don’t know whether there are restrictions around holidays. I’d never expect a free cruise offer to be available during a time when the cruise line is highly likely to sell out (like the week between Christmas and New Year’s Eve for instance) just based on basic logic (wouldn’t make sense to give away something they know with high likelihood that they’ll sell at full price). Although, that said, I did book the free Royal Caribbean cruise during President’s Week, so I don’t know. Anyway, we had no difficulty booking the cruise we wanted (a 10-day European cruise). The MSC offer requires a $400 deposit that you get back as an onboard credit, but there aren’t even any port taxes. Very easy offer.
Just did the Atlantic City Caesars to Hard Rock to Ocean status match and it was easy. So for the MSC cruise, do we have to complete our sailing by the end of June? What is the best way to figure out their offerings, and get recommendations for the best of their cruises? And what are the best strategies to spend the $400 onboard credit? Any chance you can pay the gratuities with that?
It says book and sail by 7/1/24. I would take that to mean that you must depart on your cruise before 7/1, but maybe you have to complete it before then? I don’t know.
Best way to figure out their offerings is just to go to their website. The casino dept may have more cabins available than what you see online, but maybe not. I basically just looked at cruises that were available to book with cash. In terms of their best cruises, I just Googled (and didn’t completely follow the advice of the things I read — their “best” ships were on itineraries that didn’t appeal to us, so I went with a couple of newer ships that had more amenities (look at deck plans / read on sites like cruisecritic to find out what kind of amenities they offer).
No idea if you can use the onboard credit to pay gratuities (what they call service charges). I just sat at a slot machine, loaded $400 to it charged to my room, spun it a few times, and cashed out. I wanted to use my credit card to pay gratuities to pay the final bill and earn rewards on that also.
Has anyone come across this Princess casino match before? I know that like Holland America, Princess is also owned by Carnival (the signup pages even look very similar). I just happened to stumble on this and didnt know if it was an old match and people didnt get a free cruise or if it was a new one. I just finished my Holland America cruise but I havent taken my Carnival cruise offer yet. I havent decided if I am going to try it and which casino statuses it would be worth submitting (I think I did Caesars and MGM for Holland America, but I wasn’t sure if Ocean’s status would be better):
https://oceanplayersclub.com/princessmatch/
Interesting, have you try yet?
Thanks to your post I submitted a match, just got this:
We are glad to hear you are interested in sailing with Princess Cruises. After reviewing your details you are eligible for the below offer. To book this offer please call 1-888-772-6697 and provide your certificate number below. This offer is eligible for 60 days to be redeemed.
Certificate Number:
Offer Type PCLMatch 1: Complimentary Interior Cabin
Offer Description: Valid on eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023/2024 sailings (blackout dates may apply)
Called and was informed that it’s valid for sailings until March 31st 2024.
Mark, when you submitted this match did they tell you what the blackout dates are? Was going to look at the potential of a Christmas cruise, but I am assuming that is part of that blackout dates. Also did they list a maximum number of days?
No exact blackout dates were mentioned in the email, you should call to ask. I was told up to 10 days cruises by the agent.
Driving up to AC from ATL to status match my CD to HR to OP. I understand the Prime partnership with Wynn has ended and a new partner match with Resorts World is in place. Has anyone redeemed the 2 free nights at RW yet? Also wondering if Conrad or Crockfords can be booked or upgraded when redeeming those 2 free nights.
How long did your CD take to be matched from wybdham diamond?
3 to 4 days after online submission on Caesar’s website
just received mine
I booked my 2 nights for Sept. You can choose Hilton or Conrad. No taxes, or resort fees to be paid.
Awesome. Standard room?
Hope you picked Conrad – it was very nice! While Crockford’s had nicer looking finishes (more marble and gold-accented stuff), we found our room at Conrad to be nicer overall.
Yes!, Conrad standard room. I didn’t inquire about paid upgrades.
TY for the update. The status match appears more valuable with Conrad. It’s not the Wynn but it’s it’s definitely better than 85% of the properties currently available. Is this a one time benefit match or will it renew each calendar like the Caesar’s $100 dining credit?
Hi Nick, New the the site but longtime listener to the podcast. Are the Resorts World benefits annually or are they a one time bonus for matching status. TIA
how to book?
after completing all the matches in Atlantic city, Is it worth to take a trip to philly for additional matches? What are current matches and perks in philly casinos being offered?
When status matching through Wyndham business card- Caesar’s Diamond- Hard Rock Rotalty-Ocean Prime- MGM Gold- is there a certain time of year it’s best to go to Atlantic City to do these matches? I see the Caesar’s is good through Jan. So would Feb be the best time then have the status through the end of the year? Then do you have to go back in person each year to match again? Or can that be done online?
Well, at this point, if you get your Wyndham Diamond status from the credit card, you can re-matched to Caesars every year, so it doesn’t really matter when you do that (some people have had trouble re-matching, but that’s not people with the credit card, it is people who never had the credit card but who have been matching back and forth between Caesars and Wyndham when each one expires.
