publicpersona

There's no evidence that not tipping will result in mishandling of your luggage in any way. However, that intimidation is something I've experienced multiple times as the stevedore says, "I'm the one who makes sure your luggage gets safely on the ship." Besides being untrue (the stevedores will again handle your luggage, but not necessarily that individual), what purpose does such a statement serve than to pressure for a tip?

More like ... No, you don't. Yes, you do. No, you don't. Yes, you do. No, you don't. Yes, you do. No, you don't. Yes, you do. No, you don't. Yes, you do. No, you don't. Yes, you do. No, you don't. Yes, you do. Welcome to CC.

You seem to be digging yourself a bigger hole. You say *you* haven't had a problem with showing up without tagged luggage, and you are only interested in what pleases *you*. Yes, that's the problem. Getting thousands of people and their luggage onboard in just a few hours is already a challenge. It wouldn't kill you to try to do the little things that make it smoother for everybody. Play along.

The answer is right there on the luggage tag page: 3. Make as many copies of this tag as you require, preferably in color. So if you have a color printer, great. If not, don't give it a moment's thought.

I have AirTags in each piece of luggage. It came in very handy last trip when someone in my family left a carry-on at the check-in counter and we got a notification after we'd gone through security. We knew not to waste time asking security if it was there. It isn't as useful once on ship at sea, of course. And sometimes knowledge of where your bag is can induce stress. We boarded at 11 AM and became concerned that our bags were showing still in the terminal (and updating frequently) at 4 PM. But the bags got loaded. As to Tile vs. Airtag .. With Tile you are dependent on someone also having the Tile app on their device nearby and there are about 40 million of them in the world. With AirTag, you have over 2 billion devices that can report location on behalf of the AirTag.

Thanks for the reassurance that eastbound from MCO to Port Canaveral has a cash option. I rarely use cash for anything, but in a rental car I just don't want any opportunity for something to go wrong. Yes, I can close the provided transponder (if there is one), and yes, I could use my E-Pass instead. And yes, I will pay about $1.50 more and take a few minutes more in the cash lane. But all of that is worth it if I'm not subject to the hassle and big expense that pay by tag would entail. Not going under the cameras in a rental car means that even if something went wrong with vehicle registration to E-Pass, etc., I wouldn't have that risk.

MSC is the best bang for the buck. The status match is very nice (I got matched to Black/Diamond) a few years ago. Their private island is, in my opinion, much, much better than Labadee or CocoCay .. precisely because it is new and they haven't had time to mess it up yet. Except for food venues and restrooms, it is just beaches and a lagoon .. what Labadee and CocoCay were in their prime. Entertainment excels in the singers/dancers in the shows. And on bigger ships, they do a condensed version of an opera that is wonderful and unlike anything on Royal. Music in public areas is hit or miss. The music for the shows is always canned, which I dislike. Food is not amazing. But you won't starve.

There was a discussion in this forum not long ago where someone posted a phone number and the responses to trigger getting the current Cruise Vacation Receipt sent via email. I'm not able to locate that and would like an updated copy but not enough to wait on hold/talk to someone/etc. Note this is the Cruise Vacation Receipt (invoice) I'm looking for. I know how to easily get the SetSail pass and Guest Vacation Booklet.

Any time someone says "business days" you know you are being jerked around.

I satisfied the remainder of an AMEX spend on a similar offer by booking shore excursions late in the cruise, which I promptly cancelled day one onboard. I made sure that my credit card for onboard purchases was not the AMEX.

The Origins of Tipping | Snopes.com

Most notable "pier runner" incident I've seen on a cruise was on Splendour in 1998. The ship had already sailed away from Venice when a motorboat with two elderly passengers arrived. If they wanted to get on the ship, they'd need to get over any fear of climbing a ladder to get onto a ship at sea. They made it.

Don't know. IIRC, they had always said (to me) it would be sent in the form of a check. And since each dollar returned to my travel rewards card would have cost me 4.5 cents, I'm certainly not disappointed.

FWIW, my refund from MSC was received late last week and mail around September 25th. So maybe you'll have similar results. Regarding disputing the charge, it is certainly worth a try. While the consumer laws require disputes to be accepted for the first 60 days, some issuers will favor the customer and at least push one dispute back to the merchant even months later. I've had success in the past.

You sure about that? I had the understanding that post-9/11, there was a minimum of 2-3 days to get onto a new embarkation (B2B isn't the same as you are already vetted). It appears that the closest cruise one can find on a cruise line website is at least three days out. I did find a Carnival cruise on Conquest sailing tomorrow, but I couldn't actually proceed to book on it.

Exactly. In the olden days (maybe 25 years ago), you could show up at the port and buy actually at the last minute for a cruise bargain. Two things have changed that: 1) Security. There has to be time to vet you before the cruise. Now, you might be able to buy a "last minute" deal if "last minute" means within final payment, but not in the last couple of days before sailing. 2) Retail optimization software for the hospitality industry. Cruise pricing is set by data analytics software that does an incredible job of meeting occupancy targets by specified dates. If the cruise line wants to fill every cabin by x days before the cruise, that's exactly what will happen.

This doesn't appear to be specific to Captain's Club PUP. It is to receive Celebrity marketing email. You know like ... "Here's a once in a lifetime sale!" that they send each and every day. I get those but not any PUP mailings. In other words, it is almost certain that you need to opt-in for marketing, but that is a necessary but not sufficient condition to get PUP mailings.

Yep, and you both are Diamond, you get that benefit for each. At Diamond+, the bag o’ laundry is free. I’ve seen in recent posts here that they appear to limit the bag contents to like five specific types of laundry, and if you stick a pair of rolled up jeans in the bag, they will charge for that. However, someone else said that you still can put anything in the bag that is just “wash and fold”. I’ll have another data point next week.

.. but there are laundry services available for a fee. https://www.royalcaribbean.com/faq/questions/onboard-laundry-guest-services

Not on any Royal Caribbean or Celebrity ship.

Yes, it got amplification to the tune of 41-day dry dock and $97 million in October 2019, so I'm surprised as well.

There have been a few threads about this. The frustrating part was calling for assistance and they'd just send the same eDocs that I could download. They refused to look at it before sending to observe there was no luggage tag page. I rarely call the D+ desk, but did and they sent me PaperBagTag.pdf almost instantly.

That's OK, the app told me my cruise had been cancelled. Nice. (Spoiler alert: It wasn't)

Not following your logic. You can create an ArriveCAN account, install the app, and upload passport and vax records, but you cannot COMPLETE the ArriveCAN process until you are within 72 hours of the cruise sailing time. Also, as far as I can tell (and I'm less sure of this since I've not completed ArriveCAN yet), the app has nothing to do with COVID testing. Unless there is some news in the last several hours, no changes in Canada's protocols for non-cruise arrives have been officially promulgated yet (although expected to), and cruise requirements are a different matter. Canada's cruise requirements have been stricter than arrival by all other forms of transportation. It is hoped they will change those too, but that hasn't been stated.

Roulette chips purchased with OBN are promo chips (probably also used for match play promos, etc.). You can place bets with them, but you can't cash them out. I place bets only with promo chips and rake real chips from winnings to the side, until I run out of promo chips. The slot machine method avoids putting money at risk, but I just prefer the roulette for me is just personal preference.