Royal Caribbean International and Celebrity Cruises launched a promotion giving travel advisors an instant booking bonus of up to $200 on all new fully deposited bookings throughout September.
Parent company Royal Caribbean Group said the Instant Booking Bonus is the next phase of the RCL Cares program, which launched in March 2020 to assist travel advisors during the global cruise shutdown.
"We heard loud and clear from our travel partners that the most important thing for them during this difficult time was seeing revenue immediately," said Vicki Freed, senior vice president of sales, trade support and service for Royal Caribbean International. "We listened and designed this bonus to make sure that travel professionals are seeing an incremental payout at the time of booking,"
In addition, any booking created through an online sales platform, such as Espresso or any third-party tool, will receive an additional $10 bonus. These bonuses are in addition to earned base commissions.
RCL Cares most recently launched the Pay It Forward program that provides three-year, interest-free loans to help travel agencies return to growth. The first RCL Cares program provided education to help travel partners navigate the government benefits such as the Cares Act.
"This expansion of our RCL Cares program is our way of ensuring we are all taking care of each other as we collectively build back our businesses," said Dondra Ritzenthaler, senior vice president of sales at Celebrity Cruises.
The timing of the bonus purposefully falls during Travel Advisor Appreciation Month.