As far as the rest of the matches go, my tongue-in-cheek and answer to “when is the best time of year to go?” would be “when they are offering the matches and associated cruises”. What I mean to say there is that I have no idea whether Ocean and Hard Rock will continue to match in February, nor do I know with 100% certainty that Ocean and MSC won’t stop giving the cruise to Prime members. We saw Rivers pull its match and free cruise very quickly when people were rushing in to match for the free cruise. Ocean has had this benefit for a while (and actually improved it this year), so I don’t have reason to suspect that it’s going to get pulled, but as things stand right now you are relying on Hard Rock continuing to match Caesars or MGM to top tier and relying on Ocean to continue matching Hard Rock and relying on Ocean to continue offering the MSC cruise and for MSC to continue to want Ocean players. There are a lot of links there, so the more time you wait the greater the odds of some link breaking. If you don’t have your heart set on it working out, or if you’re not currently eligible for some piece of the puzzle, I can see plotting out a “best time of year” strategy. But at the end of the day, I don’t expect the free cruise gravy train to last forever, so I’d recommend doing it sooner rather than later if you want the cruises.
The only match here that can be done online is Wyndham to Caesars or vice versa. The rest require going in-person.
Nick,
I just got my Royal Caribbean cruise offer after waiting more than 4 months. The offer if for 3 to 5 night cruise through the end of October 2023. The problem is I pretty much have my vacation plans already made for this year. If I don’t take them up on this offer will they send another one later(maybe with dates in 2024)? Kinda weird that they waited this long and the list of cruises they sent me includes a few with dates that have already passed.
they will send another one. I asked the same question sometime ago in another article.
Do you know if Carnival will send another one? I have a free balcony that expires on 8/5/2023 (1 day) and my schedule isn’t open yet so I dont know if I can go.
read this
https://frequentmiler.com/our-experience-booking-a-free-msc-cruise/comment-page-1/#comment-2367692
Thanks for responding! Here is to hoping that all those cruise lines will send us cruise offer.
Awesome write up and really helpful!
I recently went to Ocean Atlantic City and got my Ocean Prime membership, i didn’t get any freeplay, however i got an Ocean Shirt. For the MSC cruise, will i see any information in the Ocean App or i need to directly call MSC and mention about my Ocean Prime membership? Also i don’t see comp nights in the app, do i still need to reach out for that?
You won’t see any indication of either the cruise or the free nights. You’ll just need to call MSC and give them your ocean prime number. Theoretically, the cruise is only bookable starting the 15th of the month after you match, though in practice I was able to book it sooner. YNMV.
The free nights you just need to call. I think they need to be booked within 90 days of matching, and you have to wait at least 24 or 72 hours after you match (I can’t recall which).
Thank you, i will reach out to MSC in order to book the cruise.
Also i see comp nights on my ocean app for Mon-Thu
Lastly, i received mail from Holland America line after matching my Caesars Diamond, following was the offer
HALMatch 1: Complimentary Interior Cabin + $100 Freeplay with Drinks for two (2) while playing in the casino
Offer Description: Valid on eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023 sailings (blackout dates may apply)
Thanks for detailed article. I just got approved for wyndham biz earner card and will soon start the merry-go-round, I plan to book cruise for my parents. Is this possible as every card and rewards program will be in my name? Thanks.
No. You can’t book a cruise for someone else. You can understand why when you think about it from the cruise line perspective: their goal isn’t to give away a free cruise and free food and whatever — their goal is to attract a heavy-hitting gambler who will lose more than the cost of the cruise in the casino. Your Caesars Diamond status suggests that you must be a big time gambler, so they are offering you the chance to gamble away more than the cost of the cruise in their casino. They don’t want to give away a free cruise to someone who may or may not gamble (your parents) and they aren’t even offering a free cruise to all of their own regular gamblers — they’re trying to get people who gamble more than their average customers and they think you are one of those people.
If your parents want the free cruise, they need to hop on the merry-go-round themselves. For example, I helped a couple of family members navigate getting the Wyndham business card and matching to Caesars, etc.
gotcha. thanks roe reply. I should open a card for P3 then.
I just received my Caesar Diamonds approval. I have sent Carnival the screen shot, but I want to be extra cautious I am doing this correctly. Should I send Holland America the Caesar Diamonds info or my Carnival Offer for a free cruise? I thought I read somewhere on FM that Holland won’t give (or lower chance) a free cruise with an image of Caesar Diamond. I don’t think Nick got a Holland free offer since he sent them an image of Caesar instead of Carnival.
I searched through all these comments and can’t find that comment again. Please correct me if I am wrong. Thanks!
You can just send the same Caesar’s diamond info to Holland. I think I didn’t get the home in America offer because I had recently cruised on a carnival and not gambled enough. My wife and mother in law had no problem matching their Caesar’s diamond status and getting the Holland American cruise.
Thank you so much for your time in writing the article and providing insight afterwards!
We are booked on a Carnival cruise in October prior to learning about this game. Would you suggest I gamble a bit on it before I try to match my Caesars Diamond card? For reference, I last cruised on Carnival about 6 years ago and did not gamble.
how long did it take you to receive Caesars diamond match confirmation? did you match through wyndham diamond?
Maybe like 1-2 weeks for CD. I matched through WD. Holland took like 1-2 weeks when I submitted my CD proof. Carnival took like 2 weeks also.
thank you for the update. I didn’t know that I can match to Holland and carnival by Caesars diamond. Can you tell me what are the benefits for matching this?
