RDC1

2 minutes ago, Been There, Planning That said:

 

Neither was this the case for us;  I did not intend to imply this.  It was just the menu.

Have not encountered dropping off a menu before both have finished the entree either.

1 hour ago, steelers36 said:

Good point.  You may be onto something.

One other thing that I have noticed on 4 Princess cruises since the new schedule was put in place, is that the early show in the theater has been less crowded with seats often being available right up to show time or just a few minutes before. 

Clearing away dishes, yes.  Bringing appetizers if everyone did not have the same number, yes. Bring dessert to one while the other is still finishing their entree, no. Have not seen that.

8 hours ago, hippyman said:

I wouldn't say I'm looking for a lot of night life.  Just as long as they have a bar onboard.  Also, somehow I ended up on a guided trip once with a group of 50+ people and it almost ruined the trip for me.  I think it was that anyway.

If being on a tour with a group of 50+ (focus on age not individual personalities) almost ruined a trip for you, then HAL is probably not the cruise line for you.

47 minutes ago, cruisemom42 said:

 

Here is my view, which may or may not reflect reality but it is the way we have always felt as long-time cruisers.

 

Traditionally on leisure cruises (not talking about the ocean liners of old...) people paid for different categories of cabins according to their wishes and means, but once you stepped out of your cabin, for the most part everyone was on equal footing.  There were no spaces where one "class" had exclusive access and other classes did not. There were no special reserved decks or pool areas for suites, nor any reserved seating at shows and certainly not a private dining room. Even when specialty restaurants were introduced later in the game, everyone had an equal shot at booking them --- suites for example did not get priority. We were often in the lower echelons by cabin type, but always felt upon leaving our cabin that we received equal treatment, food, entertainment and access to public space as every other passenger.

 

Many lines are changing this paradigm now. 

 

(I don't include loyalty events -- for the most part a luncheon or a cocktail event -- as indicative of a difference in treatment but as a small recognition of loyalty...you get to participate whether your 100 days were in a suite or in an inside cabin.)

Exactly.  Celebrity was our first choice prior to those changes, but no longer.

2 hours ago, AmazedByCruising said:

 

Why would you resent each other? One flew in Business Class, the other has a better beverage card, an one tells about his condo in Manhattan. 

Anyway, as long as there are insides and balconies, and midships and aft, there will always be a "class system" and I wouldn't know what ships could do about that.

There is one big difference, the implementation of the Ship within a ship as implemented by Celebrity has reduced the amount of public space available to the passengers not in that class.  So it has negatively impacted the value to the remaining passengers.  As a result Celebrity does not have the same value, for non-suite passengers as it did prior to making that change.

With an airplane ticket nothing gets taken away from the economy class passenger due to the implementation of business class, if the plane was entirely economy the seat spacing would be exactly the same for those passengers.  An airline equivalent would be for an airline to decide that only business class passengers could use the seats near the gate. That would be a change that would negatively impact economy passengers.

31 minutes ago, Hawaiidan said:

 I guess you have never seen The French Laundry, PIC or Troigoso.  menu   all Mich ***  John Tovey at Miller Howe in the 70-80s   was renown.   The Hobbit in  So calif....     Gives the chef the ability to focus on  a cohesive experience....     If thats Banquet food...?????????

Never said that they were.  However, there is a big difference between cruise line quality and Michelin quality.

Cruise line food is and has been for a while hotel banquet quality with a larger selection.  Reducing that to two selections with the current quality would make it true hotel banquet.

On the other hand Michelin restaurants that follow the set menu format are an entire different ball game then cruise lines. I doubt that Michelin chef's would maintain their current quality with meals being delivered in the thousands compared to the size of the venue's where they are currently able to deliver the quality that they do.

Also Michelin chef's usually work with very fresh ingredients compared to cruiselines chef's dealing with products that are shipped around the world and loaded to supply a cruise lasting weeks.  Not exactly the same raw products.

If you want to talk Michelin my favorites are Eleven Madison Park in New York, (seats around 100, if you include the private dining rooms), La Degustation in Prague (seats 35), Quintessence in Tokyo.

24 minutes ago, Hawaiidan said:

Here is a thought....  why not make  a pre-fix menu, like many restaurants offer world wide with one or 2 choices for each course

Don't like  tonight's menu    go to the buffet and make your own !!!

Then it would truly be hotel banquet quality.

15 minutes ago, cruisemom42 said:

 

 

For one thing, they are segmenting the economy section and offering an Economy Plus or Premium Economy that is far from the pricey Business or First class options but do provide a little relief and return to some amenities that are no longer offered in Economy -- these offer by carrier but often include free drinks, higher quality snacks or meals, and more space, priority boarding, etc.  These seem to be pretty popular offerings (see quote from terrydx above yours).

