RorySC

16 hours ago, jeffmw said:

 

I'd be interested to know what, if anything, gets shaved off the top. Like when you donate to a charity and they say "100% of your donation will go to...", does any of that money end up with Royal as some kind of administration fee to the workers?

Going through the trouble of removing daily gratuities and doling all that money out individually seems like a lot of work (and you miss tipping some of the people you may not see, like laundry workers). But I'd be inclined to try doing it if it's not all going to the workers.

 

Something nice i stumbled on, the Concierge in the D-lounge has the ability, and power to handle many or most things that we would normally stand in line at guest services for. It took me less than 5 minutes to have them remove the daily from my account, and I handled everything with cash. Including tipping out that particular Concierge who was very helpful to us, and with whatever anyone needed from what I seen. As far as tipping out the laundry staff...that seems very far fetched to me. Have you ever been asked by a hotel or resort to tip out the laundry staff? Maybe, they added verbiage such as service fee's? I think that there should be no more tipping at all. Just give us a price for the cruise as a whole and the cruise line handle all of that back of the house agenda.  

We just got back from several BtB's, (2 months straight of sailings) and the gratuities are getting out of hand. So, I went to guest services to ask just where tips are going. They handed me a pre-printed list and I was very surprised. Back in the day, tips were split between the Cabin attendant, Waiter, and assistant Waiter. Now...if you look at the list, there are several others added, such as " other hotel services" staff and others behind the scenes we never see or use directly. @ $6.50 per day per guest. If we order something to the room, there is already a 18% tip added to the bill. So why are we paying it twice? (Royal, though making it what seems easier to get it pre-paid so it is out of our minds...but as a way for the guest to subsidize the payroll system) So I asked them to remove all the daily gratuities, and we went back to doing it old school. We went back to handing out cash again. Because of all the changes in the MDR, and reduced quality of the meals and reduced options. We find that we are using the MDR less and less. Maybe a small inconvenience, but when I use the MDR, I hand the tips directly to the recipients just prior to leaving from dinner...just the way we do it when we go out to eat at home. I knew that the staff would like this, but was surprised that they were more excited about it more than I thought they would be. Of course, I informed them how I would be handling it from the start, so that they did not think they would be getting twice the amount. You would be surprised just how much what I consider as "fluff" in the amount you tip per day.  $6.50 per day x 2 = $13.00, for 7 days = $91.00

On 1/19/2023 at 5:00 PM, Xaa said:

We're two peas in a pod.  I think you and I would get along really well.

well if you are sailing the end of the year, we will be sailing all of December 2023 and January 2024. I will cover the first round...you bring the bail $

I remember the Midnight Buffett's, they were entertaining Exotic and beautiful. They even had a 1/2 hour to walk through to take pictures before they let the locust in. But, being that I always have Late seating in the MDR and because we always enjoyed or tablemates sometimes we sat in the MDR till 10:30 have a lot of laughs. By the time I made it up to the Midnight buffet, I was still full. So never ate anything to much. I am sure there was huge amounts of waste. Or items that had to be moved over for other uses, I can not imagine the amount of time and manpower of the very fancy set up.

On 1/18/2023 at 2:39 PM, Ditchdoc said:

Think I've been up at midnight maybe twice while cruising and one of those was new years.

 

Now if they had a sunrise buffet ... I'd be all in. As it is, I have a hard time finding coffee when I get up because most places on board dont have it ready.

Every ship has a Sunrise Buffett....It's called the Windjammer!

9 hours ago, Floski said:

I've noticed a serious dearth of top (and medium, even) shelf liquors on our last 3 cruises (2 Harmony, 1 Wonder).

There used to be Trace, 4 Roses, and other good choices.

Blame the supply chain or whatever, but I think it's just another example of Royal going cheap.  I have become a 

cruise fanatic, but RC is not too far from losing me, at least for a couple of cruises.  

Get some danm bourbon!