Free cruises. I got an offer for interior from Holland. Here is an excerpt from the email if it helps. It expires 60 days from the email:
Offer Type HALMatch 1: Complimentary Interior Cabin + $100 Freeplay with Drinks for two (2) while playing in the casino
Offer Description: Valid on eligible sailings to Alaska, Mexico, Caribbean, Coastal, and Canada/New England on 2023 sailings (blackout dates may apply)
I believe HalMatch2 is ocean. 3 is Balcony. Those latter 2 seem rare based on FM other thread on cruises. Carnival offered a balcony right away and I think the deal expires in 1 month from offer. Good luck!
Can I use Hilton gold status to status match to Wyndham diamond to start this process?
You should be able to match Hilton Gold > Caesar Diamond > Carnival, etc
Caesaes is not matching those statuses. You need to have earned statuses from CC.
I have a Carnival free balcony offer that expires on 7/11. I just got back from a free Holland America cruise where I didn’t use the casino at all. If I let the current Carnival offer expire, what are the chances I will get another?
Did you do the Carnival and Holland match with the Caesar Diamond at the same time? I was wondering if there was an optimal strategy since they are sister companies and didn’t want to mess it up.
Did them both at the same time.
[…] in the miles and points game for a decade now, but I’m still learning new tricks. Here’s how to get free cruises by gaming casino status matches. There are various on ramps to this process, but the goal is to attain status at two Vegas casino […]
Anybody know what to do with Caesar’s match (from MGM) if one already has an account? That was the reason for rejection at Caesar’s desk, tried to delete the account and they are asking for the address to delete.
I don’t think that can be done. You’re going to need to get the Wyndham Business card to match to Caesar’s Diamond I think.
Is the carnival cruise a one time thing if you don’t gamble while you’re on the cruise? Or any of the free cruises? Are they one time things?
From what I have seen, you are not invited back for a free cruise again if you didn’t gamble on your free gambling cruise with Carnival. I have also seen where if you take the Carnival cruise for free and don’t gamble, they won’t give you the free Holland America cruise either.
I just did the Atlantic City Match deal. Hard Rock and Ocean were quick, also I won $131 at the Ocean. I went to the Borgata to match and it took quite a while. Also their status match only lasts for 1 month now. This is obviously a bummer. I am curious if I’ll be able to match to Hyatt for a longer period of time.
Congrats for winning. What did you play? do you have to play table games or slot things are allowed?
Just slots.
thanks for reply. I applied for Caesars match. I plan to trip to AC and philadelphia to complete all matches (I live in the area). How should I move forward with this? Asking you cuz you probably did all the matches recently. Thanks again.
Pretty sure you gotta start at Hard Rock, walk next door to Ocean. I’m not sure there’s any good reason to do MGM anymore. I didn’t do golden nugget.
Are you able to complete the status match from Caesars to Hard Rock in Ft Lauderdale, FL
@Nick Reyes thanks for all that you do!
i had a 12 day summer cruise around Greek Islands/ Italy on Celebrity because of this, but sadly because of health issues – had to cancel.
Bummer! Sorry to hear that. Hope you and yours are well soon!
Nick,
If I don’t plan on cruising till next year sometime is it better to wait to do all these steps till then?
Is there a best time of year to do all the matches?
Just called Wynn to book the Ocean Prime was informed that Ocean did not renew contract with Wynn so that offer is no longer available after June 30. At least that is what I was told.
Yea looks that way, looks like their contract is now with resorts world according to their new benefits. Looks like they upgraded the cruise offer as well!
https://www.theoceanac.com/sites/default/files/2023-06/05_Ocean_Rewards_Travel_Perks_Brochure_DRAFT8.pdf
Just told Wynn is waiting for update from Ocean.
I was going to try again after the 15th since my match was in early June. I wasn’t in the Wynn system yet when I called.
Ocean did indeed end the agreement with Wynn. As per the update to the post today, it’s Resorts World as of 7/1/23.
Yes. Just hot mailer in post. It’s down to two nights at Resorts World, $100 dining credit, $100 free casino play. And as mentioned above MSC cruise is now 10 nights Ocean View anywhere in the world. That part is sweet
How long do you have to take the free cruise after matching?
Got Globalist from Bilt challenge and the automatic MGM Gold (went to MGM to print the card). Submitted to Carnival, waited a week but nothing happened. Went to Ceasars and was easily matched to DIamond with MGM Gold (I was already in their system, all they needed to do is scan DL). There was no way to add Ceasars to the match request I already submitted using MGM.
Went into Carnival account, updated Title, Country and a few other fields and two days later got a balcony offer, booked a 12 day transatlantic from Baltimore to Barcelona. As soon as I put the cruise on hold, I wasn’t able to see other cruises at the discounted rate.
Submitted a request to Holland, a few days later got an offer from them also. The taxes are higher (vs Carnival), have to use it in 2023.
P2 got matched with MGM Gold from a Wyndham promo status challenge, will be matching with Ceasars next.
Nice!