 

If the airlines (often used as a comparison to the cruise industry, although the products are very different) can do this, I'd be interested in seeing a cruise line give it a go.

 

While I'd like a step up and/or a return to previous levels, I am not really the target market for premium (business class) or luxury (First class) cruising, at least not on every cruise. Premium Economy would be fine with me.

that is exactly my point the airlines have not improved economy service, at least not the US majors in any really meaningful way, but have introduced new, higher cost services in the gap between business and economy.

Cruise lines have moved in the same direction with their ship within a ship concepts. Just like airlines cruiseline have started with upgrading higher end fares, like airlines put their money into business class offerings.

in many ways you already have some ability to upgrade at lower fares, in that you can pay a little more and eat in the specialty restaurants instead of the med. 

5 minutes ago, Despegue said:

Correct.

The Airline industry however has reached a tipping point, where some airlines are actually starting to IMPROVE their service, eg. By INCREASING the catering budget in order to make them more competitive and the preferred choice. 

Even Ryanair has over the last 24 months been working on delivering a better inflight product.

The US Legacy’s have significantly improved their long-haul product in Sardine Class the last 24 months

The Airline I mostly work for has also significantly improved catering and service-mindedness recently.

why? Because they all realized that at one point, customers say BASTA. Enough is enough. The beancounters have gone too far and realized that customers have a choice, and that price is not the only focus of  most clients, but the overall price/quality IS. 

Those who purely look at the price are not the ideal customer anyhow as they will not buy additional, and very lucrative, products when onboard .

time for the cruise lines to realize this also, before they lose their customer-base to land-side resorts.

 

 

the market shows that the cruise industry is much farther from the tipping point.

as far as airlines you have had numerous failures in the discount arena. The majors have improved some, but mostly tied to increasing revenue in the business class and premium economy area. very few amenities have been added back in economy. most food must still be purchased. baggage fees still exist. seat spacing still narrow and or still shrinking. so how exactly have they been enhancing the economy product

16 hours ago, richstowe said:

Just got off NCL's Getaway . It was a good cruise but Norwegian justifiably has a well earned reputation as the nickel and dime cruiseline . And yet the waiter laughed when I made what I though was a joke about charging for extra mains . They , like all cruise lines , have relatively small portions . This is deliberate to reduce wastage and allow passengers to try various options . Ship portions are much smaller then portions on land .

I am shocked that the pointy heads have decided to use HAL to try out this "innovation" . Ridiculous ! I may have to rethink which is the nickel and dime cruiseline .

Perhaps you could sell it for $5 . 

I have never seen anybody order more then 2 mains on Holland . I have seen 3+ ordered on Carnival . Plus at the lower price point and more new cruisers , it would seem to me to be the place to try this idiotic idea . 

I have seen a couple order 4 to 5 entries between them on multiple night. They would taste them, pick what they liked best and eat those 2 and leave the others.

1 hour ago, cruisemom42 said:

In another thread this week it was announced that HAL has started building its next Pinnacle-class ship. There was discussion (and lamentation) about what this means for the smaller ships still left in HAL's fleet. 

 

I suppose HAL is also being "environmentally aware" by carrying more passengers in one, newer (potentially 'cleaner') ship than in, say, two older smaller ones.  Yet I suspect that doesn't meet with the same level of acceptance among some cheerleaders here. 

 

For me, the cruise lines started setting themselves up for these problems when they decided some time ago to increase capacity dramatically and keep basic fares steady. Now it seems to have become a sort of "mantra" among mass-market level companies that they cannot significantly increase base fares, only cut costs and create auxiliary revenue streams....

 

 

the cruise industry has always had very limited pricing power. It is a very capital intensive business that is highly competitive with other travel and vacation options. so it is not a new mantra, more a fact of the industry. Very similar to the airline and hotel industry.

50 minutes ago, Coral said:

The best thing to do is build larger dining rooms that would accommodate everyone when they want or with out a huge delay. While they are at it - build larger theaters!

and what space do you propose they use to do that on the public decks.

1 hour ago, steelers36 said:

With the TD time changes, now the Late TD times are waitlisted instead of the Early TD times.  Methinks Princess overshot the mark here.  In fact, I predicted exactly this result.  In any case, keep checking Personalizer.  Likely you will rise in the list, especially if your cruise is not sold out.  You are not at final payment date yet, so bookings are not all locked in.  If all else fails, the MD will be in one of the mid-ship DR's for a time period in the afternoon of embarkation day and you can go there and make a request.  Check the Embarkation Patter in your cabin for the exact place and time period.

 

I don't think they overshot. I think that they are accomplishing exactly what the change was intended to do.

they have been successful in filling late TD. if early TD is under subscribed, the next change will be to convert the mid ship dining room that has been td early and AT late to AT all the time.

