CruiseDirect understands that making purchases online involves a great deal of trust on your part; we take this trust very seriously, and make it our highest priority to ensure the security and confidentiality of the personal information you provide us.
What Personal Information Does CruiseDirect Collect?
In General
At CruiseDirect, it is necessary for us to obtain transaction information from you in order to complete your purchase. This includes your name, email address, telephone number, home address and billing information (such as credit card number, card holder name and expiration date). CruiseDirect may collect your email address if entered on the website forms. We also request information about your travel preferences. You can choose not to provide information to us, but in general some information about you is requested in order for you to book travel, complete a traveler profile, participate in a survey, contest or sweepstakes, contact our Customer Support, or initiate other transactions on our site.
Travel Companion Information
When you make a reservation for someone else on CruiseDirect, we will request the personal information, and travel preferences about that individual. You must obtain consent of other individuals prior to providing us with their personal information and travel preferences
Information from Other Sources
We also may periodically obtain both personal and non-personal information about you from affiliated entities, business partners and other independent third-party sources and add it to our account information. Examples of information we may receive include: updated delivery and address information, purchase history, and demographic information. In addition, if you use your social media account, link CruiseDirect’s Social Media Account, or use certain other social media features, we may access information about you via that social media provider in accordance with the provider's policies. The information may include your name, email address, profile picture, gender, list of friends, and other information that you authorize us to receive. Depending on the privacy settings of you and your friends, we may access information that you provide to a social media provider regarding your respective locations ("Location Data") to provide you with relevant content. Please note that your Location Data may also be shared with your friends on a social media provider in accordance with your privacy settings for that social media provider.
Automatic Information
Like many companies, CruiseDirect automatically tracks certain information about your computer and based on your behavior on our website. CruiseDirect might use the information collected to do research on our customers’ website behavior as well as demographics. The information we collect might include the URL where you came from, the pages you visit on our website and your IP address. IP addresses are automatically logged by web servers, collecting information about a user's traffic patterns. An IP address does not identify an individual by name; however it can reveal what geographic area you are connecting from. We also may collect information about your online activity, such as trips viewed and bookings made. Our goals in collecting this automatic information include helping customize your user experience and inhibiting fraud.
Surveys, Contests, and Sweepstakes Information
Occasionally, CruiseDirect may offer our members and site visitors an opportunity to participate in a survey, contest, or sweepstakes. Information collected by CruiseDirect when you participate in a survey, contest, call back request or sweepstakes may include your full name, e-mail address, and street address.
How we use your information
CruiseDirect will use traveler information (such as traveler names, ages, birth dates, gender, etc) as well as billing information (such as credit card holder name, credit card number and expiration dates) for the purposed or completing your transactions on our website. CruiseDirect uses other information about you for the following general purposes:
- To provide you with the products and services you request
- To provide you with your travel confirmation and updates
- To provide you with price alerts related to products you have signed up for
- To send you email and SMS notifications about travel products you have viewed.
- To manage your account, including processing payment and providing travel notifications
- To communicate with you in general
- To respond to your questions and comments
- To measure interest in and improve our products, services & websites
- To reward you as part of any reward, referral or recognition program you choose to join
- To solicit information from you through surveys and reviews
- To resolve any disputes, collect fees or troubleshoot any problems
- To prevent any potentially prohibited or illegal activities
- To enforce our Terms of Use
- To make use of cross-device tracking in order to optimize our advertising activities. As part of cross-device tracking, CruiseDirect may combine information collected from a particular browser or mobile device with another computer or device linked to the computer or device from which the information was collected. By changing your cookie settings on your device, you can change your cross-device tracking settings for advertising purposes.
- Any other purpose that was described to you at the point of collection
Communication via Email and SMS
At CruiseDirect, our goal is to make it easy for you to explore and take advantage of the travel opportunities available on our website. To help you stay informed about your travel interests, we may communicate with you via email and SMS (text messages), providing relevant information and updates.
For example, if you search for a Bahamas Cruise on our website but have not yet completed your reservation, we may send you an email or SMS with details about the cruise or travel package you viewed. Additionally, if there is a special promotion related to the cruise or travel package you are interested in, you might receive an email or SMS with information about these offers.
Similarly, if you click on a link in an email from us about a specific destination, travel vendor, promotion, or travel package, you may receive additional communications via email or SMS about similar offers or further details related to that particular destination or travel service.
We believe these messages will provide you with useful information about special offers and travel opportunities available through our site. However, you will always have the option to opt out of receiving these communications. Each email or SMS will include instructions on how to unsubscribe from future messages.
