rjrpar

Unfortunately the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing. They still can't correct the problems with Dynamic Dining, 22 hours on the phone they still can't get our rervations fixed.

 

It really tarnishes the brand image.

 

JUst like Timex and Kodak

 

I guess this is what you call a WOW experience!!

Agreed, in many respects a very poorly managed company.

If you are talking about this Christmas, then you better book NOW!!

 

By the way, the float out is this weekend and will be LIVE on the web. Also, on youtube.

Book early, in your case asap, then watch for price drops. That is always the best smart strategy, unless you are flexible enough to book last minute bargains; doubt that will be the case for a while with Quantum.

If you cancel, you will lose the OBC from Visa and Royal. If you had another booking, you could transfer the Visa OBC to the future cruise.

In other words, you don't lose the Visa obc. We cancelled 2 years ago within a week of the cruise(with insurance) and got our Visa points back, no problem.

My advice is to pick a beach (most are great), get there early to get a good spot, and enjoy. Have a nice lunch and a few drinks. If the zip line is what you want, wander over and do it.

Don't overspend on a tour, it not necessary IMHO.

I know it is a hard question but are we likely to see much sunshine in the Baltics in August?

We were there last year in late August and the weather was great. Sunny, highs of 65-75 degrees during the day, a little cooler in the mornings. Remember 1 colder day in St. Petersburg

We have been on 12 RCCL cruises and 3 on Carnival. Although the overall experience is very similar, each has it's strengths and weaknesses. I think an earlier poster summarized the differences very well. Don't believe anyone who claims there is a vast difference between any mass market cruise line.. If you really want a different, upscale cruise, you have to pay a much higher price -more than double.

We are on the 11night Feb 2 cruise and really appreciate the times for an eleven nighter. Thank you rakes5.

Are these shows the only entertainment in the main theatre or will they have the regular production shows?

I think two things have happened; 1] RCI thought they would get more paying diners, 2] they completely miscalculated the number of slots they have available. If I book 6:30 that chair will be empty from 5:30 - 6:30 because I can't kick someone out of their seat based on a stop watch. I also probably cannot book the chair again until 8:15; until the 6:30 chair is empty and I clear and reset the table. If you book someone at 7:00, the only time available maybe 5:30, with a quick turn-a-round when I show up at 7:00.

 

With traditional dining I'm positive that chair will be used twice a night. With DDD it may well be empty half the night depending on the buffer they have built in. If they use a 2:30 hour buffer for traditional dining, DDD will need to be significantly tighter.

I doubt your first point. They have years of data from 20 ships to determine how many people eat at the specialty restaurants. If point 2 is correct, they should fire their planners, it's simple math.

Hi,

We r booked on the Dec1 ,2014 Carribean Cruise on the Quantum.

Suddenly, we were e mailed to book our entertainment and dinner reservations.

 

I tried to book the entertainment and did most of it when I had trouble with their website.So I called Royal to finish booking and do the dinner reservation.

Well, Royal could not book any dinners for me until after 7:30pM. We r early eaters and we wanted dinner between 5-6 PM.

We then went to our Travel Agent to complain...she called Royal.nothing available...then she gave it to her Rep.after several weeks, we have 6 dinners...4 at the Grande and 2 other to pay...which was ok.We r still missing 5 dinners,and have not heard anything in a couple of weeks.

We cannot understand..are the restaurants that small..They did not build a large dining room...big mistake.

We wonder how people will get dinner who book the cruise in the future...we r so disgusted with the problem with the dinners and the entertainment. They tell u to book..so we booked and it says ' guest entertainer' .They have 6 shows out of 11 nights.

We r thinking of canceling the Cruise...The Quantum is a big disappointment to us!!

I believe most of these problems are related to a very poorly designed website and will resolve themselves before or during your cruise. However, I agree that RCCL did a poor job in the introduction of their new dining program and it is frustrating. One has to wonder when they clean house in their IT organization because it's a black eye for the whole company.

An earthquake flattening a city or a tsunami is a disaster. Not being able to reserve your dinner for a cruise is not! [emoji34]

Wow, being a little picky on grammar. Call it what you want, but it was a very poorly implemented system that doesn't work after 1.5 months with no indication when the problems will be fixed.

With three cruises booked on the Quantum……………...

 

I find the reservation system very easy to use and have even gone back in and made two adjustments without difficulty.

 

I like the reservation format.

 

All of my dinner and entertainment meshed without any problems.

 

I do NOT think Dynamic Dining is a disaster.

Dynamic dining may not be a disaster but the rollout of the reservation system last month was from an IT perspective. It probably worked for you but it didn't for most, which qualifies as a Disaster.

So you pay for a meal on the ship, then pay a surcharge for a special area of the ship, so you can pay more for a food item. Sad that this is where the cruise lines are choosing to take things. Hard to call that anything but nickel and dining (more like plastic and papering, can't get anything for a nickel or dime at sea).

