Jill Fehrenbacher

Event Date: July 21, 2006
Cruise Bruise:  Theft
Theft Value: $5,000
Cruise Bruise Location: Amsteram
Home Town: New York
Cruise Line: Celebrity Cruise Lines
Cruise Ship: Century
Details:

After I checked my luggage with the Celebrity staff in the port of Amsteram, on what was suppose to be a fabulous 12 day cruise, I never saw it again. 

My boyfriend's luggage arrived on the ship mussed up, with other people's belongings in it, so this indicated to us that someone employed by Celebrity was rifling through our baggage - either in the port or on the ship.

I reported the missing luggage to the crew. They gave me a guidebook and comped my internet access so I could email the Dutch police.  They also claimed that they did a lot of searching for the luggage - but I don't have any evidence of that - just their word.

I didn't lose all of my clothing (I had another bag that they didn't lose), but I still had to buy some items like T-shirts, which I did at H&M in Stockholm - as cheap as I could find - but still fairly expensive.

I basically couldn't enjoy the cruise at all, because I lost my itinerary and my guidebooks and all of the contacts I had written down and meant to meet up with. 

Also, as my laptop with all of my business files was in the lost luggage I spent the whole 12 days stressing about how I was going to recover my business and afford/find the time to purchase new hardware and redo all of my work.

I did contact the cruise line when I got home and the Risk Management department's response was that "they were going to keep searching for the bag."  Gee thanks.  I also contacted customer service to complain about the experience and the person I spoke with their  told me that it wasn't the cruise lines fault - it was the contracted porters working in the port's fault.  He didn't seem concerned about my bad experience, just trying to make the point that the cruise ship wasn't liable for the incident.  This I wholly contest, since I believe that Celebrity is responsible for the port experience and the porters they employ - whether they are contract workers or not.

Instead of trying to recover the item, do an investigation, and try to get to the bottom of this, Celebrity customer service people have spent all their time trying to ignore the issue, passify me and get me to go away. 

To this day they still haven't found my bag or compensated me for the $5000+ of loss I have incurred as a result of this cruise.

Jill Fehrenbacher
Cruise Ship Passenger Theft
Celebrity Cruise Lines - July 21, 2006