To stop receiving marketing communications via email or SMS, you can follow the unsubscribe instructions provided in each message or contact us directly by emailing privacy@cruisedirect.com.
Essential Communication Policy
At CruiseDirect, we prioritize keeping you informed about your travel arrangements. To ensure you receive crucial updates and information related to your bookings, we use multiple communication channels including email, SMS (text messages), and ringless voicemail.
Why We Communicate:
- Booking Confirmations and Updates: Once you’ve booked your travel, we send confirmation details and important updates via email, SMS, and ringless voicemail to ensure you have all the necessary information for your trip.
- Travel Alerts and Changes: If there are any changes or urgent updates to your travel plans, such as itinerary adjustments or unexpected delays, we will promptly notify you through these channels to keep you informed.
- Pre-Departure Information: As your travel date approaches, we provide essential pre-departure information, including check-in details, packing tips, and any necessary travel documents, via email, SMS, and ringless voicemail to help you prepare for your journey.
- Payment and Insurance Reminders: We send reminders for important financial deadlines related to your trip, such as deposit due dates, final payment schedules, and insurance options, through email, SMS, and ringless voicemail. These reminders help ensure that your trip remains secure and well-planned.
- Post-Travel Communication: After your trip, we may reach out for feedback or to inform you about related travel opportunities that might interest you.
Your Control:
We understand the importance of your privacy and provide options to manage your communication preferences. While some communications are necessary for the smooth facilitation of your travel plans, you can customize your preferences for non-essential updates at any time.
To stop receiving non-essential communications via email or SMS, you can follow the unsubscribe instructions provided in each message or contact us directly by emailing privacy@cruisedirect.com.
Your privacy and the security of your information are of utmost importance to us, and we are committed to providing transparent and essential communication regarding your travel experiences.
Who we share your information with
Suppliers & Vendors
When you book travel with CruiseDirect, the personal information you provide us will be shared with the appropriate third parties necessary to complete your purchases. This includes the vendors you have selected (e.g., cruiselines, airlines, shore excursion vendors etc.) as well as the third parties facilitating transactions (e.g., credit card authorization companies). The personal information we provide these third parties will only be that which is necessary to ensure your travel arrangements are successfully confirmed and executed. If you contact our consumer support, they may need to share information about your request with the appropriate vendor in order to assist you.
Third Party Vendors
CruiseDirect may provide personal information and cruise booking information with third party vendors who provide services and functions on our behalf, including, but not limited to, credit card processing, marketing research, content entry, referral programs, business analytics, customer service, marketing, survey or sweepstakes programs, fraud protection, website usability. We many at times authorize third-party vendors to collect personal information on our behalf. The personal information collected would only be used to perform their functions and the third party vendors are not permitted to share or use this information for any other purpose.
Referring Websites
If you were referred to CruiseDirect from another site (for example through a link that you clicked on another site that directed you to CruiseDirect.om), we may share some of the information about you with that referring site.
Companies within our Corporate Family
CruiseDirect may share your personal information with our parent company, International Voyager, as well as any companies within our corporate family. This sharing enables us to provide you with information about products and services both cruise-related or other, which may interest you. The corporate family companies that you have access to your information will follow practices that are at least as restrictive as the practices described in this Privacy Policy. They also will comply with applicable laws governing the transmission of promotional communications and, at a minimum, give you an opportunity in any commercial email they send to choose not to receive such email messages in the future.
Other Reasons CruiseDirect May Share Your Personal Information
CruiseDirect will sometimes share aggregated data with our service providers. This data does not contain any personal information and is used to develop featured programs and content that will be of interest to our members and site visitors.
If you provide us a review of your trip, you authorize CruiseDirect to publish it on all our Platforms under the user name you provided. You also authorize Cruisedirect to aggregate it with other reviews.
In the event that CruiseDirect or certain of its assets are acquired, customer information may be of the transferred assets.
How you can access your information
In the event you would like to remove any personal information stored, you can contact CruiseDirect at privacy@cruisedirect.com at any time to remove your personal information. Please also note, CruiseDirect may retain certain information for analytical purposes as well as for record keeping.
Your Choices
You can choose not to provide CruiseDirect with any information, although it may be needed to book travel access portions of our website, or take advantages of certain features offered on the website.
You can request that CruiseDirect adds, updates or removes your personal information from your account as described above.
You will be given the opportunity to unsubscribe from any marketing emails by unsubscribing by using any opt-out URL or you can unsubscribe from such communication at any time by sending a request to privacy@cruisedirect.com. Please note, CruiseDirect reserves the right to send you other communications including, but not limited to, emails regarding your travel reservation, administrative messages, surveys related to your transactions on the site, without offering you the opportunity to opt out of receiving these messages.