Did your MGM Gold card have an expiration date on it? I got the printed card, but it doesn’t have an expiration date…so didn’t know if Carnival would accept it
P2 went to MGM National Harbor and the card that was printed didn’t have an expiration date. We went back a week later and tried to reprint it at the kiosk, it didn’t work, went to the desk and the person told us that the registration was not completed initially. Once it was completed, P2 was able to reprint the card at the kiosk with the date.
Did they send you the offer via email or you saw it on their website? It’s only been 2 days since I status matched my Caesars Diamond, but I only see “Up to $500 off + Free Drinks + More”. I updated the account profile details but left the middle name blank. Wonder if I should put in a letter or symbol.
Got the email with the link to the offer. Mine took 3-4 days after the profile info was updated.
The Holland America match website says “uploaded file type is not allowed”. I tried both jpg and png. Any tips?
I am going to answer my own question: the file extension needs to be in lowercase letters, for example .jpg and not .JPG.
[…] a month ago Frequent Miler wrote a very long, detailed and helpful post about how to get free cruise offers by matching casino statuses. You should go and read through it. Even if you aren’t holding a […]
Had followed Nick’s fantastic treasure hunt at beginning of May. Even got Rivers and Live Black b4 they stopped. But absent mindedly i skipped MGM.
My OCEAN Prime status did get me 2 nights at Wynn Vegas and 7-night MSC Carribean cruise…but I have to redeem by end of June. Nope. And I have never received a free Carnival Cruise offer.
But, I have booked free 3-nights Resorts Vegas with $200 dining, 10-night western Mediterranean MSC balcony cruise and 10-nt Holland America Mexican Rivera inside room cruise. w00t! Nick. Thank you.
And since your Ocean Prime got extended to 6/30/24 (assuming you matched after March 1st), you can now book another 10-night MSC cruise anywhere (ocean view)!
Can you explain about being able to book more than 1 free cruise? I have my Wyndham Earner Business card and hoping to visit AC this month to do the status merry go round.
So if I did the Ocean Prime match next month, how long would I have to book/take the free 10 day cruise? Trying to figure out if this is worth a trip to AC.
Can one do a paid upgrade for the MSC cruise from ocean match to a balcony or exterior room?
Sure, they will charge you $800-$850 for the upgrade.
What would the rate be for a 3rd person (child) to an interior room offer?
If you’re MSC diamond member you get upgraded to a balcony cabin. This was my experience
My wife is an MSC Diamond member (matched before booking). She did not get upgraded from her Ocean view room on our current sailing. I’m sure it’s very YMMV as to whether you get upgraded for free in the days before sailing.
I got upgraded to the Balcony room at the time of booking.
I did the match to Carnival. And did get offers for $100 cruises. Does anyone know Is this a 1 time thing only, i.e. if I book a cruise, do you no longer get offers for the $100 cruises? I was trying to see if can do multiple cruises. Thank you
Suicide Cruise Mission: Completed! Flew the AA redeye 6/2 from Portland, OR to status match. Took two trains from PHL, stayed for the nice free buffet at the Ocean, gambled and won $107 there, got on the bus at ACY to PHL and few home to PDX, all within 24.5 hours. Was successful on all counts, but zeroed out on the $50 slot spins at Hard Rock (what are the odds?) Waiting for free cruise now and for free Wynn stay…Thank you, Nicodemus!
Interesting, I was live in west thinking how to get to Atlantic City, so PHL have trains go to Atlantic City?
American airlines provides bus transportation from Philadelphia to AC when you book a plane flight to AC through Philadelphia….. Only airline in America to do that. I skipped the bus ride and took two different trains to get there quicker. Did take the American bus from AC back to Philadelphia for my return trip home to Portland.
I may have stumbled into another pathway to this: The Chase Sapphire Reserve offered Marriott Gold status last year, which I picked up then. I status matched to Wyndham, which I thought would get me Gold status. Wyndham surprised me with an email yesterday saying “enjoy your diamond status!” My Caesar’s status match is pending.
Did you get Caesar status matched ?
Did you get Caesar status matched ?
Just wanted to add a more recent data point for those still looking to do the matches in Atlantic city that they are still indeed all doing the status matches. I just got finished taking my wife and mother in law to Atlantic City using the Oceans free nights as well as the Hard Rock Free nights. I signed them both up for the Wyndham business card and matched their Wyndham Diamond status to Caesars Diamond status a couple of months ago (this was originally to get the free cruises). this Weekend they matched Caesars Diamond -> Hard Rock Rock Royalty (they haven’t actually switched over to Unity yet) -> Oceans Prime -> MGM Gold (and in turned that into Hyatt Explorist). The Ocean’s reward desk confirmed that starting July 15th they should be able to book the MSC cruise and that their status was good through June 30, 2024. Very successful weekend and glad everything worked smoothly without any issues (my wife previously came up with me in March when I did my matches and we were not successful in combining our MGM status so that she could share my gold status. Didnt realize that didnt work in AC….)
So hopefully that should mean that the status matches should be good through the rest of the month for anyone looking to do them this month. We will see what Oceans and Hard Rock look like next month to see if the train keeps on moving!
Thanks for the post, Andrew! I went (above) alone, cross country to do this, so I am comforted by knowing our status is extended until summer 2024…Whew!
