MR_T

We was on the equinox in January and there was a little kid there with its parents whom seemed to enjoy making the kid scream & shout loader and louder while playing and poking it while they we’re having breakfast in the solarium… when I mentioned to the manager/crew member he seemed rather confused and didn’t seem to be aware of the sign at the entrance to the area saying over 16’s only 🤷🏼‍♂️
 

ps - it wasn’t cold! 

For the Jan 8th equinox sailing that departed from terminal 19 we had 11.30am allotted time but arrived at the terminal at 10am as we had nowhere else to go and we were told to go straight through to security and then check in and once that was completed we were seated in a big area, there was already around 50 people sitting there and we were there until actual boarding started at 11.45am for non suite guests, I’m guessing by the time our boarding started at least half the ship pax was waiting and not once was our allotted time mentioned or considered, it was a free for all once the boarding started so that was a bit annoying 🤷🏼‍♂️

9 hours ago, zitsky said:

Where do you get that I “blamed you” for what happened?  Because I asked you about it?  I asked what you said to staff?  Do you just want me to say “Yes.  Celebrity bad.”

 

You said you reported it but you seem unhappy that Celebrity didn’t address all your concerns.  I wasn’t there.  If it was me I would report it and if not fixed immediately I would clean it myself.  Then maybe ask for some small compensation.  

Reported 3 times without a satisfactory outcome, on top of continued small issues that had to be chased up after this also, given up to be honest as I’m not spending my vacation time back & forth to GR when I just feel it’s not got any better In any way 🤷🏼‍♂️ we’ve just accepted she’s not great at her job and we’ve lowered our expectations for this cruise & the next. 
 

luckily we have had a great dining room experience every night so that’s a huge plus for us so it’s not all bad. 

23 hours ago, zitsky said:

It sounds like a game being played on both sides.

 

So she said yes she was your room attendant and then you said, “we need ABC, why haven’t we met you yet?”.  Then what did she say after that?  Most wear a name tag.  What were you hoping that she would say?

 

Our room attendant on the Beyond was very good but a little shy.  It helped that we tipped him twice.  I think it was because he was from Indonesia and he saw two men traveling together.  My husband is from Malaysia.  
 

We met other attendants, not ours, that were a bit more outgoing and friendly.  Call me crazy but I think the Filipino staff was more comfortable seeing two gay men traveling together.

Oh I don’t know maybe my name is… sorry for not cleaning your cabin properly the first or second day/night… sorry you had to find some random drug on the floor by your bed… let me give you my details so you are able to contact me directly if you need anything else during the cruise relating to the cabin… there’s just a few things she could have said but I guess I’m just being difficult because my experience isn’t as great as yours… and I guess it was my fault because I didn’t tip her extra before receiving any service, you know people do have bad experiences when others don’t 🤷🏼‍♂️ it’s called life, there’s no need to to try and make it out we are somewhat to blame here, we got bad service at the start of a expensive vacation and rightly complained about it. 

33 minutes ago, elliekate said:

Are you sure there is a cabin attendant? Years ago, we and several other couples were in aft cabins on Summit. After not meeting the attendant for three days and having less than par cleaning, I asked the assistant attendant where our main cabin attendant was. The assistant was very nice but I think it was his first cruise and I just got a wide-eyed look. The head of housekeeping finally showed up and after telling me we did have a cabin attendant, she admitted we didn’t have one…..he had jumped ship at the end of the prior cruise. They were in the process of flying one in which happened on day four! The truth would have been nice from the beginning! They sent flowers as an apology!

Wow that’s crazy, sounds like they tried to get through it without letting you know… 

i can confirm we have someone, only because we asked someone in the hall if she was our attendant, she still didn’t introduce herself she just said yes and smiled as if everything was normal.. 🤷🏼‍♂️ 

21 hours ago, barbels said:

Hi Mr T

We'll be joining you on the Equinox next week.  I'm hoping we won't be getting the same cabin steward as you.  We've never had a bad cabin steward on Celebrity.  In your situation I would write a note to the Hotel Director.

We've only ever had one terrible cabin steward.  that was on an NCL cruise.  One day early in the cruise we didn't get the usual evening turn down and another day our room was never serviced.  When we complained to him about it he said "It's not my fault."  After that we complained to housekeeping and the service improved.

I'm hoping the rest of your cruise is much better.

Since you are on the ship now I do have two questions.  Who is the Cruise Director?  How has the entertainment been?

Hope to meet you on the ship.

Barbara

CD is a young lady called Crystal, she’s ok I guess, seems happy & jolly but not really see her around the ship at all really, not that we look for her but does seem less visible vs other CDs we’ve experienced in the past. 
 

entertainment has also been ok but not fantastic, seems to have a lot of similarities in the acts but there are a few changes  in entertainment crew (singers/dancers) at the end of this cruise so whether that changes anything I guess we’ll have to wait and see. However we are not generally show people so what we find ok you may love so I’m sure you will find something ☺️

22 hours ago, helen haywood said:

OP, I’m sorry you are experiencing these issues.  We just disembarked January 8, 2024 from cabin 1206 and had a wonderful cabin attendant.  Enjoyed the cruise immensely.  We are frequent Celebrity cruisers and Equinox is one of our favorites.  I do think the staff are over worked.  