During my last 4-5 sailings, they have not had Crown Royal, but 1 time I found it for sale downstairs in the store. When I asked the gentleman working the store why? He said he was asked that question countless times, and had no answer to that question. The bar manager said something about supply chain issues, and during Covid...I bought that line. But not anymore. I don't see it as a price issue, because the price of drinks and or beverage packages are a sliding scale to cover the fluctuation.

I thought it was offered from guest services...maybe I read it to fast. I have had issues before on cruises before, but not sure why they were not moved to another cabin? They have to keep some available for situations of importance like when a pipe brakes and floods a room out or whatever. But I am a jerk, because I would have went downstairs with a blanket and pillow and curled up right there in front of them with the 1 hand Al Bundee thing in the pants. 

13 hours ago, Xaa said:

Curious why you would prefer OBC to FCC.  In either case, you have to be on another cruise to use it.

I hate that this happened to you and certainly wish you luck in resolution.  I sort of think the 30% is a fairly good offer.  As you say 3/7=43%.  But not 100% of all three days were a wash, they were diminished.

Don't take that the wrong way, I'm rooting for you and hope you get more.  Good luck!

Many people prefer OBC, because they will go sit In front of a slot in the casino. Move OBC to that machine and immediately cash out go to the cage and you then have the cash in hand right away. 

yep same here.

I can not even access the site on laptop, but can get in through the app. weird!

Unable to see mine either. 

Welp...this could also be a small savings to the guest as well. I can see more and more people switching over to cash tipping again.  Walking into the MDR, and or reading the menu off the wall or on the app to make a choice if they want to dine there that night or not. If they have their meal in the MDR then tip accordingly, if you go elsewhere like the Windjammer you saved a few $. This could backfire on RCCL, and then have to answer to the crew for the $ shortfalls. 

On 9/22/2022 at 2:44 PM, WAAAYTOOO said:

It’ll be interesting to try the infinite veranda concept on Icon.  Not sure how I will like it but won’t know until I try !  Frankly, I don’t really get that much use out of a balcony anyway so the extra room will be a bonus.  I like having a balcony but don’t really sit out there, much.

I would like to at least try the Infinite Veranda, but was thinking....on the current balconies, if you step out onto your balcony and put the handle back in the closed position you can still keep the A/C going. If this new veranda is open, I would imagine the A/C will will turn off, and all the cool air in the room will be lost. Now it will take a lot of time to re-cool the room back down and change the humidity back to a comfortable level. If we let all the A/C to be sucked out, especially while moving then try to re-cool the room back down, I think the HVAC systems will have issues with freezing up. The (A) coils will need to be turned off and wait for the ice to melt. Anyone who has a RV and with a lot of Open & Closing of the doors would fully understand what I am talking about. Now couple that up with a lot of slamming doors with the suction effect. Will be interesting to see how this goes, but this I am sure has been discussed somewhere on Celebrity's message boards before.

I think it will be a zero gravity experience.

I was just watching a video and and thought I saw that the big ball being installed in Icon, may be a zero gravity experience??? If this is what it is, who knows what that may cost. If you consider $29 for 2 min in Ifly onboard Quantum Class ships are to much or expensive maybe, but where else would you be able to experience such a thing! 

25 minutes ago, berkeleykel said:

 We were recently on the Wonder from Barcelona and I mentioned to my husband how unfair the breakfast situation seemed to continuing cruisers.  They close down everything early like it is a regular disembarkation day even though it’s just a normal day for 1/4 of the ship!

However, you do have the luxury of booking shows for the second half of your cruise before the new cruisers join in Barcelona. And I heard, although I’m not sure how true it is, that they held back spaces at shows for those boarding and each port so neither group would be completely locked out.

Yes the breakfast thing was not cool, but as far as booking shows early was not the case. Sometime after midnight on turnover day the internet was turned off. Was turned back on after 11am. Not that it mattered because we can not use the app. So we had to wait till the new guest boarded but those folks were booking from inside the terminal becausethey have access to the app. So you have to make a choice of waiting for the bookings to open after 11am, and not get off the ship and tour Barcelona,  and when you get back from a day in Port you have long lines at CS on day 1 for the new arrivals that are long. You get the point.