[…] followed the path laid out by Nick Reyes at Frequent Miler. It’s a LOT, so we will be writing about our experiences in parts. This part led to two booked […]
I marched my status at Rivers and Live Casino first week of May. The cruise offers are not my account. It appeared you also must play and earn (some?) tier credit for the cruise offer to show up. Only the Ocean Prime cruise offer is available however one must travel before 7/01/23.
The Rivers offer didn’t actually “show up” anywhere, but by the first week of May they had already instituted the language stating that you needed to earn your status in order to get the cruise (I updated the post with that information on May 1st).
The Ocean Prime Cruise is once per membership year. Everyone who matched since sometime in March are automatically getting extended to June 30th 2024, so if MSC wouldn’t let you book the cruise yet, you should be able to after July 1st. I would actually expect they would let you book now for after July 1st. Might be worth more than one phone call.
Since Caesar’s year ends in January, I did my round of matches in February. However, I received Ocean status until 7/1 and eventually, I missed my cruise because I was busy and remembered about it only now when I was out of time. Is it better to do Ocean mid-year and get a full-year membership? My impression was that they give only 6m when this is a status match.
Anyone else have an issued trying to redeem the MSC free cruise with Oceans AC Prime? I called the MSC casino department. While they could find my Oceans AC member number, they said there is no cruise certificate attached to it and that I had to send an email in. Still waiting for their response. Anyone else have this issue?
Saw a DP in the comments where you will be disqualified from Holland America if you match with Carnival. Can I send a screenshot of my Caesar’s Diamond to Holland America to get a free cruise offer and then send it to Carnival after?
Yes
Has anyone done the Hard Rock status match recently since Sean’s May 8th post? I am headed to Atlantic City the first weekend in June where my wife and mother in law are planning to status match their Caesar’s status to get the free cruises. I am a little worried though because when I called the hotel about my reservation they referred to me as an Icon member instead of Rock Royalty, and when I asked about the status match the CSR seemed to indicate that they werent doing it anymore. Wanted to confirm that they are still doing it before we head up there.
I’m not sure what May 8th post you’re referring to, but a friend of mine did the match just this past Thursday. Still Rock Royalty — though when I went to Mirage about a month after my own match, Mirage said I was already Icon (clearly they connected the account from Atlantic City).
(and yes, he also matched to Ocean Prime).
As a follow up question- if you are already ICON status (I matched at Mirage) can you still get matched to Rock Royalty? Or is that even necessary to get the free cruise.
@andrew hope you can report back! I’d likely head down next week to do further matching also.
Hopefully I didn’t miss the literal boat on this one. I pass by Live! every day but P2 and I have no interest to take a cruise for another couple years (where it would be part of a FIRE strategy) so I didn’t get on top of it (in part bc I heard the MSC cruise offers expire)
Otherwise from looking at their chart looks like MS’ing Plat could be one way to get there. Having their CC would be easiest way…it looks like. Not a lot of info about the other PA casinos in terms of matching to THEIR status online
Just finished up with my weekend in AC. My wife and mother in law were successful in doing all of their matches to get the free cruise with Oceans and the free nights with Oceans and Caesars.
You already missed out on Live! as they changed their status match and Rivers stopped doing the cruise, but you should be able to get the Ocean’s match even just with your ICON Unity card as it says the match to Icon on their brochure:
https://www.theoceanac.com/sites/default/files/2022-10/OCR_56131_OceanTierMatchRackCards.pdf
In terms of if you can match to Rock Royalty, I am not sure about that. I am not sure if they would consider you a new member or not since you already have Icon. At the very least I would think they would give you the status matching Icon (rock royalty), but maybe at the very least you could just try giving them MGM Gold and Caesars first to see if they will give you the free nights and $50 free play as a new member.
Is the Holland America offer still only valid thru the end of 2023? I haven’t done the match yet and am hoping at some point it switches to allow 2024 bookings. Thanks everyone for all the good insights.
I got it for 2023
Does anyone know how to book the Carnival offer with Kids ? When I try to add kids in the search, the options of free cruise disappear. Can I book for 2 adults and add kids later?
I was able to add kids directly as part of the online booking with Carnival. There are some rooms that are capacity limited to 2 it’s possible you are running into an issue with the ship only having those rooms available for the free offer. That was the case for the Holland America offer – all the free interior rooms available for our chosen itineraries could only sleep 2, so adding our daughter required upgrading to at least an Ocean View room. (In the case of HAL you have to book over the phone for the offer)
Are there any shortcuts for couples? Any way to spin one wyndham card into caesar’s diamond for both of us?
Nick (and others)!
We were under the impression that you wanted to match to MSC Voyagers Diamond (from Hilton Diamond for example) BEFORE you booked your free cruise. If that’s the case, we can’t seem to figure out how to do it.
We’ve signed up for the MSC accounts and within our profiles when we click on ‘MSC Voyagers Club > Become a Member’ we have two options ‘I have cruised with MSC in the Past’ or ‘ I have booked an upcoming cruise with MSC’.
If we click ‘I have cruised…’ we get ‘An error occurred checking member travel’ which makes sense since we haven’t cruised before. We obviously can’t click the second option as we haven’t yet booked.