It’s definitely not the norm, we’ve pretty much always had a good experience with our cabin attendants, this is definitely a one off, hopefully anyway 🤞🏻

17 hours ago, NMTraveller said:

Sorry this happened to you.

 

IMHO the ships are currently understaffed...  Thanks to management...

Agree 100%, I think anyone that cruised 10+ years ago and cruises now it’s very noticeable the difference in service levels all around the ship 😔

1 hour ago, MISTER 67 said:

This is unacceptable, how does stuff like this happen on a mainstream cruise line.

That being said we have been on 5 Celebrity cruises since the startup in late 2021, we sailed on the Equinox 3 times, the Reflection and the Infinity one time each and all 5 cruises the ships were very clean and despite their age, in very good shape. The only thing that we saw that needed attention were the condition of the verandas.

This is our first negative experience in 20 plus celebrity cruises. 

1 hour ago, hcat said:

who in mgmnt.. going up the food chain is monitoring this..?

 

can u remove any daily or pre paid  grats for housekeeping  ?  you are not getting any proper service!

 

for outdoor loungers I'd look for another spot..maybe a higher or lower deck !

We started with guest relations as there’s no longer a number for the attendant on our phone? Not sure if it’s been removed in general or just worn off ours… we’ve not met our attendant (currently day 4) so done have their number. GR said they would escalate it to management. So far only had call backs from GR 🤷🏼‍♂️ on a side note the it’s not gotten any better regarding the attendants service… 

As for removing gratuity’s that’s not something we would ever do, however we will most likely not leave any extra which we would generally do. 

1 hour ago, JDPCruisers said:

This is unfortunate to hear and the slow response to rectify the situation. A rocky start for sure but, as you do, certainly hope the rest of your cruise gets better. How about the conditions around other areas of the ship? 

In general the ship looks great, yes there’s a few areas that are tired looking and could do with touch ups/replacements but that happens over time but overall still a beautiful ship. 

Hi All, 

First of all I’d like to qualify my title by saying after 25ish cruises mostly on celebrity I’m a pretty positive person most if not all the time regarding anything celebrity as we love/loved the brand… however and unfortunately we find ourselves in a somewhat different place on our current cruise. 
 

We are currently on the Equinox (B2B first leg) and have found some of the recent reported issues (cleanliness) around the ship (cabin & pool deck areas mainly) to be somewhat relevant to our current situation. 

So, starting off after a pretty smooth check in & boarding on day 1 we head to the cabin as usual, drop our bags then head out to lunch, everything going great, we get back to our cabin around 3pm to find it in the same condition as at 11.45am which was when the room attendant quickly knocked to inform us we couldn’t stay in the cabin as it wasn’t finished/ready yet… the sign was still on the bed saying not ready so we new this and wasn’t planning on staying anyway but didn’t really think anymore of it so we left until 3pm, the first thing we noticed was it the sign was still on the bed 🤷🏼‍♂️ no issue I guess they just forgot to pick it up so no issue, it was only as we moved around the cabin we noticed that it really hadn’t been cleaned well if at all 😱 2 x filthy bedside tables, a pill I guess from the last guests on the flood by the bed, not under the bed but between the bed & patio doors… a dirty towel on the rack, a heavily dusty sofa table base & a stained bed cover just for good measure… 

some of the pictures might not show how bad it was but the face towel is what I used to clean 1 side table, 

Before it gets mentioned yes I did report it and yes some of the issues was addressed, but not all, it took until day 3 for the side table by the lounge area to be cleaned properly even though it was reported twice, 

Moving on to today day 4… (still not properly met our room attendant if at all)

Today we are in a port and we decided to say onboard for a quiet ship day by the pool, We are in Antigua and been here before so just fancied a quiet ship day after 2 full sea days. 

However, returning to our sunbeds around 10am we find some heavy cleaning going on either side of our sunbeds at the location of the double bed seatings, Now I say heavy cleaning because the areas under these double beds were absolutely covered in think dirt, I mean almost like a think layer of mud covering the whole area that these beds sit on… So 2 things come to mind… 

1 - how long has it been or how often is it that these get cleaned 😱 there must be all sorts of body fats/creams festering under there enjoying a perfect breeding environment for some pretty bad stuff, and going on the strong bleach smell around the area I’d say it’s been a while since the last cleaning… 

2 - why is this being done during the day in full view of guests vs at night/early morning while no one’s around… 🤷🏼‍♂️ I know there’s only a fraction of the guests onboard but still it’s having a huge impact on our planned quiet day of relaxing, still at nearly 11am all we can hear is the loud jet washers going off constantly, 

So, good news… it’s being cleaned 👍🏼 

Bad news… it’s being cleaned now😡 

Now these issues are not the full extent of our issues/concerns but I just have to say on day 4 of 19 we are pretty disappointed with our current celebrity experience, I must say though the crew in general are great as usual, some departments more than others are obviously understaffed which doesn't help but I guess that’s just something that’s happened over the years with cutbacks etc but this cruise just seems worse to us and maybe it just time for us to move on to something new. 