56 minutes ago, jimlouisesophie said:

RDCI, Please check with your credit card company as many have limitations depending on ones age.

mine does not.

we use a credit card that includes trip cancellation coverage and buy an annual policy through geoblue for medical and evacuation. 

On 3/13/2019 at 8:15 AM, OlsSalt said:

 

Does management "saving money" also result in lower passenger costs?

If you consider that being able to reduce the rate of fare increase is a form of lower passenger costs, then yes.

I would suspect that the change is as much if not more related to the impact of the additional entrees on staff workload and dining room/kitchen flow as much as it has to do with food waste. That is why they are targeting the MDR and not the buffet.

Every additional entree has to be plated, transferred, served, cleared, etc. All of that impacts the serving staff and the kitchen, especially if they are served one after another.  

Since you are going to be on an excursion you need to pack everything other than the hanging items into your suitcases and make sure the safe is empty.  

The last time I did this the B2B packet included a number to call prior to turn around day to request having the items moved.

On previous cruises the move was handled by the current Steward. 

2 hours ago, Hawaiidan said:

Interesting.....it appears that the future of cruising on HAL  is focusing on going to  ships larger than  2200 pax.    Saving in  the economy of scale.....    Sad as  1200 ships are about the largest that  to me deliver a real ocean going experience.   It seems that they see the future public as wanting to be on newer, total resort experience rather than  ship experiences. 

 In other words   ships for people who  want to cruise  but don't want to do it on s ship !!!!!!

I think it is more that the public are very price sensitive, and to maintain price HAL needs to improve cost efficiency.

18 minutes ago, Cancun01 said:

All valid points to a certain extent.   I suspect that the pre-existing condition may not have been disclosed and as suggested above it is being used as a loop-hole to not refund.

 

 To add insult to injury, the cruise line will probably turn around and resell the stateroom thus “double-dipping”.  In other words they will sell the stateroom twice with no refund to the original  purchaser.  That is the unconscionable part.  Just because it is common practice doesn’t make it right.  To the O/P ...make sure that your friend at least receives the port fees back. She is entitled to those fees. 

 

BTW Some of the luxury lines have been known to offer some type of partial credit on a future cruise in similar  circumstances if they are indeed able to resell the stateroom.   They see the bigger picture and don’t want to loose potential future business.  Then again there are others who won’t even give a voucher for a cheap bottle of wine on a future cruise. 

 

Your friend should contact one of the various travel ombudspeople to ascertain if there is anything that can be done. It doesn’t hurt to ask.

the luxury lines also have fare structures that allow them the luxury of accepting some risk, the mainstream cruiseline fares are for a risk level in accordance with their published refund practices with all risk outside of those practices assumed by the passenger as is very clearly stated.

the OP does not state where they purchased their travel insurance nor provided anything beyond the most basic claims, but the cruiseline is clearly not at fault.

On 6/29/2018 at 8:01 PM, shepp said:

Many of us love(d) the Coral and Island because they were smallish ships with really good passenger/space ratios (tied for best in the fleet). Now the Island has 10% more passengers and one very major public space gone. The refurbishment put additional cabins where the aft showroom, the Universe Lounge, used to be. No more full-circuit Promenade Deck and the big viewing verandah aft on Caribe deck, one of my favorite places to hang out, is no more, replaced by still more cabins. All in pursuit of revenue.

 

The Coral's still lovely, though.

Exactly

It looks like that Princess has been and still is assigning the Island to routes that are unique and that people will book, in spite of the ship's issues. Most of the Panama Canal full passages, unique South America routes and in the future the World Cruise.

the cruiseline does not refund outside it's normal refund policy in case of death. that is what travel insurance is for. So the real question is why the insurance company is not paying when presented with a properly documented claim. 

might be the medical information that was provided to them indicates that preexisting condition was related.

what insurance policy did they purchase.

I guess you wont be cruising with anyone because other cruise lines have the same refund practices.

29 minutes ago, joeyancho said:

Wow dude, you put a lot of time and effort into this.  

the OP posted some of the same videos a few months ago in a similar topic.

On 2/28/2017 at 4:13 PM, auntiedodo said:

So you're saying Royal will give us some money back on our credit card and the insurance may cover the rest? That would be fine, but it sure doesn't sound like what we were told.

that is how travel insurance works. you file a claim with the insurance company ASAP.  As part of the process you will need to show them the documentation on the amount of the refund from the cruise line, as well as documentation for all monies paid. the documentation will usually also need to include a form to be completed by the physician. After receiving all required documents the insurance company will pay the original amount paid minus the cruise line refund and cost of insurance if the reason was for a covered medical condition.

Standard SEC filing boiler plate. you can find the same language about meals going back for years.