Carnival Cruises has finally issued a statement after a woman took to social media to vent about her $15,000 vacation being canceled just two days before she and her family were supposed to board the ship.
The drama kicked off when Tiffany Banks took to TikTok to slam the company and their online security measure after her entire family's vacation was canceled thanks to a social media blunder.
The family - from Kentucky - were all excited to be going on their trip and had forked out a whopping $12,000 for the most expensive room on board - the Excel Presidential Suite.
They spent a further $2,000-$3,000 on excursions.
But less than 48 hours before the ship was supposed to set sail from Florida, Tiffany was shocked to find an email from Carnival confirming her cancelation of their place on board.
In a video posted to TikTok, Tiffany recalled the events.
“We have nearly $15,000 tied up in for this vacation including excursions. The room itself was I think $12,000 or $13,000, and then we’ve got a few grand tied up in excursions, and actually with almost $2,000 for flights,” she said in a video posted to the platform on May 12.
After panicking, she rang up the company to try and get to the bottom of the issue, but was told that another customer had already reserved the room she lost.
Instead, they offered the family two interior rooms, which were the cheapest on the ship, but Tiffany was not satisfied with the replacement.
The company launched an investigation into the matter to try and get some clarity and it was soon discovered that there had been a security breach which led to the removal of Tiffany's family's vacation.
It was alleged that someone with an IP address leading back to British Columbia had created an account using Tiffany's unique booking reference -- after it was shared on social media.
It turns out that a screenshot of a countdown email - containing the family's booking reference - was posted to Facebook, which led to some unknown individual using the unique booking number to create a new Carnival profile and cancel the booking.
Big yikes.
In an update, the family stated that they tried to get on the ship on the day but were refused access, so they booked an Airbnb in Florida instead, though they would have rather been on the cruise.
"Do not share that booking number," Tiffany told her followers on TikTok. "But it shouldn't be such an easy way to go in there and edit somebody's cruise or information. Like, that's not okay. [Carnival] gotta' do better."
Days after Tiffay's story went viral, a spokesperson from the company has now issued a statement via the Daily Express US.
While they stated that they "refuse to comment on any specific guest complaint or incident," they did add: "It is never a good idea to post personal information about your travel plans, including a confirmation number for a booking, which could allow a bad actor or [idenity thief] to use that information in inappropriate or even illegal ways."
The best offer the family received was a $10,404 credit towards their next cruise.
However, after Tiffany and her family were turned away from the cruise when they tried to get on regardless of the blunder, they vowed to never book with Carnival again.
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