1 hour ago, Mr.Cruiser said:

I think the problem is that Royal doesn't inform about these differences beforehand and then of course people are disappointed because they don't expect it and are used to a different experience.

I also have a booking for next year departing from Rome and only learned about interport and the problems by accident. Luckily I know about it now and I think if you are prepared for it, it's not half bad.
A search here revealed that the topic has been discussed covered before and there are also people who have had a slightly different experience and also gained something positive from it, e.g. here:

 

They worked so hard to transition all of us over to the app and that took some doing. Even just last week announced that pre booking of things are now set in stone, that they are not coming back at all. Many where hoping that it was only a Covid thing, but nope the decision is now final. When you are only a small group of lets say 1000 attempting to fight a group of 4500 who had 5 days head start you don't stand a chance. Also let me say, that when we went to the MDR, we felt like the Bastard Child of the room. All the tables have already set, and in use for 5 days. Now here you come and they try to fit you in where there is room. We always for many years pick Late seating, and shared tables. Now we join this sailing in the middle and we are now My-TIme for dinner. We hate MT dining....it is a total mess and unorganized. You would have thought that they were prepared area for the new guest coming.  ALSO on Barcelona turnaround day....you better be up early to get breakfast. Breakfast on that day us from 5:30am to 8:30am and what a mess, because you have all the craziness of all the announcements and people pulling bags all though breakfast areas while they wait for there numbers to be called. In 3 different languages. 

19 minutes ago, Reigert2008 said:

Did you use a travel agent to book this?  I'd suspect a good travel agent would have been aware of the interporting and at least been able to prepare the guests for differences or suggest an alternate sailing.

Yes I use a very good agent from MEI, I originally book this sailing downstairs @ Next Cruise, then transferred over to MEI. While I started to have these issues, I immediately contacted my agent who responded to me very quickly even know it was 1:30 in the morning where she is located because she just happened to be on a cruise out of California herself. She opened her system and noticed that it is not listed as a Interport sailing. She even went on to say that none of the sailings are listed as Interport anymore because agent atempt to steer customers away from them because of these issues. I guess it would not be so bad, if they had dedicated people onboard to help with all these issues during Interport. But being that there were so many if us took a lot of time. Yes the terminal was very fast and quiet, yes the saftey briefing was quick and they did it in person, but in today's world in technology I can not see why this could have not been fixed months ago. I am sure is there POS system or something in the Casino went down. It would have been fixed right away.

Guest beware, and make sure when sailing on Wonder of the Seas from Rome If your sailing is a "Interport, (2) itineraries on the same ship" be ready for problems. We have been out on multiple sailings for the past month. Independence from Port Canaveral prior to flying to Europe, then onto Odyssey,  then finally Wonder both from Civitavecchia. We were never told that Wonders sailing originally started in Barcelona, and that if you board in Civitavecchia you are not included in certain amenities. Main problem is with the Royal App. Because we did not board with the original sailing in Barcelona, the app is very basic for us 1200 that boarded in Civitavecchia. No booking anything with the app. No dinner reservations, no show reservations "and they are scanningsea passesto get into shows now", no excursion reservations, no tapping the kiosk to view your photos, no viewing your account, ect. When you want to make any reservations, you can atempt to call during the hours that the restaurant has someone to answer the phone, and or wait in line at guest services. Keep in mind that for my sailing Thursday to Thursday there were 1200 of other angry and or upset guest who had the same issues. Now for guest who boarded Wonder Saturday to Saturday "the main sailing" had 5 days head start to fill all the reservation slots before you. For us that boarded Thursday, the festive feel when you board is pretty much nonexistent. No sail away parties, no exciting feelings of thousands of fresh new people boarding with you. When you board, all the other guest for them, it was just another port day. I spent the first 2 days literally working. Working the phones, standing in lines in attempt to make reservations and fix issues. Now to add insult to injury, after spending 2 days and hours and hours trying to fix everything come Saturday when the original "Barcelona sailing, turn around day" happened everything we finally got set up in the computer was wiped out. Because it was turn around day, going into a new sailing everything started from zero and because we have no access to the app, we had to start all over again with calls and standing in lines. We tried working with the representative in the Diamond Lounge,  but she was experiencing all the same issues with long hold times and reaching the right people during certain hours and don't forget I was 1 cabin of 2 of 1200 people with the same issue. When trying to speak with Management in CS and work up the latter all they can say is sorry. Royal Caribbean App is not set up to handle 2 itineraries at the same time. After 22 years sailing with RC, working our way into Diamond + being as they say Loyal to Royal,  I do not feel that they have been loyal to us. We have sailings still on the books including a 27 night sailing out of Australia in April,  and we are diligently shopping to rebook with another line. Yes this is long, but if I can help that this does not happen to another guest would make us happy. 