Are we missing something, or is it indeed okay to match to Diamond after you book the free cruise? If we do match after we’ve booked the free cruise do we have to circle back and ‘attach’ our respective MSC Diamond number after the fact/make sure the perks are included as they should be for Diamond members?
Thank you for your help Nick (and others)!
I have a direct link to the status match in the post, but here it is again: https://www.msccruisesusa.com/manage-booking/msc-voyagers-club/status-match
I didn’t sign up for an MSC account before doing that match — they just assigned me a number. I guess if you use the same email and phone and stuff they’ll probably line it up with the account you’ve already created.
Thank you Nick! Yes, we had indeed seen the link within your initial post but it looks like we got caught up with trying to create the Voyager account before submitting the match form.
Fingers crossed that matching goes without a hitch and we’re upgraded to MSC Diamond.
Thank you again for all of your help!
We wanted to provide a bit more context on the nuts and bolts of booking the rooms for others considering doing the matches:
Ocean Casino AC
Hard Rock AC
were you able to get the hard rock free nights booked? seems like there are no “comp nights” available when i called, only discounted nights
Yes! Thankfully we were able to book the weekend after Memorial Day.
Not being able to simply go online and see a calendar of what nights qualify as comp nights is definitely not ideal, especially when playing in two or more player mode and trying to coordinate contiguous stays.
Hopefully you’re able to find something!
Update post stay:
Received Balcony offer from Carnival through my Wyndham/Caesar Diamond match. I searched over 100 cruises from all departing ports and Balcony availability was slim pickin’s. Matter of fact I only found a single Balcony cruise departing from the US. Turns out it’s a nice cruise, 8 day Bahama out of Mobile AL, so I booked it. Demonstrating good ethics Carnival warned of view obstruction, but Nick did advise to look at reviews and YouTube videos as the obstruction from the life boats do not block your horizontal view as they are stationed below the deck. Truth be knows if things get ugly the location of the life boat could be a real benefit. :-).
I just tried the Caesars Diamond to Holland America match, I guess they know I’ve done the Carnival match last year. Terrible offer:
$200 Free Play per person (1st/2nd Guest Only) *valid on new bookings only
Thanks for this amazing detailed information and its exciting. Just booked almost free cruise in Europe/Iceland. Now that we are spoiled is there any credit card or other options to get almost free wifi in cruise and excusrions? Is it a good idea to book excursions through cruise or book independent?
Nick,
I submitted my Carnival free cruise offer to the Royal Caribbean offer match in late March and I still haven’t gotten any emails from them. Does it normally take long to get an offer?
I submitted a Carnival offer too to Royal Caribbean in early April and still haven’t gotten word back. Does anyone know the time it takes to hear back from them? The auto message after submitting with Royal Caribbean said to wait 10 to 15 business days, which has already well passed.
When I tried to register for the match at Carnival through the link I got this message: “Sorry, this deal isn’t available to you. (You can totally grab one of our others, though!)”
Is this normal or does this mean I’m hosed?
I had the same message. I tried a different email and it worked.
I tried that and didn’t get that error message so I guess it worked, we’ll see if the offers come in.
Thank you!
Hey Saul – this actually happened to me too, I called Carnival and talked to the casino department it turned out there was an error in my personal data (the year was missing the last digit in their backend database for some reason!) and they were able to get it fixed and confirmed I was now registered for the Fun Match – so if you haven’t tried yet, calling is a good idea to see if there’s something they can do
Another way to get MGM gold is through Celebrity cruise line. I have Elite plus with Celebrity and they have a reciprocity agreement that gives you MGM gold. I did have to go to pick up my card at the casino but just had to show a snap shot of my Celebrity status. I got the balcony cruise in Europe with Carnival last summer that way.
1- How do you book the free nights with Hard Rock?
Thanks
Lots of persistance……I got my status match first weekend in March and finally got the free nights booked middle of last month. As noted a couple comments below by Michael below it doesn’t show up online and the phone reps can’t see any availability. I called multiple times and they just kept saying “there is no availability” and to try again when the next month’s schedule opens up, but then there was no availability then either.
I ended up having to email the info desk at info@hrhcac.com to complain, and they finally were able to book my two free nights.
Should I match to Carnival and Holland America at the same time?
I did these approximately the same time (within 2 weeks of each other) and received free cruise offers from both. Holland America was a quick response within 2 days but back in February when they were processing faster, I didn’t get the free Carnival offers until two months later when I updated all of my VIFP information as Nick mentioned in a more recent post from FM Insiders data points.
Can you explain what is VIFP
Just Carnival’s name for your rewards and cruise account with them. Another article noted that some people weren’t getting the free cruise offers until all the fields were filled in, including ones you might typically leave blank in other accounts (middle name, title, etc.). That was the case for me as well.
UPDATED TO ADD: I’m sorry – I just saw your answer below. Thank you!! The only field I can’t complete is the Address 2 because I live in a house (so no apartment number). Do you think that’s fine?
I got an offer from Holland America right away too (and just booked a free Alaskan cruise for August), but I’m still waiting on Carnival. What exactly did you do when you say you “updated your VIFP info.” I can’t find the post where Nick mentioned it. I’m hoping to get things moving with Carnival. Thanks in advance!