If someone wants a premium steak and lobster let them pay for it. Since it doesn't affect you, why do you care? It has no impact on the quality of the free food and is strictly voluntary.

I have booked my dining reservations but am unable to book entertainment yet as it's not showing on my cruise planner. Can anyone give me an idea of the show times so I can alter my dining reservations if it looks like there are going to be any time clashes. Many thanks :):)

Why not just wait until the times are released for your sailing? There will be plenty of opportunity to sync your reservations at that time.

Hi All, we are sailing July 31st on EOS for 9 nights. Will definitely post photos of the pier area that day. Cannot wait to see the pier and what they have done so far up close and personal. ;)

Anxious to see their progress by end of July, look forward to your pictures. Thanks and enjoy the Explorer!

The things that you're terming 'Extras' were included in the base prices that you're comparing current pricing to.

So, to compare apples to apples, you would have to add in the costs for the things that are now optional, and then compare your prices.

You could argue that there are more dining choices than there were and it would be hard to disagree.

But listen to the posts across the boards and you'll see that most people feel that the quality of the food back when all meals and entertainment were included, was better than it is today if you're sticking with the included meals.

In order to get that same quality (or more accurately, maintain the same level of quality that you had back then in the MDR), you have to go to the specialty restaurants.[/quote

 

You're wrong. The food in the MDR 15 years ago was nowhere near the quality of the specialty resataurants. Drinks and soda were never included and entertainment was and still is in the base price. So what are all those optional things you refer to??

On the Oasis class, if you make a reservation, it is recorded on your room key, and you can present that 1/2 hour before show time. Seating is still first come, first serve, please do not reserve seats.

 

If you don't have a reservation, you can wait in a line, and 10 minutes before show time they let the standbys in, a few at a time, while seats are available. So even with a reservation, if you come 5 minutes before the show, you aren't guaranteed a seat.

 

Also, on the Ossis ships, for some venues, a small area was also set aside for suite guests, and higher levels of C&A, until 5-10 minutes before show time.

 

On the Oasis class ships, for most shows, the standbys get in. However for some of the smaller venues, or popular shows, only the first few standbys get in.

 

 

 

 

So… it's nice to have a reservation.

 

However, it will be interesting to see how things go with the new Dynamic Dining. We've always experience minor waiting times on day one with traditional dining, as everyone has to find their assigned tables. We tried to book our entertainment first, so we weren't rushing to the show after dinner. If you book dinner first, remember that if the show is at 8:30, you will want to book dining early enough to get to the show by at least 8:15 to take advantage of the reservation.

 

7:30 dinner reservations will make it impossible to get to a 8:30 show. Some of the 7:00 shows are only 45 minutes, so who knows what will happen if you show up 15-30 late for dinner.

Thank you, seems like reservations make life easie

We are Diamond cruisers on the 2/2/2015 QOTS. We have never had to make entertainment reservations on any cruise, except for getting tickets for the ice shows.. A few questions: Do we need to make reservations for every night in the main theatre?, Are the reservations for entry only or are they for specific seating? We have made several dining reservations for 7:30-8:00pm, could these times conflict with both shows on some evenings?

Any help would be appreciated.

I would rather pay for things I want on a cruise than have everything included and be paying for things I don't want.

Agree, that's why we avoid the AIs; we drink very little.

We are Diamond on RCCL and have been on 3 Carnival cruises, two to Europe. Our opinion is Carnival is usually a great value and provide a very similar experience as RCCL. People criticize their food and service, but it's about the same as most other cruise lines, including RCCL. Actually, earlier this year we were on Celebrity and was disappointed that their food was on a par with both Carnival and RCCL.

I think interest in the Quantum is lacking. I base that on my personal interest level and the fact the since we booked 11 months ago, the prices have remained stable. We booked a standard balcony for the 2/2/15 sailing and paid a very fair price - about $330/nite/cabin - and I expected big price increases to follow and they have not.

The disaster with the dining reservation system has been a big negative. Still considering cancelling but probably won't since we avoid air travel sailing out of NJ.

Been on both cuise lines twice in the last 2 years. There are a few jerks on every ship but the clientele on both RCCL and Carnival is very similar. There is really no reason to even think otherwise; both are mass market lines, traveling to the same ports and charging similar prices. Are customers at Fridays any different than Applebee's???

I don't mind the "just a jacket" requirement for men but I would like to see it enforced. I know DH will be more willing to go to Grande not having to wear a tie. But if this dress code is not enforced -- what's the point? BTW, I do like the menu.

If we go with your suggestion, then Grande is not formal. However, you want your version of formal, or really country club casual, enforced. This is the craziest thread I've ever seen.

