QUESTION: CRUISE ONLY SHUTTLE TO SHIP AND YOUR SCHEDULED ARRIVAL TIME

[Phillip Diamond Plus]

  I have an early flight arriving at "8:35 am" the morning of embarkation for Allure of the Seas on Nov. 27th, 2021. That means that I will have to wait hours either at the terminal or at the airport before my boarding time. 

  But what if I scheduled Royal Caribbean's  shuttle to the terminal?  Would I still have to wait until my arrival time or do they go ahead and board the shuttle passengers? 

  If they do go ahead and board the bus loads of the shuttle passengers, then that would be a good reason for me and others to book Royal Caribbean's transfer. 

[GKMCruising]

Nope, you're still gonna have to wait either way. We had the same issue with our sailing a few weeks ago.

[teddy]

Agreed.  We booked Air2Sea with the shuttle for our cruise out of Nassau.  We got to check in early and had to wait.

[Robandmar]

Our flight arrives at 9:30 on 11/18. I’ve already purchased my transfer from RCL my check in is 12:00.  Do they have the transfer/shuttle running so I can make my noon check in or will I have to change ETA. Only other choice would be to pursue a refund and get an Uber to port for an on time check in

[Ampurp85]

I didn't like my RCG transfer as I was very late getting to port. Plane landed at 10:55 and we were at the RCG transportation counter by 11:30. They waited until the bus was full so it was after 1pm before we even left the terminal. Then we had to go to another terminal and pick more people up. So it was 1:45 when we made it to the port and then almost 2:45pm when we made it to the ship.

[jticarruthers]

Which port is Allure out of at the moment?

I have had two very different experiences with the "strict boarding times" so far.

Freedom in Miami they were giving us a hard time about even pulling into the parking garage 15 minutes before our scheduled "time" and had us sit in the car for a few minutes before allowing us to join the line at the terminal.

Mariner in Canaveral was the opposite experience, we showed up at our scheduled time like good children and spent almost two hours in line as apparently every other passenger just showed up. Talked to several people on board who confirmed that Canaveral does not seem to pay any attention to the boarding time slots and just took anyone that showed up, when they showed up. Needless to say, going to arrive a little earlier in two weeks when we go back

 

[AshleyDillo]

2 hours ago, jticarruthers said:

Which port is Allure out of at the moment?

Canaveral currently. My experience with Allure was the same as yours was with Mariner. They weren't adhering to boarding times. However you can't be disappointed and disgruntled if you show up early and they do enforce them. On the other side of it, I would be irked if I showed up at my scheduled time and had to wait 2 hours as you did because they weren't enforcing it. 

[Ampurp85]

Isn't PC the one where you have to actively tell someone you arrived at your scheduled time? They apparently have a lot of newbies working and they have been just letting anyone come in regardless of scheduled time. I think they were just checking vax card, passports and negative test and disregarding the scheduled time. I believe PC was the port that a Star class pax almost had a problem with because they were unfamiliar. 

[jticarruthers]

We had to show vax card and test result 6 times before we got to the point that anyone even asked for passport and boarding pass (about 90 minutes after arriving) so i am pretty sure that the whole time window thing is irrelevant at Canaveral.

I do plan to just head to one of the bar/restaurants in walking distance for a beer though if they do try to enforce it when i arrive "early" next week.