I got the upgrade to Hyatt Explorist via the recent Bilt offer. Apparently, Hyatt Explorer status achieved this way does not work for matching MGM Gold Status.
When I tried to get the MGM Gold Status match on my Hyatt account, I get this message saying you are not good enough 😉
“We’re sorry! Your World of Hyatt Trial Tier status is not eligible to tier match into MGM Rewards. Once you meet the qualifying criteria for a World of Hyatt tier you can tier match into the appropriate tier in M life Rewards.”
You can match the trial explorist to MGM Gold but you have to do it in person at a casino
You can do it in person before July 16 – just did it today myself
This things going the dodo way shortly now that we the frequentmiler hoarde have descended on the cruise lines lol
Hi Nick, has BetRivers Philly changed their website? They now state that the tier benefit must be earned to receive cruise benefits. And there doesn’t seem to be a chart telling you what matches to what any longer?
It seems “*Tier Status must be earned to receive cruise benefits. Cruise benefits based on rated play.” was added sometime after april 7.
https://web.archive.org/web/20230407120415/https://www.riverscasino.com/philadelphia/casino/premium-cruises
Has one that matched recently received the cruise benefit?
[…] You can also start with the Founders Card to get Caesars Diamond status. I’m not familiar with that route, but Frequent Miler does include it in their post here. […]
If we match to Hard Rock in Vegas for the free $100, can we match again in Hard Rock Atlantic City for the two free nights or are we no longer considered new members? Thanks!
I just did this and got both matches. 1st did Vegas then Atlantic City. I did do it pretty close together though, about a week apart, so that could have something to do with it. Possibly the system hadn’t updated? As for the 2 free nights, I was offered this, but have not been able to book. My guess is there are going to be a lot of blackout or sold out comp nights on this benefit. I also got the $50 in freeplay in Atlantic city.
HR AC confirmed via email there is a problem booking these nights. The phone reps and the web do not see the offer. They are “working on getting this rectified.”
[…] Gold status is also one of the on-ramps to the casino and cruise match Ferris wheel. You can’t use the trial status to match MGM, but if you earn 10-night credits with the Bilt […]
Not true you can match trial explorist but has to be done in person not online. I just did it today in AC
Thank you for this epic write up. Never seen such an analysis on any other blog. Is it possible to go on 2 MSC cruises in the same calendar year from different casinos? The Ocean terms say once per calendar year, but I don’t know if that is enforced by Ocean or MSC (which is likely subsidizing the cruise) among all casino programs.
We have a reader who has booked both the Ocean and Rivers MSC cruise offers. That’s only one data point, but it tells me that it isn’t impossible.
Thank you SO much for this awesome write up Nick, you can the FM team consistently hit it out of the park!
A few questions:
To save time can we setup our online accounts in advance for each hotel/casino BEFORE we start matching, or is is best to let the customer service rep create the accounts (therefore creating the player number) and status match all in person?
When it comes to booking the free nights in AC we know you have to wait 72 hours. However, can you see availability of what nights/days of the week are eligible to be booked from each hotel’s website immediately after matching (in other words, before the 72hrs have passed)?
How do you know when you’ve been matched at Live! Philadelphia? Do they send you an email/text letting you know or do you just have to keep checking your online account?
Thank you again Nick!
Do not set up accounts with the casinos in advance. Some of them only match when you are a new player and frankly I don’t know which is which. I wouldn’t want to risk messing that up. Just build in the time for them to set up your player account and match you.
The free nights in AC have to be booked over the phone, so there is no way to see the free nights. You just have to call. I hear that weekends are really tough (Hard Rock theoretically allows weekends, but Ocean is Sunday-Thursday).
Live! doesn’t send anything. I downloaded the “MyLiveRewards” app as soon as I left the casino. I set up a login using the players card number on the card I was given (you get a red “classic” card to start). The app keeps you perpetually logged in to your account, but about 72 hours later I pulled up the app and it automatically updated my card to Black (I saw it switch from Red to Black when I opened it). If you don’t want the app, you can alternatively set up the login and login on the desktop site — same thing.
Thank you so much Nick for the detailed response, this will come in really handy!
Have a great weekend!
[…] is one EPIC Frequent Miler post: How to get 57 free nights of vacation from a single credit card. Maybe I’ll see you at a mostly free cruise soon? Just like the one Capital One paid for us […]
Again such fun…thank you Nick & FMer! So have Ocean Prime (confusing name for me, as its the name of a good chain seafood restaurants) and tried to book my 2-nt Wynn Vegas. They need several days to confirm status before booking.
The post notes that you have to wait until the 15th of the month following the month in which you match. So if you matched during April, you won’t be able to book that until May 15th.
“How get free cruises by gaming casino status matches…”
How TO get free cruises by gaming casino status matches…
Why is everybody on the internet dropping the “to” in infinitives lately? (Genuine question.)
Just to make ocd people angry. (I’m OCD )
Oh my, what fun this is! Thank you.
Spent most of my weekend schlepping around Atlantic City and Philadelphia racking-up VIP reward cards. Just an FYI. I have been trying to log into my new Hard Rock rock royalty account and been unable to do so. So I phoned and they informed me that they’re currently upgrading to the new unity program and some folks, consequently, cannot log in and asked me to be patient and with no date on when the change is going to occur
Nick/all, is there any way to know if for sure that Carnival accepted the screenshot from Caesars?