Going on 2 cruises this September out of Civitavecchia.  (As a reference, we are D+) so have been on many cruises, but never in Europe. As we have started cruising back in the 90's where dress codes were either enforced more, or taken more seriously. Though I will still ware at least a sport coat in the evenings in the MDR, I too have taken more of the attitude of "If you can not beat them, join them" and no longer travel with a Tux or two. Though I sure miss where everyone was dressed in the evenings. I am not judging, you do you!

My question is, over in Europe, are dress codes taken more serious? Obviously in and around the pool area Europeans have different sunbathing customs that are not so much in the USA other then Spring Brake .

What should I prepare for, how to pack?

7 hours ago, Matt said:

If memory serves me correctly, isn't there a rating for MDR service and another for food quality?

I always thought that as well, but if true...they are both being scored together. So to me, that is not right.

7 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

I didn't even get a post-cruise survey after my last cruise.

That is odd, I have always received one like 4 hours after I got off.

1 hour ago, cruisellama said:

I've shared your experience of the differences, but never heard one bad review regarding food prep is applied to wait staff.   Although recently on Allure, when something was not right with the food, the wait staff was VERY vested making it right - offering a re-do or something else to replace..    

Yes, I agree. I am not one to say anything if I did not like it. It was not their fault, but if it is seen that you are not liking something they will very much go out of the way for corrective action.

So I just got off the Adventure of the Seas after a 13 night reposition from TX to NJ.

While siting in the Main dining room, I could not help overhear a conversation between guest and crew speaking about the Post Cruise Survey at another table.

My take from it was that I guess someone or maybe more was Extremely happy with the service of the MDR crew.....BUT, not overly thrilled with the food itself. This was around the time when the crew reminds you towards the end of your cruise that you will be receiving a "Post Cruise Survey" after you arrive home, and that it was very important that these be filled out.

Because the surveys are part of the decision factor whether or not crew members are offered another contract, it is important to fill these out Good or Bad. 

But, here is what very much concerned me, I am hoping that someone can confirm if this is real or not, that the MDR & Kitchen Staff are treated as 1. So If you love your waiters, but hate the food....a bad survey about the food is also a strike against the wait staff.

If this is true, what other parts of the crew are tied in together? 

I am reluctant to do anymore Post Crew Surveys anymore until, I find out what's what.

Has anyone else got any wind on this?

On 2/8/2022 at 9:55 AM, Eddy said:

The stock was a good buy at $75. It will go higher until  another media reported disaster, or more Covid variants. Its still a gamble. Do you know the perks of owning 100 Stocks?  

with 100 shares, they give you OBC for each sailing.  

• $250 Onboard Credit per Stateroom on Sailings of 14 or more nights
• $100 Onboard Credit per Stateroom on Sailings of 6 to 13 nights
• $50 Onboard Credit per Stateroom on Sailings of 5 nights or less