Florida_gal_50

It is worth it to me. If it's not to you that is fine. Not sure why there has to be ridicule for those that do. The last TA used charged me USD. We are both in Canada. I gave her screen prints of everything. It should have been super easy. She told me that the price would be higher than I could find on the Hal website. Then she told me that you couldn't buy air through HAL. I had to do it through her immediately. What a huge prize. That TA lasted about a week before I got rid of her. Who needs that?

Are you getting that same $1300 a seven day cruise? What are you struggling with for the control aspect? I thought it was straight forward. I’ve gotten very little obc using a ta. Zero for a price reduction.

You won’t get any discounts with a pcc but you will have control of your booking. I don’t like having to get others do things for me. If there are upsells they come directly to me and I can deal with them immediately.

I have cruised celebrity, Princess, hal and carnival. After 3 sets of not great cruises on the koningsdam, I’d had enough. I never say never because I always end up doing what I say I wouldn’t do. I investigated several other cruises with different lines for this spring and they all got knocked off the list because of having to take a guarantee to not being able to book at pre cruise hotel for under about $800 cdn. Begrudgingly I ended up booking another cruise on hal with less than ideal items that are important to me. I’m super happy I did because it restored my faith in hal. The Princess cruise I was really interested in had a big flu outbreak and I think they had to return early but I’m not sure. I’m not sure why people become so invested in what others are saying or doing. It’s just odd. Just because people change their mind it doesn’t make them people with bad character. That is a huge stretch.

Ok 2 minutes. Unfortunately the luggage takes forever so it's really doing nothing. I'm sure everyone here gets luggage immediately.

Well at least they got part of it right. It can't be used in the casino. I've always used my OBC for gratuities (not the obc ear marrked for shorex). My last cruise was barely a month ago.

Can you provide a link to that? I haven't seen any such thing but I'm more than willing to admit I'm wrong. Let's just say for giggles that there was such a post. Are people that feeble minded that if one person says to boycott hal people are going to immediately start doing that? I read, take note, and form my own opinion. I'm assuming that's what most would do.

I haven't seen a separate line for those that have filled out the arrive can ahead of time in the airports when I've entered Canada. Maybe there are separate lines in other airports. I'm just hoping to give some accurate information so people don't think they will be put into some super speedy line. Take it for what it's worth. I do find it interesting the way people will practically knock you over to run to the customs area so they'll get ahead of everyone. I go to the bathroom, get my nexus card and clear customs while these people are still in line. All of us are stand waiting for our luggage to come out after that for 20 -30 min. (westjet and air canada).

My point is that you don’t have to use it and it’s not speeding anything up but I know no matter what is posted there has to be someone to say it’s not true. If you have nothing but free time go ahead and do it.

There have been many posts about travel agents struggling with this. It’s about the persons ability not about the position they hold or where they sit.

Yes, I understand as I’m Canadian. I’ve flown into my country and have never heard a peep upon arriving the last 2 times. Not a single person asked if I had it completed.

I haven’t heard a peep about this lately. Haven’t been asked for it retuning to Canada in November or April. I do have a nexus card and that was fast. Can’t see how it would be faster.

I’ve had great luck a couple days before the end of the first cruise getting the reservation desk to book me into the next cruise for specialty dining. That said I usually know a lot of these people because I eat mostly at specialty.

Yup, I had 3 such cruises booked this way over a year and a half. I had to do a little training of them but I eventually got $250 for each set of cruises.

When you have a couple cruisers stating the thing that seems odd. You’d be ok with shortages of almost all liquor and tons of overcharging. I hope you will get to experience that first hand if so. I’d rather be on a well run ship myself. I’ve been on both in the last year.

I guess I missed the posts to say things are wrong on EVERY ship. That isn't what the OP is saying, just raising questions. The threads are easily skipped over (once again).

So every ship is the same? Right.

I’d be very, very careful about moving a non refundable cruise deposit. I’ve heard at least one story on here about someone moving a non refundable cruise deposit to a refundable cruise. That person later had to cancel the refundable cruise and I’m pretty sure it ended up being to bad so sad. It’s at least worth asking the question before you do it. I’m sure hal is more than happy to help you lose your money.

On my last cruise I ate in the mdr twice. I was only able to make a reservation for 5:30 even though I was in a Neptune Suite. I should have just done a walk in because there didn't seem to be a line up. I don't want to eat with others so that's why I made the reservation.

The explorers bar is a bar on 2. Explorations cafe is a coffee place on 12. It says that under dining on the picture you posted. Why they have it under dining is a mystery to me. You can’t dine there unless you want a cookie or small snack item. I can’t read the ship picture even in real life that’s why the deck plan is super helpful. Not trying to argue but I can see why your dad got frustrated.

Not to nit pick but it is on the deck plan. Hopefully it will show properly here. It's on the right side of this picture

Not sure where you got the explorer cafe from. It's actually explorations Cafe. That's probably why people couldn't find it. Thanks for taking time to do a review.

Same. I eat very early at home. My sweet spot on a cruise is 6pm.

It’s very, very difficult to get early dining on hal at least it was when I did fixed. You could book a year out and still not get it. It does sound like a person might be more successful on board to do that. Late dining doesn’t seem to fill up as fast. On celebrity you could book every night ahead of time when I last sailed with them. The line was long to get into the mdr anyway in my experience. I “think” there was at some time the ability to book the mdr before you got on the ship but it didn’t last long and I’m almost positive that’s no longer an option.

The person that was talking about the servers not being the same was in open dining.