So MSC is the cheapest free cruise and can the auto gratutites be declined and is there a way to get free internet?
Yes, you can decline the automatic gratuities (though they aren’t expensive). No free Internet on any cruise line to my knowledge except for Virgin Voyages.
You are getting a free cruise and cannot even pay gratuities? Not cool.
Great and really thorough write up! Does anyone know if it’s possible to book any of these cruises for another person? My mother in law loves cruising and has a lot more time for it than I do. I guess I could sign her up through the steps in this article but she’s not into the points and miles game and it would be a lot easier just let her have my “free cruises”.
No, it’s not possible to give them away. You have to look at the goal here: The cruise lines aren’t trying to give away cruises, they are trying to attract high roller gamblers. Because of your Caesars Diamond / MGM Gold / Ocean Prime / Rivers Platinum or higher status, they assume you are the kind of high roller who will lose more in the casino than the cost of the cruise. If they let you give away the cruise to someone else, that would totally defeat their purpose (getting you to gamble and lose in their casino). The person who has the casino status has to sail.
Makes sense! Thanks so much!
thanks for the details. If I set my everything for mother (after applying CC for her to getting the statuses), can she book cruise fro her and my dad?
I’ve read a report that someone was told at Live casino that the marketing department can take up to two weeks! And another DP said they had submitted the match to love two weeks ago and still no update. This would be bad news for me as I’ll be coming from pretty far. Nick, how long ago did you do that match and do you know of any other casinos that Rivers would match with to get their black level?
Scroll down 8 or 9 comments to see my DP, but short story is matched on Sunday, had Black on Wednesday (72hrs later).
There are other Rivers Casino locations. Des Plaines IL, Portsmouth VA, Pittsburgh PA, and Schenectady NY. I wonder if all the locations match other casinos similarly?
Not similarly. We did have one reader who reported having matched (a couple of months ago I think) at Portsmouth, but they said that the person at the players club didn’t seem to know if they offered a match and took the cards to someone else who seemed to make an on-the-spot decision. The reader said that they showed Caesars Diamond and MGM Gold and got Rivers Black, while their buddy only had MGM Gold and only got Rivers Platinum. By contrast, Rivers Philadelphia has a matrix behind the counter that the employees check to see which card matches to which status.
I think it makes sense that Rivers Philadelphia matches since they have to directly compete with the other Philadelphia casinos *and* Atlantic City. That’s not going to be the case in some other markets.
Caesars has the Grand Victoria Casino in Elgin and Harrah’s in Joliet, Penn Gaming has the Hollywood Casino in Aurora and also a Hollywood Casino in Joliet. Boyd has the Bluechip Casino just over the border in Indiana. There are 3 casinos in the Quad cities area, that are about 100 miles from the casinos I named before. I live across the street from a Boyd casino (it’s a river boat) in Peoria, IL. I have only visited a few of these casinos because I go to Vegas at least once a year. I have not tried to do all the kinds of matching that you outline in this post, but I know people who have had their status matched at IL casinos. I personally feel that you should keep your gambling in one organization so that you actually earn real status organically.
I would venture to say that most casinos match the status you have with another casino, within reason. From the Caesars or MGM status you can match just about all the casinos in Vegas. Wynn is not matching right now, but that will probably change. I don’t pay to stay in Vegas, not even resort fees. I don’t gamble a huge amount but just enough so they want me to come back. Which is the big deal with these cruise offers. If an individual wants to keep getting cruise offers they need to gamble. Probably a minimum of $200 per cruise day. Otherwise all this matching is a one-shot pony.
I finally got my free balcony offer after updating my profile, thanks for the info! When i click on the available sailings all the balconies are showing sold out for every cruise on every date. Anyone else having this problem?
Probably. Like I said, availability ebbs and flows. You’ve got to keep checking it every week (or maybe every few days even).
I matched and it shows the Blue category is that what it should show? Thanks and great post.
Color doesn’t mean anything (well, it does: Blue means you’ve never sailed with Carnival, Red means you’ve sailed at least once before, Gold means you’ve sailed a bunch of times). That status has nothing to do with the free cruise offer. I know they call it a “match”, but it is more like an “offer match” than a “status match”. Nothing actually changes with your Carnival status, they just offer a free cruise.
Another DP for getting a balcony offer after updating a profile. I have the same issue as Molly with all balcony options sold out, but also the only cruises available to me are during the school year. Those in the summer are not available. With older kids we have less flexibility with that. Is that to be expected or does this ebb and flow as well?
Great post. A small data point to add: I submitted for the Holland cruise offer after I’d booked Carnival balcony but before I’d sailed… got the 12-day HA inside cabin offer, then sailed Carnival (only gambled the $100 in free play, earning $130 back), then was still able to book the Holland offer. So as long as you get the offer before you sail Carnival you should be good to book it even after Carnival.
Also the site URcomped was matching Carnival offers for a while. Used that to sail the new Celebrity Beyond last month, which was head and shoulders above any cruise ship I’ve ever been on in terms of design. URcomped also partners with Virgin Voyages so it’s well worth trying unless they’ve stopped matching.