PS - The pictures don’t do it justice as they had started to clean before I could get the pictures…

Just a quick update, 

Arrived at the port at 10.04, bags dropped at the porters right away, waved through the doors and straight through bag scanners & checked in right after and now sitting in the waiting area ready to board. Took around 5 mins from getting out the cab,

Only issue (for us) is they make you take the next available seats so no social distancing anywhere although there’s loads of seats in the hall… not a major issue but would rather to be a little more spaced out… 

Hi All, 

we’ve done a number of celebrity cruises from Florida but the last one was a couple of years ago so just wondering if things have changed regarding arriving early for embarkation, 

We just received an email saying not to arrive early as you could be turned away so just wanted to ask what’s actually happening when people arrive a little earlier than their allocated time? We have 11.30 but generally like to get to the port around 9.30/10am and just wait, for us it’s all part of the start of the cruise and would rather wait there vs at the hotel sitting around waiting to leave, we really want to be on the ship as early as possible so for us getting there early is all part of the experience. 
 

Anyone with recent early arrival experience it’ll be great to hear from you 😊 

ps - we are not in the retreat so their turn up anytime isn’t relevant - thanks 

If you don’t use the credit on the ship I think it would go to the credit card on file (if using one) at the end of the cruise, unless of course you cash it out on the last full day… others will confirm if this is wrong but I’m pretty sure the stock credit is refundable 

Thanks everyone, the reason I asked was I was also under the understanding it was a Europe thing but came across this article, this is 2-3 years old I think but was just wondering it if was actually real or even if so still in effect? 
 

The article was from cruiseexperts . com 

Hi, 

Does celebrity still offer the late check out on the last day of the cruise at FLL? If so does anyone know the details. 
 

Thanks - Tony 

Hi, 

looking at the difference on the 2 drinks packages on the premium package it lists coke products as an inclusion… does anyone know what this means as surely coke products are included in the classic package! 

We got off on the 25th and from what we saw nothings been done anytime lately… 

The ship is certainly showing it’s age but luckily its due a dry dock in the next few weeks I believe where I’m sure the issues will be addressed 🤞🏻

We we’re on the Reflection departing September 16th and was told that the crew had the option starting that cruise to wear or not… I’d say as a guess 5% decided to still mask up… 

Currently on the reflection with around (70%)  2300 guests, I asked about the following cruise and was told around the same number (70%) 

The pool deck was definitely full on sea days (we only had 2) but you could get a bed on the upper decks if wanted throughout the day… 

Otherwise I’ve not found the ship overly crowded anywhere else. 

2 hours ago, choochella said:

 

Ship: Equinox 
Length of Cruise: 10 nights
Cruise Sail Date: September 26, 2022
Date email offer received: Used move-up online
Captain's Club Tier Select
Booked through Celebrity Direct OR via TA: TA
Current Cabin: Inside
Bid? Yes/No:Yes

If YES - Bidding Details:

Cabin Category: Veranda
Bid Offer:$530
Notification Date: September 12, but cabin # not received until September 23. 
Accepted
General Comments (offer details, etc.)

Lowest bid was $250 pp. Bid $15 pp over lowest. Total of $265 pp. Bid accepted but cabin number not given until 2 days prior to cruise. Received an obstructed veranda. Unable to change. Would not have bid knowing we had a chance to receive an obstructed view veranda. Celebrity should include different type veranda staterooms to bid on. If they can list whether Retreat, Aqua, or Concierge, they should also list other veranda types as well. 

I wouldn’t worry they are not as bad as they sound, plus… they are no way near as obstructed as an inside cabin… for a couple of hundred dollars each it’s still way worth it 😊

Don’t know who’s correct but the cruise director said there was 2306 pax onboard (I think) the first night at the show… I’m going to say it feels more like the higher number but who knows for sure 🤷🏼‍♂️ 

Currently on the Reflection and we have the p/package and the still water is in cans, if ordering sparkling we’ve been served bottles 

Currently on the Reflection and we are doing exactly that, every time we head back to the cabin we pick up a couple from wherever we are on the ship until our stash is sufficient 😊 

On a side not we normally get the cabin attendant to empty the fridge but to be honest there was only 2 small bottles of wine and a few little vodkas in it to start with so no real need. 
 

Don’t know if all the fridges are the same but when I opened it the first time it wasn’t very cold at all but the dial was set quite high so I changed it and it’s much cooler now 👍🏼😊