Part of my talk at TravelCon was a theory that I might be able to obtain cruise benefits from mLife based on an unwritten rule system. Upon my return, I thought I might have been wrong about this, as the first call to Royal Caribbean resulted in them sticking to the rule book, but things changed yesterday, and it seems I may have been onto something.
Here’s the partnership rules, which outline the mLife and Celebrity (Royal and Celebrity are the same parent company) relationship
Note the terms.. you must earn mLife Platinum or Noir status (not match into it via Hyatt) in point 1, and you get a certain type of cruise in point 3.
During the day in Vegas I earned mlife Gold status, which as you can see does not make you eligible for a free cruise.. but here’s the email, offering a cruise option that is outside of the terms above.
The real thrust of my presentation in Vegas was to create gigs that pay in perpetuity, and while getting a few things for free (dining, drinks, haircuts and such) at the time is good, it really only pays off when you start getting emails like the above, and suddenly your vacation options look a lot better.
How free is free?
I enjoy ‘free’ cruises and have just returned from a week on the brand new Norwegian Escape, and we are headed on a 10 day cruise of Europe from Barcelona in April. NCL prices free differently from Royal Caribbean, who interestingly price differently from Celebrity. Here’s some data points on that, though we should note I am at first offer with Royal/Celebrity, which tends to change based on shipboard reporting.
NCL Pricing
NCL tends to price as follows for a comp cruise:
$25 per person per day, plus port fees/taxes. You might get this offer for an Inside Stateroom, or for a top suite (I believe the best I have been offered for this rate is Balcony) you can then upgrade that to higher levels. Anything above Mini Suite on NCL (basically just a bigger balcony cabin) leaps up, but to go from Balcony to Mini Suite can run at about $240 pp as you can see from the below.
Note that the 3rd person pricing (Dylan) is free here, but to get that with NCL you need to hunt for cruises that are 3rd person free, else he would be at full fare, rather than $25 per diem. Also, I have no idea why the base rate isn’t $250 pp for this cruise, but am not complaining!
Also, I picked up 4x ‘Cruise Next’ coupons on the Escape, they cost $250 each, but you get $500 against your bill on the cruise (even if you only buy the coupons..) and applied one on my return.
Upgrades
If you were offered a base cabin lower than balcony, you could upgrade to each level (Inside>Oceanview>Balcony>Mini Suite) for a fee, but going from Inside to Mini Suite would cost more than the $240 pp shown above. I believe I was offered an Inside to Mini Suite for $600 pp in the past.
Celebrity Pricing
I picked a random date in February for Celebrity. They quoted me $400 for 2 people all in, and $800 for 3 (that kid fare..) I’ve not yet tested to see if I can find a 3rd guest free fare like with NCL, but it is a possibility. My mLife Gold cruise offer is any Caribbean cruise on Celebrity or Royal Caribbean in an inside cabin. For Celebrity, to upgrade that the policy is 30% off the published rate.. which came to a price of about $3000 for a 7 day on the Celebrity Reflection.
Royal Caribbean Pricing
For Royal, I started off with the Oasis of the Seas (mega ship of about 225000 tons) the base fare there was $1220 for 3. I was surprised to see it higher than Celebrity for an inside cabin, though the rep mentioned the fare was absolutely all inclusive, in that it had the service charges along with port fees and charges and other costs prepaid. Upgrading on the Oasis to a balcony came in at around $1500 for an inside view (it’s a weird ship) and about $1900 for an ocean view. Pricing was more aligned with the NCL system, and the rep informed me that you can get a variance of $100-1000 based on how sold out the balcony cabins are on your week.
The Wrap
Overall, I’m super happy that my hairbrained theory in Vegas came true, and tempted to hop on a Celebrity cruise for $800 and haggle for an upgrade onboard. Oh.. and for those who care, I had my second haircut this year onboard the Escape for free 🙂
I matched to mLife Platinum from Hyatt Diamond. I wonder how much gambling and at what minimum table game bet it would take to move up to Noir and qualify for a cruise?
You can figure that out via the earning charts, but I never really aim for status, hence getting this at gold level.
Noir is invite only. So I’m not sure.
None of that matters
Those are great news, Matt. Thanks for the update. Now, we are planning our own social engineering as well.
I might try getting a haircut too, but those are luckily free for me already.
Matt – Could you elaborate or point me to an article about the “theory” you reference at the top of this post? I’ve gotten the Platinum mLife status match via Hyatt Diamond. Not sure about the next steps.
Also, could you tell me a bit more about the NCL “free” cruise and you how you got it? I’m trying to send my parents on a very similar cruise on NCL. Any advice would be awesome. Thanks man!
It’s nothing to do with status, it’s not a match, it is appearing to be a highly attractive player and getting paid off for that. You do need to play.
You can earn mLife points by spending on hotels, spas, restaurant and charging them to the room, not just gambling. My quick two night trip to the Mandalay Bay and earned 18000+ mLife points (as well as Hyatt points) The room rate was only $175 for one night (and free the second night on hyatt points) but added spa visit, restaurants and earned quite a bit of points. 3 to 4 nights stay probably would have earned me over 50k points.
If you go to MGM properties a lot, you could possibly get to Platinum by earning mLife points other than gambling.
To repeat: it has nothing to do with earning Platinum. Earning Platinum (or Noir) is not the goal.
If you want the published Platinum benefits, then absolutely, earn them however you like, but I’m trying to earn unpublished benefits, such as getting a cruise when I shouldn’t.
Gotcha. No problem with that. Was the NCL cruise related to mLife? I didn’t find that in their list of benefits.
Nope NCL was through NCL- but I found a trio connection between total rewards, spg and NCL.
If you are mLife Plat due to Hyatt Dia match, I realize you do not get the free cruise.
But … do you get the other cruise line benefits (such as Priority Check-in, Welcome Amenity, etc)?
I think I just found the answer on the Royal Caribbean website – “Crown & Anchor Society members that earned M life tier through our partnership tier match are not eligible to receive onboard partnership benefit”
Yep, I’m wondering whether I should actually match to Platinum, it might be interesting to play with that as I’m earned to gold.. I think there might be opportunity beyond the terms.
Matt – clearly you’re being deliberately (and perhaps appropriately) cryptic but this post is just a tease (and a frustrating one) to those of us who didn’t see your presentation and whose direct questions you aren’t answering.
Can you tell us what this theory you’ve put into practice is or not?
I’m not trying to be deliberately cryptic, it’s just too much of a pain in the arse to explain in writing- it requires rethinking everything you know about status. I hate the idea of wasting people’s time trying to puzzle it out, so will try to find a way to explain it better in a post soon.
So, the way I’m reading the points earning chart, you played $750,000 worth of video poker, or ran $225,000 through slots or potentially less through table games.
I think you should let your readers know which method you used. I get the average 90-99% return of money, and I get you used to work in a casino.
Agree with the cryptic comment. Just say what you actually did and let people decide if it is for them or not.
I’ve explained more in a more recent post to try to address this. I believe the coin in was about $55k from slots.
Thanks. I’ll need to find the other article. Interesting stuff.