Rhiannon Ingle
Now, in this day and age, holidays are far from cheap.
Once you've sorted flights, accommodation, currency exchange and a new summer wardrobe - you're already down a small fortune.
But, all that cash is usually worth it once you're having the time of your life soaking in the rays with an Aperol Spritz in hand.
Advert
However, that dream clearly didn't come true for one family whose staggering £11,809 ($15,000) cruise holiday got cancelled just two days before they were set to sail after making one pretty vital mistake on social media.
The mum, Tiffany Banks who hails from Kentucky, US, has since taken to TikTok to open up a little more about the less than ideal situation.
She was looking forward to holidaying with her four children and husband but was left beyond stunned after realising what led to the shock cancellation.
Advert
Tiffany began by explaining that the trip aboard the Carnival Celebration cruise ship was all paid for upfront when she, out of seemingly nowehere, recieved an email about off-ship excursion cancellations.
Bear in mind, this was just two days before the family-of-six were set to fly to Florida to board the cruise ship.
Naturally, she called up Carnival Celebration to investigate further, explaining that a member of staff explained that she had cancelled her $12,000 (£9,444) reservation for the boat’s largest room via the online system.
Advert
Understandably, the mum went into 'full-blown panic', revealing: "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."
Tiffany insisted that she hadn’t cancelled the trip and simply hoped the whole fiasco was just a pesky system glitch.
The cruise line explained to the mum that the room she originally booked was already reserved by another customer and they offered her another room which was, according to Tiffany, the cheapest on the ship and not an adequate replacement.
Advert
Carnival also refused to issue the family with a refund, explaining that it was against their cancellation policy they said no money will be returned within 15 days or less of the cruise date.
Regardless, the Kentucky decided to shoot their shot anyway and jet over to Miami hoping they'd be able to board the ship anyway - a dream that unfortunately didn't come true.
TikTok viewers soon became suspicious that Tiffany wasn't sharing the full story to which she said: "I’m an open book. I talk too much. I give out too much information — that’s just me, naturally."
Advert
Well, it turns out that that was most definitely the case with this situation as Carnival later explained to the mum what had happened to her booking.
She had accidentally shared the booking reference number of their trip on Facebook when posting a countdown to the family holiday.
And, on that very same day, someone who had seen that made an account with Carnival and used the number before cancelling the family’s trip at the last minute.
Ouch.
Tiffany, who was told she was a 'victim of a form of identity theft', has since vowed to never travel with the cruise line 'ever again', despite being partially at fault.
A Carnival Cruise spokesperson told LADbible Group: "While we are not going to comment on any specific guest complaint or incident, 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 identify thief to use that information in inappropriate or even illegal ways. "