Cookies & Other Technologies
"Cookies" are small pieces of information that are stored by your browser on your computer's hard drive. You can always choose not to receive a cookie file by enabling your Web browser to refuse cookies or prompt you before accepting a cookie. By refusing to accept a cookie, however, you will not be able to access many travel services and planning tools offered by CruiseDirect.
Cookies help CruiseDirect recognize you as a repeat visitor and remember any preferences you have set or searches you have performed on while you were visiting our website. For example, while in the booking process, if you enter the ages of the guests traveling, we may store these ages to auto complete them in another travel package you are viewing. We may also use cookies to keep a record of searches you have done on the website, to for easy access to your search history.
Cookies help CruiseDirect to customize the content and advertisements provided to you on our website and on other sites across the internet. For example, when you view a cruise on our website, a cookie is automatically set by us, our service providers, third party vendors, or our partners to recognize your browser as you navigate on the Internet and to present you with information and advertising based on your apparent interests.
Cookies help CruiseDirect measure and research the effectiveness of our website features, offering, advertisements, and email communication (by determining which emails you open and act upon).
CruiseDirect may also use Web beacons (also known as clear gifs, pixel tags or Web bugs), which are tiny graphics with a unique identifier, similar in function to cookies, that are placed in the code of a Web page. We use Web beacons to monitor the traffic patterns of users from one page within our sites to another, to deliver or communicate with cookies, to understand whether you have come to our site from an online advertisement displayed on a third-party website, and to improve site performance. We also may allow our service providers to use Web beacons to help us understand which emails have been opened by recipients and to track the visitor traffic and actions on our site. This helps us measure the effectiveness of our content and other offerings.
If you have any questions about our use of cookies or other technologies, please email us at privacy@cruisedirect.com.
How we protect your information
CruiseDirect understands that making purchases online involves a great deal of trust on your part; we take this trust very seriously, and make it our highest priority to ensure the security and confidentiality of the personal information you provide us. While no website can guarantee security, we have implemented appropriate administrative, technical, and physical security procedures to help protect the personal information you provide to us. For example, only authorized employees are permitted to access personal information, and they may only do so for permitted business functions.
In addition, CruiseDirect uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology to encrypt all your personal information, including credit card information. The process of encryption takes the information you enter and converts it into bits of code that are securely transmitted over the Internet. This scrambled data cannot be read as the information travels over the Internet. Once our secure server receives your encrypted personal information, it is translated back into its original form and stored in our off-line database. Your credit card information is not transmitted over the Internet again.
Your role in protecting your information
To protect your privacy and CruiseDirect’s proprietary databases and systems, you should not share any of your information, such as reservation number or account information, with any unauthorized individuals or third-party information aggregators that would allow them access to your sensitive account information.
Children's privacy
CruiseDirect is a general audience website and does not offer services directed to children. We do not knowingly collect personal information from minors. If you are under 13 please do not attempt to send us any personal information.
External Links
If any part of this website links to other sites, those sites do not operate under this Privacy Policy. We recommend you examine the privacy policies posted on those external websites to understand their procedures for collecting, using and disclosing personal information.
Visiting CruiseDirect.com from outside the United States
If you are visiting our website from outside the United States, please be aware that your information may be transferred to, stored, and processed in the United States, where our servers are located. CruiseDirect may also transfer that information to its affiliates and subsidiaries or to other third parties, across borders, and from your country or jurisdiction to other countries or jurisdictions around the world. The data protection and other laws of the United States and other countries might not be as comprehensive as those in your country, but please be assured that we take steps to ensure that your privacy is protected. By using our services, you understand that your information may be transferred to our facilities and those third parties with whom we share it as described in this Policy.
Display of tailored advertising
CruiseDirect collects data to serve you with relevant advertising. CruiseDirect is committed to providing you with relevant content and information. To do this, we may through, cookies and other technologies, collect information about your website use and travel-related searches. We will use this information, together with other information we have collected about you, to serve you with ads, on our website as well as external websites to match your apparent interests. For example, if you research cruises to the Bahamas, you may see an add for Bahamas cruises on this site as well as other websites that you visit. CruiseDirect may also use your personal information to send you email communications regarding products you have viewed on our website. For example, we may send you an email with cruises that you have viewed or new promotions and deals related to the cruise that you viewed while on our website.
Contacting CruiseDirect
If you have any questions or concerns regarding our Privacy Policy, please email us.