The internet is a great place to find information about cruises, but it's also home to some nasty scams.
A lot of people flock to places like Facebook to find more information and learn about their cruise. In fact, this is a good strategy because there are great resources there, and all over the internet.
However, some offers are indeed too good to be true.
Thankfully, if you know what to look for, scammers are easily spotted. But the prospect of a great deal is tempting for many people, and it leads to disappointment if they were to try to book them.
Bar crawl or group offers
One common scam on Facebook is for someone to try to sell you bar crawl, t-shirts, travel mugs, or lanyards for their sailing.
Many times groups will want to set up fun events for themselves on their cruise, such as a group bar tasting, slot pulls, or other events where everyone in the Facebook group gets to hang out and try it out.
These can be fun ways to make new friends, as well as see what the ship has to offer.
Jenn Yazzetti, an admin in the Symphony of the Seas Facebook group, warned people trying to sell you on these items, "more often than not, they are scammers."
How to avoid getting scammed: You definitely don't have to pay to participate in an event, or gain access to a bar onboard.
And if you get hungry, stop by one of the complimentary food stops along the way.
Someone looking for a cabin mate
Another "seems innocent until it's not" scam is related to people asking for someone cruising solo and wanting to share a cabin with them to save money.
Royal Caribbean charges a hefty fee if you book a regular cabin by yourself, which is known as the single supplement fee.
Essentially, cruise ship cabins are priced based on double occupancy, and if you book a room by yourself, you end up paying for the missing second person.
So sharing a cabin with someone else and splitting the cost would definitely save money.
Unfortunately, some people take advantage of this need by trying to get money out of it.
Julie Nedelko shared this warning, "Be suspicious of any post that talks about being a solo traveler looking for a companion to save on cruise fare."
"Sometimes it starts out with just a complaint about paying extra to be solo, or too bad my friend can’t go. This could be a phishing scam looking for victims."
She admits there could be legitimate postings, but you need to look into it far more before opening yourself up to something like this.
- Is the profile new?
- Does this person have less than ten friends?
- Is there just one or two friends and where are they from?
- Has the person joined many groups and used the same cut and paste message?
- Does the person want to message you off platform?
- Do they start giving personal compliments?
How to avoid getting scammed: I think she's spot on about keeping a healthy amount of suspicion with anyone that wants to share a room.
This is a stranger on the internet, and even if it is a real person, you still have to effectively live with this person for the duration of the sailing.
If you are going to go down this route of trying to save money, I'd set up a call and really get to know them before paying for anything. My advice is pay the single supplement fee, as it's far less risky.
Selling cruising ducks
The hottest trend in cruising right now is hiding ducks on a cruise for others to find.
No matter which cruise I go on, there's a few different people who are hiding them and interest grows as the sailing continues.
As people learn about this idea, it leads to them wanting to try it out too and this is where the scammer comes in.
A person on Facebook recently posted, "some groups are having trouble with scams from fake accounts trying to sell unwanted rubber cruise ducks due to a change in plans."
Another person responded, "This scam with same photos showed up in a page for cruise dates that I moderate. Several people got scammed!"
How to avoid getting scammed: If you want to hide ducks on your upcoming cruise, but them yourself from an online retailer.
You can find batches of them cheaply, like 30 ducks for $19.99 on Amazon (this link contains an affiliate link, which costs you nothing but I make a small commission).
T-shirt sales
Similar to the first scam, this is where someone tries to sell shirts for your specific cruise.
Naturally there's a lot of excitement about a cruise and if you're like me, those last few weeks are very exciting as you try to get everything you need.
In Facebook groups you'll see someone with a link to a website selling t-shirts for your ship, sail date, or both.
Wayne Green wrote, "Warning to everyone. These t-shirt sales are scams to get your card details and address. They have warnings on other groups as many have been scammed."
How to avoid getting scammed: Just like the cruising ducks, if you want a custom t-shirt or any shirt related to your cruise, order it yourself through a reputable seller. Vistaprint, Etsy, or Spreadshirt are all good options.
How to report a Facebook Group scam
If someone messages you directly on Facebook Messenger and it looks like a scam, stop communicating with them immediately and report the incident to Facebook.
If you're in a Facebook group and think a post is a scam, the first thing you can do is report the post to the group admin. It will get deleted the quickest in this manner.
- Click the three-dot menu to the right of the post
- Click Report Post To Group Admins
- You can also click Report Post
- This sends the post to Facebook for review
In my experience, reporting to group admins works best because Facebook's review seems to use artificial intelligence and it takes forever to get a resolution.
Group admins should delete it a heck of a lot quicker so no one else is potentially scammed.
