Good morning,
I have been following you guys for a year or more now due to the wealth of information you share and have participated in more than one of Matt's live sessions on Monday's leading up to our first cruise last July 2023. I doubt he would remember, but if he does, I had dropped him a few Superchats asking about things like accommodating 18 people in the main dining room for my wife's BDay. We had a big group, hehe. :)
In fact, that's sort of why I am posting. I want to preface my issue with a bit of background on our trip to put it in perspective.
We planned a 7 night Eastern Caribbean cruise that included a day at Coco Cay. In fact, with only 2 other stops planned and 4 days at sea, Coco Cay was SUPPOSED to be the highlight of our cruise vacation which occurred on the final day of the cruise. On this trip we took 18 people, all family and friends. We had 4 Grand Suites, a junior suite, 2 balcony rooms, a promenade view room, and one interior room. During this cruise we were celebrating a few milestone events. A 40th birthday (family friend), a 50th birthday (best friend/brother in law), a 75th birthday (mother in law) and on a personal note, my wife turned 43 while on the trip BUT the overall point of the trip itself was our 25th wedding anniversary ALL of which took place during the summer months but none directly during the cruise except for my wife's BDay. Of the 3 ports and 4 days at sea all anyone was excited about was the Coco Cay stay, and for good reason.
Going all out, I opted to book and pay for TWO cabanas for our day there. I booked one in thrill waterpark for our combined 7 kids and a second one in Coco Beach Club for 9 of the adults (Mom and Dad in law opted to just get the Coco Beach Club pass). For each I had to pay a mini fee for the extra person plus ended up getting snorkeling gear for a few of the kids and a souvenir or two. All in all though I spent ~$6000 on Coco Cay ALONE. We can ignore everything else I spent as my focus here is Coco Cay and aside from the story I am about to tell below had a GREAT time the other 6 days.
Due to unforeseen circumstances the ship got delayed at one of the port (Tortola) thanks to a few errant passengers that may have gotten themselves into trouble. The ship also had to divert on day 6 (I think) to Turks and Caicos due to a medical emergency in which a passenger had to be transported via lifeboat to the main island for treatment. Both of these set the ship schedule back by roughly 8 hours. When all was said and done, Royal Caribbean was forced to push back the Coco Cay day from a standard 8am-5pm schedule to not even arriving TO the port until just before ~3pm. The Captain was gracious enough to stay an extra bit of time but ultimately we were shuffled back to the boat somewhere between 6pm and 7pm EST. This took our Coco Cay day from 8+ hours to less than 4.
I asked both the concierge and customer service desks if there was anything that could be done about the EXTREMELY large amount of money I spent for our excursions there in the hopes of getting some sort of credit to make up for the lost time, lost use of amenities, and loss of general sun time and fun time. I was told BY BOTH that I should be sure to fill out the surveys at the end of the cruise asking to be contacted and explain my issue there. They both assured me Royal takes the surveys seriously and even stated that how the crew gets recognized as well so they KNEW it would be taken seriously. I did exactly as told to. I filled out the survey and waited.....and waited... and waited... till roughly October. I made a phone call to Royal. I don't recall the number or where I found it on their website but when I called I got a general customer service person but they didn't seem to know what to do with my call. (wrong dept maybe). Anyways, that person, who didn't seem to know how to escalate my situation told me they would inform their supervisor who would then have someone get in contact with me, but it was possible I would just see some sort of onboard credit on my next cruise.
I booked 2 more cruises shortly after this. One, we just got back from Mar 11th. It was a 4 day, Eastern Caribbean, from Mar 7th - Mar 11th on Independence of the Seas only stopping at Labadee, Haiti. The second cruise I booked was a 7 day Alaska cruise for my wife and I, our 2 boys, and one long time girlfriend.
As you may have guess by this post, I had no ship credit during the 4 night cruise a couple of weeks back and no one else ever tried to contact me. Not trying to hash up an issue from a different ship, 6 months prior, I did not say anything DURING this past cruise. Once we returned home I filled out the survey as asked, once again, but also dug in a bit to find the TRUE customer service contact to reach out to. I sent an email to
[email protected] re-explaining everything that had happened last July on Wednesday Mar 13th. They responded yesterday, a full week later. I explained everything above in similar detail and said all I was really asking for was a bit of a ship's credit since we had planned on continue to cruise with Royal. Don't get me wrong though, I asked for a BIG credit ($1500) but expected some sort of a negotiation. Additionally, my wife and I hit PRIME status on Casino Royale curing this past cruise and even though we only have 2 cruises under our belt so far (with a planned Alaska cruise I am now rethinking) are still only 8 points away from Platinum status since we booked a Grand Suite on our first cruise and a Junior Suite on this past one. I told the guest relations desk all of this. Hell, we were even offered $600 in ships credit while on board to book our NEXT cruise, so its not like they don't just hand them out for good business sense. At one point in my explanation of everything I even stated I understood the "change in itinerary" policy that even YOU GUYS always mention and I KNEW Royal had ZERO "obligation" to give me anything. I just felt that due to the extraneous circumstances, the amount of people we had, and the amount of money I and our family spent AND was planning on continuing to spend with Royal that my situation should be looked at on more of a individual basis and that providing me a good ship's credit would go a LONG way to show my value as a customer and probably impact Royal in a miniscule and even negligible way. All of which I stated in my email to them.
Apparently I am just a minnow in their sea of whales because the response yesterday felt like an insult..... I am pasting below. To me, this feels like a slap in the face. "HAHA, NO, we arent giving you anything, but let me spew out all this love for your money in your face and tell you how happy we are to get out of any obligation to you and be as obtuse and condescending as possible all while expressing our gratitude for your dollars". UGH....to me, its cringy. Whats even more upsetting is that the rep below mentions the importance of bringing up your issue WHILE ON BOARD, which I did, AND included that in my original email to them, but its as if that's the excuse for not compensating me??? Where is the ownership here?? As a customer I tried many things and am just being moved in circles so the next group DOESNT have to help. Now, I have no recourse after being pointed BACK IN TIME to my Cruise in July.
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Hello Rick,
Thank you for your email. I am sorry for the delay in my response and appreciate the opportunity to assist you.
I am sorry to learn of your shore excursion was delayed in coco cay. There may be times when things do not go the way we had intended. We understand your disappointment regarding the change in your cruise's itinerary. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer compensation. Nevertheless, we truly apologize if our decision causes any disappointment. All comments are taking very serious and reviewed with our management team. It important to bring up any issue while you are onboard to our customer service desk so they may further address your concerns onboard.
Thank you for bringing your concerns to our attention. Your comments have been documented and reported to our operational teams for further review. We understand your vacation is important to you and it is important to us too. We hope all our guests will take away only pleasant memories of the time spent with us. We hope you allow us the opportunity to welcome you back onboard again soon.
Sincerely,
Martha Filgueiras
Royal Guest Experience Management
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I was actually BLOWN AWAY this was their stance.
How can I get assistance here? I am BEGGING RCB (Matt) to give me a path or, if even within your abilities, help directly. Is there an escalation path through guest services? A customer care director I can reach out to? An "office of the President" type of help desk to handle more complex cases? I would be happy with a name and an email. I even considered just doing look ups for the board/CEO/etc... to get any sort of email to send my case to but decided to get guidance from you guys first since I fully believe you are the experts here.
The current case they have probably closed already is:
Adventure Of The Seas / 15-Jul-2023 / 561298 / 3-68505426149 / Miller
Anything you can do to help is appreciate but I am obviously not here to press any issues with you guys so if you can not help, I understand.
Thank you,
Rick Miller