We’ve written extensively about getting free cruise offers from casino status matching (which can start with hotel elite status — see How to get 57 free vacation nights with a single credit card for details). One of the matches we’ve been reporting for almost a year and a half is the Carnival Fun Match. Many readers have gotten offers for free balcony staterooms on Carnival, but for some reason others haven’t gotten any offers at all. There may be some good news: a member of our Facebook group shared a tip the other day that has led to a free balcony offer for the handful of people who have tried it.
The Carnival Fun Match is an offer whereby you can submit your land-based casino status or offers and Carnival has been known to offer many people a free cruise (you pay port taxes and a $100 deposit per person and get that back as an onboard credit (up to $200 per room). You can read more details about this offer in the post How to cruise for free (or close to it) with Royal Caribbean and Carnival.
But some readers have reported signing up for the match and receiving only low-interest offers for discounted cruises or in some cases no offers at all.
Earlier this week, a member of our Frequent Miler Insiders Facebook group posted a potential solution. They said that they logged in to their Carnival account and made sure everything was filled out. They specifically called out the “Title” field (Mr. / Mrs. / Ms.) and “Country” Field (where you see United States below).
They reported filling out those details and then, within a few days, receiving an offer for a free balcony stateroom. After that was posted in our Facebook group, several members there reported success with it and I have since heard from a few more people who reported receiving a free balcony room offer shortly after filing in those areas and/or other empty fields in their online profile with Carnival.
I obviously don’t know for sure that there is a correlation here and can’t guarantee that everyone who does this will receive an offer, but if you previously submitted for the Carnival Fun Match and you’ve been disappointed not to receive any free cruise offers, this is at least worth a shot.
I should emphasize that available inventory for these free cruise offers can really ebb and flow from month to month and even sometimes from day to day. When I received my first free balcony room offer, it had an expiration date within the same calendar month. I didn’t book by the expiration date and then the next month I received a new free balcony room offer. I don’t know that you’ll be so lucky, but that continued in our case for about a year from the initial free balcony offer. Over the course of the year, I saw cruises become available and not available — so don’t be discouraged if the cruise you want isn’t available today. It probably makes sense to figure out the payment deadlines for people sailing on the cruise you want and aiming to check around those dates since some people will have cancelled right before final payments are due.
Hopefully this helps someone get a free cruise offer. Let us know if it works for you — or if at least a week passes and you don’t start getting free cruise offers, I’d love to know also — just leave a comment.
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If you accept the $500 offer from Carnival, will it also offer you the free balcony too? Or can you only take one or the other?
I had already given up hope that I’d receive the free room offer – but today, after two months (one month after updating profile to complete all missing fields) – I finally got my first offer. Thank you!
[…] e-mail from Carnival with any kind of an offer after submitting my request for a free cruise. But Nick’s recent post on FrequentMiler here on BoardingArea prompted me to take another look if I had perhaps missed […]
sorry for the incoming dumb question. So, after submission, we get to see these offers via email or in the Carnival website My Offers tab?
I signed up for the Carnival Fun Match program a few months ago, uploaded my Caesar’s Diamond card, and just received a “Free Balcony Room” email the other day. However, when I visit the link, the only bookings available seem to be interior rooms, and the occasion ocean view room.
This is still a great deal, obviously, but I’m wondering if I should hold out and see if another offer comes through that has balcony bookings available? This offer expires tomorrow, and I’m wondering if I should just pull the trigger on an interior room, or roll the dice to see if something better pops up later.
Any insight?
Thank you but it did not work for me. My fear is that when I submitted a copy of my Caesars gold “card”, I used the screenshot from my phone which only included my name and account number because I forgot to screenshot the full account version which includes the date as well. I tried to resubmit but since it is an “optional one-time submission only” it won’t let me. I called and spoke to an agent at Carnival who referred me to the Ocean Players club to submit a request. That was over 5 weeks ago and nobody has responded to my emails. My current thought is to try to delete my Carnival account to try to start fresh and see if that works. Thoughts?.. Thank you!
Gold isn’t a top tier
Good point. I meant Caesars Diamond Card.
Did you have any luck hearing back from them? I had a similar issue where it kept giving me an error message even though I’ve never submitted again. When I tried to contact them, they told me to email Ocean Players club and I never heard back either. Really wish they had a direct line that manages the program.
They emailed me back but did not address my question. They simply said some people get targetted with offers while some do not. I think I will just delete my Oceans account and try to start over.
Thanks for the info. Do you know how we can delete our account to start over?
This worked for us! Had general save money offers, updated the info and got a free balcony offer next day. Thank you!
All the information was already on my profile, so I just changed my phone number and saved, two days later the offers started coming in. I got the free balcony room offer, but when I went to try and book a cruise, they all say sold out for as far as I could check.
Not getting any free offers and just came across this tip.
Went to my profile but I had nothing to update since everything was already filled out from my cruise in 2018.
Could it be that I’m not getting offers because they see that I did not gamble in 2018?
Eventually got the free offer two months later (four months total)
did you have to re-submit the match?
[…] morning everyone, I hope your week is going well. A few weeks ago, I followed Nick’s advice from Frequent Miler and got a “free” cruise from Carnival Cruise Lin…. Nick also got me a “free” Holland America Cruise, so if I ever see Nick on the High […]
I already had all the fields completed and received free inside and ocean view room offers all the time. I just learned about the fun match but don’t have a wyndhm card/Ceasars card etc but I do have a platinum card from a local casino and figured what the heck submitted a copy of front and back. Less than 24 hours and I received a cheesy fun match offer for $500 off blah blah blah. Will be interesting to see if any better offers come through over the next week or two.
My experience so far is that I filled the fun match out with Caesar’s Diamond October 2023, and I starting receiving free inside stateroom offers November 2023. I received my last inside stateroom offer December 6 2023. I never got the balcony offer. Since then, I have been consistently receiving a $5000 casino cash bonus offer. I just saw this post and updated my info, keeping my fingers crossed it will trigger more free cruise offers. I will update if it does! Thank you for this post.
Update: I got the free balcony offer 5 days after updated my personal info. Thank you so much!
I completed the match yesterday and this morning I have a Free Balcony Room! email in my inbox. However, when I click View All Sailings in the email offer, the Carnival website shows the “Up to a Free Balcony Room…” offer, and underneath it says “OH SNAP! We are unable to locate an exact match.”
Does this mean I qualify for a free balcony room, but no cruises are left??
What’s the fee for a name change on these free Carnival cruises?
I have a quick question. I matched MGM Gold to Carnival, how do I see whether the match is successful? Is VIFP club mean the match is successful? Thanks!