MISTER 67

After being very loyal to HAL for years we are down on them right now, food budget has been cut, they were portioning out butter and cream cheese on our last cruise, I like Lox and bagels but the lox were horrible and gray in color, one morning I asked for scrambled eggs in the buffet and lo and behold when I sat down to eat them they were frozen, someone forgot to heat them, entertainment budget has been cut and actually before the pandemic. Cabin service is only in the morning. The ships are classy and very clean and at one time very well maintained but they’ve had issues with some of the older ships.

I wouldn’t.

Holland America has cloth hand towels in the public restrooms and has had them before there was a Celebrity Cruise company.

That happened to us with Holland America, we were very loyal to them as well as Princess but we had enough of HAL with too many cost cutting measures. It will be a long time before we give them another try and we will just cruise with Celebrity and Princess but if Celebrity continues with their constant nickel and diming while raising the cruise fare they will lose us also.

We moved to Florida 30 years ago and you are correct, new construction going on everywhere. I-75 south of Tampa was only 2 lanes in each direction now it’s 3 lanes and in some sports 4 lanes and around Sarasota they could use 5. That being said we wouldn’t live anywhere else plus it’s so easy to hop on a cruise ship.

Not a gratuity, a service charge which goes to who knows where, my feeling it goes into the Celebrity corporation coffers.

I wanted to add that if you order an up charge meal in the MDR like 16.95 for lobster they add a 20% service charge, your server is already receiving part of the automatic gratuities so why the service charge, I refuse to believe that the lines are passing on the service charge to the crew, maybe I’m wrong but just the way I feel. Another way to combat this is go to guest services and reduce the automatic gratuity by 20%, we aren’t grinches, we tip at least 20% in our local restaurants and always tip extra to our waiters and cabins stewards on the ship but that 20% service charge just leaves a bad taste in our mouths.

All I know is one thing, that we pay automatic gratuities of 36 dollars a day per couple, the 20% added service charges on just about anything you purchase except in the shops is just plain and simple gouging. I’m surprised there’s not a 20% service charge on the gratuities.

I used that feedback on our last cruise as I complained about the food in both the MDR and the Lido Buffet. Our maitre d called us in our cabin and tried to deal with our concerns, this was the last day of the cruise and he stopped by our table at dinner to see how we were doing, it just so happened that the meal we had that night was the best of the cruise with a very tasty and ample sized prime rib. That was still not enough to make us completely happy and we will not be cruising with HAL in the future as we had issues with service and have not been happy with the entertainment since before the pandemic.

IMHO a complete refund would have been appropriate with an offer of flying the OP and his party back home from the next port of call at no charge. If I ran a cruise ship company I would probably not sell maybe 10 cabins on a ship that would be available for the unacceptable situation that occurred in the OP’s cabin and any other situations or emergencies that might pop up in a cabin.

Holland America at one time was our favorite cruise line but we’ve had issues with them the last 2 cruises with various problems so this toilet issue does not surprise me, I can understand the outrage from the OP and a 600 dollar FCC is a joke, who would want to sail again with HAL after an experience like that.

We sailed on the Equinox last week dis-embarking on Saturday. One thing I forgot to mention that cheese cake was always available every night in the MDR but that has been cutback to one night. Again I don’t understand with so many great desserts available in the OVC at lunch time, is having cheese cake every night on the menu in the MDR going to put Celebrity out of business. I don’t eat cheesecake every night but it’s my favorite dessert and it’s nice to know it was always there when you didn’t care for the other desserts on the menu.

We sailed on the Equinox 3 times, the Reflection once and Infinity once and as I said we had morning and evening room service and mints every night on all 5 cruises.

We had twice a day room service on all 5 of our Celebrity cruises since the startup. There was no charge for the roast duck nor for the Veal Chop or Beef Wellington.

We’ve taken 5 Celebrity cruises since the startup and we received 2 chocolates mints for all 7 days on all 5 cruises and we also had twice a day room service, can’t say the same for our Holland America and Princess cruises though the Princess cruises were in November and December of 2021 when the lines were trying to return to pre pandemic cruising, in fact the first sailing we did was the first for the Caribbean Princess in 608 days, ship was only half full, everyone was masked up and there were some shortages here and there, no mints at all, we still had a great cruise and it was so good to be back on a cruise ship

Prices on everything have gone up from drinks to excursions to automatic gratuities. The menu selection in the MDR has been parred, too many pasta dishes. In a way I don’t understand this as the selection and variety in the Oceanview Cafe is simply outstanding as is the quality. We were on the Equinox last week and had a pretty good cruise, we did a bid on a move up to a veranda cabin, the cabin was good but the location was bad as we heard the constant beat of drums from the main showroom, we were forward on deck 6. Back to the dining room, the last 3 nights of the cruise our waiter informed us that the chef had prepared additional meals not on the menu, they included, roast duck, Beef Wellington and a veal chop on the last night, they were all very good. My guess is there were probably complaints about the selection. There was no lobster during the week unless you paid an up charge.

We are also early risers, we are usually the first ones in the Lido buffet for breakfast.

That was a great job, someone had to be up all night getting all that ready by daybreak.

Do you attend St. Petronille in Glen Ellyn, we attended there back in the 1970s.

Excellent post.

The traditional promenade decks on the older ships with the steamer chairs.

I’ve seen people turned away who showed up in shorts and tee shirts.

We are in our late 70s and have no problem with younger people, what we don’t want is for Celebrity, Princess or Holland America turning their ships into amusement parks with water slides, roller coasters and bumper cars like what Carnival and Royal are.

The food and entertainment need improvements, until that happens we will not book any longer with HAL.

Lobster is overrated and overpriced.