Copenhagen - walk

Helsinki - shuttle bus from cruise line for small fee

If you've been calling Royal Caribbean's Dynamic Dining line nearly daily since it opened on the 12th like I have you've probably heard someone mention waiting for the "green light". It's a term that seems to have been given out in some official form as I've heard it repeatedly from multiple people now all in the contexts of still having issues with the system and not being able to do much until they receive the green light that everything is working.

 

The other day I got transferred to someone higher up who had an hour long discussion on what it means and what their process is going to be. Apparently they were officially told to expect it by the end of last week but it never happened. Their was a major upgrade that took the system down Monday night at 8:30 pm EST to 9am EST tuesday morning that fixed some of the issues but the system still has many more. They are now hoping to receive the green light by the middle of next week. Once they are given the green light by IT the entire site should be functioning properly without any bugs. The a select group of agents (sounds like it kept growing to encompass most of the original Dynamic Dining agents) has been taken off the phones to sort through all of the reported issues and build cases. Upon receiving the green light they will begin contacting every person that has had an issue in order to correct them. They have access to a history of every single dining time that you have ever booked. He even went through and listed each of the past times and changes I made so they do have them all. The agent will work to get you back to which ever reservation is correct. I asked for more detail on this and he said that they will work for any time that you had already booked. So if you have a reservation that got messed up and you worked to try to get back to your time it doesn't matter, you can still ask for that original time back. Unfortunately though I did ask about a reservation I made on the 12th that seemed to disappear when I later checked for it and he had no record of it. When I asked him about that and the many times I have called about a time that was available only for the system to say it couldn't be booked because of various issues he said that they would not be able to grant those but RCCL hasn't finalized what they are supposed to do to handle situations like that so a procedure may be coming for that.

 

In my reservation I have many duplicate bookings and I asked him about that issue. He said that it was not limited to me, it was not even a small group, it was an extremely wide spread issue. He couldn't say for sure what kinds of times may be opening up but said to expect availability to slowly start opening up as they go through this process of correcting all the issues and remove all the duplicates.

 

Unfortunately though I did ask about if i should just sit back and wait to be contacted so that they can get me the times I want changed or keep on calling hoping for a change and he was hesitant to answer but recommend continuing what I'm doing. So if you are dealing with issues, reservations that changes, or anything else it sounds like you can just sit back and wait for them to contact you and they'll put them back. If like me you want to improve times though you're best bet is to still keep calling and slowly make improvements.

 

On a side note I asked about the payment box and tab disappearing from my profile for both Quantum sailings but not my future Jewel sailing. He compared them and said that when they redid the site in the fall they changed the categories for cabins and my Jewel has those but the Quantum doesn't. The payment system doesn't know how to handle that. I said that it didn't disappear until the 16th and he said it could have slipped through the cracks in the fall and the Dynamic Dining updates brought the issue out. For this issue he once again said to wait it out and hope that when they receive the green light everything will be resolved, other wise the process to correct it is to rebook the cruise which loses all of the pre cruise planner data including dynamic dining reservations which obviously is not a viable solution. I'm not sure how many other people have this issue, but they are now aware of it and will be working on some kind of solution but have no timeline on it. While the payment section was down I asked for a copy to be emailed. I found out that they switched me to prepaid gratuities. I called and questioned them doing it without notifying me. They looked and said it shouldn't have happened, the system refused to allowed the changed, but they got an override and put it back. Official policy is that you can do prepaid or pay by day gratuities with Dynamic Dining but IT messed up when they switched all of the reservations to Dynamic Dining.

 

If anyone else learns anything about the resolution process please add it. Their are a lot of threads discussing issues, but not many discussing how things will be taken care of.

Thanks for the info. There is no excuse to release a system for general use until it has been thoroughly tested and is in what they call "green light" condition. Makes one wonder how effective RCCL management really is on all other business issues.

very annoyed at RCCL regarding roll-out of Dynamic Dining and Shows. I sent a letter to the CEO. In turn he gave the letter to someone in Executive Guest Relations. Spoke with the person who assured me everything would be handled. A week goes by no response from this person. Just called him again and found out that he has done nothing This lack of service will destroy this brand. This will be my 5th RCCL cruise and another 5 on Celebrity so I am not a NEWBIE. These guys need to get there act together. I imagine the first day on board will be a nightmare with hundreds of people lining up to make changes. Please don't tell me to be patient as this is a horrendous procedure. Cruises are supposed to be stress-free. RCCL has figured out a way to make it just the opposite. I urge everyone to call their executive offices 305-539-6000. Thats the only way they will change things

Very good post. Although I agree with another poster who says this won't ruin RCCL, I find the reservation system and the need to book so many reservations frustrating and I will avoid these ships in the future.

Also, this is not new technology. It's a simple reservation system used by thousands of companies and only the incompetency of the RCCL IT organization is at fault.